[Audio Empire]

On Fri, 21 Oct 2011 06:13:08 -0700, Edmund wrote
(in article ):

On Thu, 20 Oct 2011 22:09:21 +0000, Arny Krueger wrote:

"Edmund" wrote in message
...
On Wed, 19 Oct 2011 16:23:43 +0000, RichD wrote:

http://tinyurl.com/wsj-headphones

Seems pricey to me.
Is it necessary to spend this much, for good headphones?

I didn't see even one expensive one, if you want "high end" yes you
need to spend a lot more and a special amplifier too. If you are happy
with a $200 model and a normal amp that is up to you.

IME, a person who can't be reasonably happy with one of the really good
$100-200 headphones or earphones is paying too much attention to price
tags, and not paying enough attention to the sound.

Reasonable happy, sure.
The reason why I have my opinion is something that started with a friend of
mine.
He owns a 500 Euro headphone and was "reasonable happy" with it but somehow
he
had a "feeling" it should perform even better.
After a while he listened to his own headphone but trough an special build
headphone-amp
and the difference is nothing less than amazing, he was absolutely
flabbergasted.
He brought his own CD's and SACD's and could hardly believe his ears, long
story
short, he bought the 1500 euro headphone amp and is very happy with it.
I listened to this set and the even more expensive sennheiser ( with the poor

specs :-) )
and never heard anything better.

Edmund

I've heard a lot of headphones in my time. They all sound different (much
like speakers, how about that!). The best I've ever heard were the Stax
SR-007 MKII with the matching Stax amplifier. But at almost US$5000, that
ensemble ought to sound good! Next best were the HiFiMan HE-6 for US$1200.
But again, for that money they should sound good. really good headphones from
Denon, Audio Technica, Sennheiser, and AKG can be had for less than US$500
though and I'm especially fond of both the AKG-701s (US$350) and the
Sennheiser HK-650s (~US$400) even though I own neither.

What I have is a pair of AKG K-340 electrostatic/magnetic hybrid phones from
the mid 80's. I've had them for more than 20 years and they still work and
sound great. I had to replace the bungie-cord suspension for the headband
once and replace the self-tapping screws that hold the headband suspension
together with a small machine screw and nut arrangement, but the headphones
still work well and sound great (the electrostatic element is an electret,
and so the K-340s don't need a power supply like most electrostatic
headphones. They just plug-in to any headphone jack.)

Stax makes a model sold without an amplifier called the SR-307 that's part of
their "Lambda" series and sells for less than US$500 on the street, but this
is WITHOUT amplifier, and you cannot use Stax's in a regular headphone jack.

I hope this helps you make a short list of headphones to listen to.