Headphone Buying Megathread/Guide V4 - Come here for all your audio needs! (New Threads are not need - Hardware & Software

Looking for a new pair of IEMs after my Sennheiser CX 3.00s died overnight. Any recommendations are appreciated. [B]Budget:[/B] 90AUD at most, but I'd prefer to go at or under 50AUD. [B]eBay: [/B] Ebay is fine. [B]Country:[/B] Australia. [B]Isolation:[/B] Minimal noise leakage and maximum outside noise reduction is important. [B]Purpose:[/B] Listening to music and general usage. [B]Music Tastes:[/B] I wouldn't pin down any one genre and I know fuck-all about what's good for one genre or the other, but strong bass would be nice. [B]Previous Experiences:[/B] I think my pair before this were Sennheisers as well. Can't remember exactly what type. I'll probably get another pair of CX 3.00s if I can't find anything significantly better at that pricepoint.

[QUOTE=helifreak;52005186]Damn, was hoping for more like $200, can't justify spending > $500 on them at this stage - not that far down the rabbit hole yet. Might look for some more in my price range and link them in here on the weekend for opinions.[/QUOTE] What sort of sound signature are you after? Bassy, neutral, etc?

[QUOTE=SataniX;52005751]What sort of sound signature are you after? Bassy, neutral, etc?[/QUOTE] Mostly electronic stuff so more towards the bassy end but not too far since I still listen to some piano and panflutes.

I wanted to ask, how are these headphones doing in terms of quality if anyone knows: Audio-Technica ATH-T500AVC. I've been looking for AT ATH-AD500x but on local sites they seem to be going for pretty much double for what's on Amazon so I'm wondering if this is a good alternative. [editline]25th March 2017[/editline] Or if there are any other good alternatives, feel free to suggest.

Think it's down to either the Shure SE215's ($145, local), 1MORE Triple Driver In-Ear Headphones (~$140, import), or RHA MA750 (~$166, import). If there's something else around that price range that's available on Amazon there's a good chance they'll ship it here if I've missed something better.

Been looking at a pair of Philips SHP9500s', are they a good buy for ~60-70 dollars?

[QUOTE=helifreak;52014168]Think it's down to either the Shure SE215's ($145, local), 1MORE Triple Driver In-Ear Headphones (~$140, import), or RHA MA750 (~$166, import). If there's something else around that price range that's available on Amazon there's a good chance they'll ship it here if I've missed something better.[/QUOTE] The SE215 are good earphones, but I wouldn't recommend them for electronic. Not enough bass (for my tastes at least). Can't comment on the rest I'm afraid.

Can confirm my 315's are definitely lacking in bass

[QUOTE=AJ10017;52019721]Been looking at a pair of Philips SHP9500s', are they a good buy for ~60-70 dollars?[/QUOTE] I don't feel like mine have held up as well as my Sennheisers have over the same period of time but they're very open and airy as well as being comfortable to wear. The VModa BoomPro also just plugs in the bottom of it as if it was made for it. They're $55 on Newegg ATM and $40 for Open Box, they're extremely hard to beat for the price. [url]https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16826138190[/url] [url]https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16826138190R[/url]

[QUOTE=SataniX;52020067]The SE215 are good earphones, but I wouldn't recommend them for electronic. Not enough bass (for my tastes at least). Can't comment on the rest I'm afraid.[/QUOTE] Suspected that might be the case. Ordered the RHA MA750's, should arrive before easter which will be nice on the multi hour train trips to visit my parents.

Decided to try wireless and noice cancelling headphones (I run them mostly by aux though for quality) and bought a pair of Sony MDR 1000x, and holy shit I can't hear anything when the NC is on. Also has a cool option to only let voices through and it works great. Sounds great with aux connected to phone and PC.

Are the Sony MDR-1Rs better than my ATH m50s?

[QUOTE=RoboChimp;52040324]Are the Sony MDR-p1Rs better than my ATH m50s?[/QUOTE] I don't remember if I tried out the mdr 1r's or the 1a's, but the fit on the Sony cans are a lot looser campared to the m50x, weight is lighter, and bass is not as tight, but way more prominent. Highs are not as strident, but it's still v-shaped like the m50x's. If pure enjoyment is what you're after, the Sony cans are way more fun and I'd pick them over the m50x's if I had to pick between the two. If you're looking for a serious sound, look towards the Sennheiser hd6x0/580. If you want to continue down the m50x path, the fostex thx00 is an insanely fun headphone and endgame down that path.

Ah, well my experience with Sennheiser is that they favour bass mostly so I think I'll try the Fostex Headphones.

