Think about the favorite headphone that you own.

[brachypelma44]

Now, out of curiosity, what price range did it fall into at the time you purchased it?

Feel free to comment after the poll, if you want to.

My favorite thus far is the Hifiman Sundara, which was $320. It was my 3rd set of headphones after the Fidelio X2 and the HD 6XX.

It will be interesting to see if the poll skews towards one end or the other, or if it's fairly balanced.

 

[Jimbob54]

Now, out of curiosity, what price range did it fall into at the time you purchased it?

Feel free to comment after the poll, if you want to.

My favorite thus far is the Hifiman Sundara, which was $320. It was my 3rd set of headphones after the Fidelio X2 and the HD 6XX.

It will be interesting to see if the poll skews towards one end or the other, or if it's fairly balanced.

I assume we are talking RRP, not price paid for used/ silly season amazon offer etc ?

 

[brachypelma44]

I assume we are talking RRP, not price paid for used/ silly season amazon offer etc ?

I hadn't really considered the used market when I made the poll. I guess we'll go with the RRP.

 

[3125b]

With or without EQ?

Anyway, that's a lot harder to say than I thought. I like different qualities of my headphones and use most of them regularly.
My overall best headphone is the most expensive one I'd say - but it's not in every aspect my favourite.

 

[Jimbob54]

I hadn't really considered the used market when I made the poll. I guess we'll go with the RRP.

Not to bugger your poll up too much more, but its a fair bet more voters top out under $300 than (way) over $300 and may never have listened to anything other than their own kit. But lets see where the chips land.

 

[brachypelma44]

Not to bugger your poll up too much more, but its a fair bet more voters top out under $300 than (way) over $300 and may never have listened to anything other than their own kit. But lets see where the chips land.

I have an educated guess on how the votes will be distributed, but whether it lines up with reality or not remains to be seen.

Also, I would have preferred to keep the same interval of each range throughout the poll options (say, every range would be $50) to get a more detailed result, but there are only 10 slots, so I had to get a little creative to avoid topping out at $500.

 

[brachypelma44]

With or without EQ?

Anyway, that's a lot harder to say than I thought. I like different qualities of my headphones and use most of them regularly.
My overall best headphone is the most expensive one I'd say - but it's not in every aspect my favourite.

Just looking for your overall favorite, regardless of whether you EQ or not.

The best measuring/objectively superior set isn't always always going to be your favorite, either. Sometimes perfection is boring.

 

[MakeMineVinyl]

My headphone collection.

 

[Jimbob54]

My headphone collection.

View attachment 103536

Im guessing the one on the right is the first and last time the colour peach ever featured in any audio kit?

Just out of interest, what am I looking at here please?

 

[escape2]

I actually preferred my old AT ATH-M50 to my current Philips X2HR. I guess I'm a basshead.

I paid $90 for the M50.

 

[Jumbotron]

I have not had a lot of headphones, and certainly not any of the most expensive ones. Most of my headphones were inexpensive and from China (several were Superlux and Takstar, for example).

If my memory serves me right , my three most expensive headphones have been:

Audio Technica ATH-M50X
Massdrop's Hifiman HE4XX
Takstar HF 580 (planar)

From all those, the only ones I keep are the Takstar HF 580, which initially I did not like much, but as time passed they have become my favorite, especially after equalizing them a little.

 

[MakeMineVinyl]

Im guessing the one on the right is the first and last time the colour peach ever featured in any audio kit?

Just out of interest, what am I looking at here please?

What you see is really the extent of my headphone collection. The one on the right was my first headphones from when I was something like 12 years old. I thought they sounded glorious at the time, but I probably thought everything sounded great then. The ones one the left are from WW1 I think. They were handed down from my father in law, who got them from his father or something like that.

 

[Jimbob54]

What you see is really the extent of my headphone collection. The one on the right was my first headphones from when I was something like 12 years old. I thought they sounded glorious at the time, but I probably thought everything sounded great then. The ones one the left are from WW1 I think. They were handed down from my father in law, who got them from his father or something like that.

Oh, it was a genuine question- I believed this was your collection. Im interested in what make and model, if known. Assume the left are the war relic so make probably unknown. Do you know the others ?

 

[MakeMineVinyl]

Oh, it was a genuine question- I believed this was your collection. Im interested in what make and model, if known. Assume the left are the war relic so make probably unknown. Do you know the others ?

The ones on the right are "Stereo Head Phone HP-2" That's all the info. I opened them up once and they have what looks like 2" transistor radio speakers. Barbaric....

The older ones have more information: "Made In USA - Western Electric - Pat In USA July 23 1918 - 516W - 1100" They actually work, and seem to be very high impedance.

 

[M00ndancer]

I have an educated guess on how the votes will be distributed, but whether it lines up with reality or not remains to be seen.

Also, I would have preferred to keep the same interval of each range throughout the poll options (say, every range would be $50) to get a more detailed result, but there are only 10 slots, so I had to get a little creative to avoid topping out at $500.

As with everything else it depends. I would suspect that the poll will be very v-shaped. Lots of sub $300 headphones and a lot of headphones well above $700.

 

[M83]

Paid £127 for my Philips X2HR when new in Feb 2020 & £325 for my used but mint condition Denon D2000 in November 2020.

 

[Sgt. Ear Ache]

Hifiman HE-400i...absolutely love them. EQ'd of course. I believe I paid $349cdn when I got them about 5 years ago. I can't frikkin believe it's been 5 years since I got them! Holy crap stop the world I wanna get off! lol

 

[frogmeat69]

Retail price for my favorite pair (at the moment), the Quad Era-1, is $799.99, but I got them cheaper by a good margin.

 

[Killingbeans]

My "favorite" pair of headphones at the moment is a $50 set of Samson SR850. My old Goldrings died and there was no room in my budget for anything other than some cheap temporary replacements.

I'd like to get some Sennheiser HD 560S at some point. Would set me back around $250 and become the most expensive headphones I have ever owned.

 

[A Surfer]

You won't be able to get any information such as does the price influence preference which I assume was some of what the OP was after. You would need to ensure that everybody who answered the poll had owned headphones, preferably at the same time, that included every price bracket. No point in trying to decide if there is a relationship between cost and preference with this particular approach (if that is what the OP was after).