AKG had a full service station set up for headphone listening tucked away in the Harman room, just off the main pathway at NAMM. The headphone company has been around for quite some time and has featured many audiophile classics like the AKG 701 (and subsequent variants). They have straddled the boundary between high end and pro with some success, and this time around its the AKG K533 PRO in the spotlight (quite literally from the lighting in the room, please pardon the color balance).
The new headphones are somewhat standard fare at a new middle ground price point of $199. The sonics of this pair of cans are sculpted complements of a 50mm dynamic driver running at 32 ohms. Intended for monitoring, mixing and mastering the closed back design is fairly light to wear at 305 grams. Ear pads are replaceable and the cable is fixed. The K553 PRO should be available in retail at the end of February.
The big kahuna is still the open-back K812 at $1,500. You can find a [review on them on Inner Fidelity] courtesy of Tyll Hertsens himself.