For anyone living in the Los Angeles area, Schiit just opened up a brick n mortar where you can roll all the fancy schiit gear, and I'm pretty sure this isn't a prank! Might check it out while I'm in LA next week. [url]http://schiit.com/schiitr[/url]

anyone got a good source for parts? my DT990s are held together with zip ties and superglue but the drivers are still good. [editline]1st April 2017[/editline] they're about 7 or 8 years old and have easily 30k+ hours on them so they don't owe me a thing but if I don't have to spend $400 on headphones again I'd rather not

[QUOTE=butre;52042747]anyone got a good source for parts? my DT990s are held together with zip ties and superglue but the drivers are still good. [editline]1st April 2017[/editline] they're about 7 or 8 years old and have easily 30k+ hours on them so they don't owe me a thing but if I don't have to spend $400 on headphones again I'd rather not[/QUOTE] Have you contacted Beyerdynamic yet? They've been known to sell spare parts and repair kits for a lot of common problems. And if you can't find answers in the NA branch, Beyerdynamic Europe has a lot more support and spare parts that you can order overseas. I remember a reddit post a while back where someone built the Tesla T1 from spare parts, all sourced from Beyerdynamic themselves. (turned out to be roughly the same price, he just wanted the joy of building it himself)

[QUOTE=KangarooSteak;52046908]Have you contacted Beyerdynamic yet? They've been known to sell spare parts and repair kits for a lot of common problems. And if you can't find answers in the NA branch, the German branch has a lot more support and spare parts that you can order overseas. I remember a reddit post a while back where someone built the Tesla T1 from spare parts, all sourced from Beyerdynamic themselves. (turned out to be roughly the same price, he just wanted the joy of building it himself)[/QUOTE] didn't even think about that. took me a while to find it on their website but eventually did, total comes up to $108.53 for all the parts I need including shipping. that's a whole fuckload better than than the cost of these things new, and it'll most likely get me another 30,000 hours out of it [editline]2nd April 2017[/editline] hold up I just went on amazon and these things have gotten way cheaper over the years since I bought mine. the price has been halved since I got them in 2010-ish. I wonder if it's worth it to just buy a new pair for an extra $80 rather than rebuild them and hope the drivers don't crap out in a month

Yeah just reread your post that you paid 400 clams back then, they've certainly gotten a lot cheaper, as well as a bunch of now-older totl stuff. I remember just last year I picked up a used hd650 for $350 used and now they're going for 290 new and the hd6xx's $200. A steal if masddrop decide to put them back into production. [del]I've also heard rumors that massdrop is making an hd8xx drop for $800 soon. Prime material to Superdupont mod for the ultra-endgame.*[/del] *Damnit it was an april fools joke!

[QUOTE=KangarooSteak;52047060]Yeah just reread your post that you paid 400 clams back then, they've certainly gotten a lot cheaper, as well as a bunch of now-older totl stuff. I remember just last year I picked up a used hd650 for $350 used and now they're going for 290 new and the hd6xx's $200. A steal if masddrop decide to put them back into production. I've also heard rumors that massdrop is making an hd8xx drop for $800 soon. Prime material to Superdupont mod for the ultra-endgame.* *Damnit it was an april fools joke rip[/QUOTE] totl stuff isn't really my thing. at a certain point it becomes less about the music and more about jerking off to the gear. I used to use a pair of K812s when I was working at the recording studio and they're just so analytical that they bring out every single problem with every recording. it was good when you were working, helped you put the best product possible to market, but it made actually listening to music during downtime more of a chore than anything. it probably doesn't help that I have a background in recording there, my whole job was finding problems with music so now it's hard not to find problems with music, and that's just not something I want to be doing in my free time.

A while back I posted about some 1980s JVC studio mastering headphones I picked up and did some light restoration on. They still sound great right off my sound card but lately I've started working on my old radios again and got to wondering about tube amplifiers. Would it be worth picking up a cheap tube amplifier for headphones this old? I really want to stress that they already sound great and I doubt my sound card is getting everything out of them. I'm also a little worried that running them off an amp will shorten their lifespan. I've been told as it is they'll probably last forever since they're built to handle much higher currents than my sound card will ever put through them.

