4 ms·

I'm not an audiophile (as I understand the perjorative, anyway) but I have spent a long time (20+ years) wearing headphones professionally. Yes, often at a desk

I'm not an audiophile (as I understand the perjorative, anyway) but I have spent a long time (20+ years) wearing headphones professionally. Yes, often at a desk, but also in the field or in a theater monitoring recording or playback. What I look for is simple: comfort, durability, isolation (in both directions), neutrality. In that order. Comfort - I swear by circumaural designs. Some people apparently don't have a problem with pads resting on the pinna, but I find this painful after an hour or two. Isolation is also worse with supra-aural designs. Durability - most headphones break quickly. The cables are usually the first to go, around the strain relief on either end. I've had some pairs that used a 1/8" minijack on one of the earpieces, making the cable replaceable - until the jack failed and couldn't be replaced without breaking open the earpiece. Good headphones will survive any reasonable drop; really good ones will survive being drop-kicked. Isolation - if you can't hear the signal over environmental noise, why bother monitoring? If you're recording or working in a theatrical environment, you don't want your headset audio leaking out either. In an office setting, nobody wants to hear your music, no matter how awesoem your jams are. Closed-ear designs are the way to go. Neutrality - Relatively flat frequency response. But this is way down the list of priorities for me. A great sounding set of headphones that breaks after 2 months, or is uncomfortable to wear, or doesn't block the sound of your workstation's fans is not a great set of headphones. tl;dr - Beyerdynamic DT250 is my headset of choice. My current pair is almost 15 years old and the only thing that's failed on them is the pleather on the headband, which has fallen off its fabric backing. Still on the original earpads and cable, and they're as good as the day I bought them. Stay away from consumer brands and models; like fast-fashion clothes, they are not built to last. (This is also why you should buy your cookware from a restaurant supply store, not williams-sonoma.)

radiowave 11y ago
All true, but as far as listening to music goes, it's a pity the DT250s don't sound better - to me they make the bottom end sound like the proverbial bag of hammers. I tried the DT150s, which sound better but I didn't find nearly as comfortable over long periods, and eventually settled on a pair of DT770 Pro, which seem to me to be about perfect for comfort, and a good balance of sound quality and isolation.
falcolas 11y ago
To offer a counterpoint - I use a set of cans with no isolation at all. I prefer the broader sound stage (it feels more like an open air concert than a band in your bedroom) that the open cans offer. I purchased a set of HIFIMan cans with planar drivers on sale for around $500, and I haven't looked back. They sound better than any other >$1000 cans I've listened to, bar none. That said, they offer no isolation whatsoever, so you do need a quiet environment in which to use them.

radiowave 11y ago

All true, but as far as listening to music goes, it's a pity the DT250s don't sound better - to me they make the bottom end sound like the proverbial bag of hammers. I tried the DT150s, which sound better but I didn't find nearly as comfortable over long periods, and eventually settled on a pair of DT770 Pro, which seem to me to be about perfect for comfort, and a good balance of sound quality and isolation.

falcolas 11y ago

To offer a counterpoint - I use a set of cans with no isolation at all. I prefer the broader sound stage (it feels more like an open air concert than a band in your bedroom) that the open cans offer. I purchased a set of HIFIMan cans with planar drivers on sale for around $500, and I haven't looked back. They sound better than any other >$1000 cans I've listened to, bar none. That said, they offer no isolation whatsoever, so you do need a quiet environment in which to use them.