> my subjective experience of even cheaper studio monitors have been on-par with even the most expensive headphones, I should go all-in on that account instead

> my subjective experience of even cheaper studio monitors have been on-par with even the most expensive headphones, I should go all-in on that account instead That's certainly an interesting experience, I've heard that a good pair of speakers costs much more than an equivalent pair of headphones. You can get "audiophile" level Sennheisers/Audio Technicas for a few hundred dollars, but that's close to the starting price for any half-decent pair of speakers, with "good quality" setups probably costing in the thousands to tens of thousands of dollars. There are a few things you could do to make headphones more speakers-esque - use an external subwoofer or rumbler, add a bit of cross/mix between the channel and perhaps use a dsp plugin for HRTF (Head related transfer functions). Assuming your amp/source is good, it should definitely smoke a fairly more expensive speaker system out of the water.