[QUOTE=Grenadiac;52055067]A while back I posted about some 1980s JVC studio mastering headphones I picked up and did some light restoration on. They still sound great right off my sound card but lately I've started working on my old radios again and got to wondering about tube amplifiers. Would it be worth picking up a cheap tube amplifier for headphones this old? I really want to stress that they already sound great and I doubt my sound card is getting everything out of them. I'm also a little worried that running them off an amp will shorten their lifespan. I've been told as it is they'll probably last forever since they're built to handle much higher currents than my sound card will ever put through them.[/QUOTE] A cheap tube amp? probably not, cheap tube amps usually have poor buffer implementations and don't really use the "tube" to power your headphones. If you want the real OTL "tube" experience, you're looking at $200+ like the Schiit Valhalla 2 or Bottlehead Crack + Speedball. If you want a top-notch tube buffer (half solid state, half tube) for all the juicy parts of tubes w/o breaking the bank, Schiit Vali 2 is an excellent choice around $140 used. (Even the Schiit Vali 1 was good but it's known for microphonics) Depending on the impedance rating of your headphones, OTL tube amps like the Valhalla 2 and Crack work better with super high impedance headphones (200+ ohms), and solid state / tube buffers work better with low impedance headphones. As far as tube amps shortening headphone lifespans, your headphone will probably break down from general wear before your tube amp does it, unless you blow out the driver or something with a volume spike. But the tubes themselves do degrade over time and require replacement every 3000-5000 hours.

[url]https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00A2QM5O6/ref=olp_product_details?_encoding=UTF8&me=[/url] This is the one I was looking at, but maybe the Schiit would be a better choice. I really know nothing about audio and my knowledge of vacuum tubes is pretty limited; I only really know them from cleaning up old radios. My headphones are 65 ohms, and run through a 1/4-3.5 converter to boot, so I think an amp would help bring them to life. Trying not to bankrupt myself between this idea and actually fixing the radio that gave it to me. :v: One of its tubes, 12AU6, is seemingly commonly used in these amps and that's how I ran across them.

65 ohms is actually damn efficient and would synergize better from a tube buffer amp over a straight up OTL. I'd give the lean on the Schiit vali 2 because I have previous experience with them and it's a fantastic little thing for anything short of the He6. But I'll also say that the vali 2's implementation is more on the neutral side with a hint of tube-ness, rather than full blown tube. I haven't demo'd the little dot yet, but from a lot of my sources, it's way tube-ier, in an in-your-face TUBES kinda way. Syrupy low end with a hazy top. My preferences is a slightly tighter sound with a punchy mid-bass, so I'd probably pick the Vali 2 because it can drive a ton of regular headphones with authority.

I heard it clears up with aftermarket tubes, which was kind of pulling me towards it because as a matter of preference I like the warmer tones I get from my vintage tube equipment better than the colder, if crisper, newer digital stuff.

[QUOTE=Grenadiac;52055582][url]https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00A2QM5O6/ref=olp_product_details?_encoding=UTF8&me=[/url] This is the one I was looking at, but maybe the Schiit would be a better choice. I really know nothing about audio and my knowledge of vacuum tubes is pretty limited; I only really know them from cleaning up old radios. My headphones are 65 ohms, and run through a 1/4-3.5 converter to boot, so I think an amp would help bring them to life. Trying not to bankrupt myself between this idea and actually fixing the radio that gave it to me. :v: One of its tubes, 12AU6, is seemingly commonly used in these amps and that's how I ran across them.[/QUOTE] just so you know, running through a plug converter doesn't hurt anything so long as it's a reasonable quality one. the only advantage to a quarter inch plug over an eighth inch is durability, and even then it only matters if you're constantly plugging and unplugging ie a switchboard

yeah I don't think the converter is hurting anything. I run them through a grado converter because my laptop obviously doesn't have a quarter inch jack. I just thought the thicker cable might reduce the uh, power, or something... from the laptop.

nah, volts is volts and amps is amps. only going too thin can be an issue, and you'll honestly never go thin enough to be a problem with just an audio signal

Right, birthday has arrived and I have money. I have around £100 for headphones and £65 for a mic. I've been recommended [URL="https://www.amazon.co.uk/d/Headphones-Earphones/Sennheiser-HD461i-Closed-Over-Ear-Headphone/B013UTN662/ref=sr_1_32?s=network-media&ie=UTF8&qid=1491298565&sr=1-32"]this[/URL] and [URL="https://www.amazon.co.uk/Modmic-Attachable-Boom-Microphone-GDL-0500/dp/B01MCYRKY3"]this[/URL] respectively. Thoughts?

Spend more on headphones, less on the mic. I'd suggest £140 / £25. Both are also fairly poor choices (and the headphones include a mic). A little above your budget, but perhaps: [url]https://www.amazon.co.uk/d/Electronics-Photo/V-MODA-XFL2V-U-MBLACK-Moda-Crossfade-Matte-Black/B00HYH7HXA/[/url] [url]https://www.amazon.co.uk/BoomPro-Microphone-computer-Internet-telephony/dp/B00BJ17WKK[/url]