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Cool. I'd be curious to see the same treatment of other high-end headphones. And all Bose products, which have always seemed egregiously overpriced to me. Tang

Cool. I'd be curious to see the same treatment of other high-end headphones. And all Bose products, which have always seemed egregiously overpriced to me. Tangentially, it's actually really hard to find good headphone reviews anymore, let alone headphone demo places. Pro music stores (like Guitar Center, Sam Ash, etc) are probably the best bet these days - but they tend not to carry headphones like the high-end Sennheisers that used to be my favorites (HD570 I think?).

amelius 11y ago
I'm also curious about the price of "high-end" amplifiers. Amplification of electrical signals was solved a long time ago, even before the first home computer was available, and we've not seen a corresponding, dramatic price drop.
- mrob 11y ago
  Audio amplification was "solved" a long time ago only if you didn't care about energy efficiency. Good class-D amplifiers are more recent, and they give real improvements in battery life over older designs.
_asummers 11y ago
http://www.head-fi.org http://www.head-fi.org has always served me pretty well for audio reviews. I don't often dip into this market, so this might have changed in recent years.
jseliger 11y ago
And all Bose products, which have always seemed egregiously overpriced to me. AFAICT, their noise cancelling headphones still have by far the best noise cancelling. If you work in a noisy environment or fly frequently, they're amazing. If your primary concern is audio quality in a normal or quietish environment, buy cheaper headphones (or I suppose more stylish ones, if that's your jones). I actually just got a pair of very expensive Jabra Evolve 80 headphones (http://www.jabra.com/Products/PC_Headsets/Jabra_EVOLVE__Series/Evolve_80 http://www.jabra.com/Products/PC_Headsets/Jabra_EVOLVE__Seri...) primarily for their mic. The noise cancelling is dramatically worse than Bose and the headphones make me look dramatically stupider because of the mic. But clients can hear me better so that's a net win.
- SyneRyder 11y ago
  Love my QC25s, they're one of my favorite tech purchases ever. I prefer the sound to my Etymotics and AKG K270S. Can't believe I put off buying them for so long, I wear them everywhere, even working at home at midnight. I wonder if Bose is doing something beyond noise-cancellation in the QC25s when you turn them on. It sounds similar to a BBE Sonic Maximizer, as if they've licensed the algorithm and tweaked it to the characteristics of the drivers in the QC25s (which sound lousy when the headphones are turned off).
rorykoehler 11y ago
Bose sound quality is shocking. A pair of €300 Bose headphones sounded worse than a pair of €20 Sennheisers to me. This is not an exaggeration.
slashink 11y ago
Sennheisers are great but i swear by Beyerdynamic. I have a pair of DT-770's that lasted me for 9 years. You bring up an interesting point that there's no real center in the U.S. that carries audio gear online, Europe has Thomann (thomann.de) that basically carries everything but now in SF it's hard to find something else then B&H Photo Video NY to deliver stuff.
ksk 11y ago
Well, they just evaluated the BOM. That tells us nothing about the sound quality, just the margin. I'd say the audiophile market is a more resilient to style than the general population, but not completely. Flat response headphones, like the AKG-701's are reviewed as not being "fun". The thing is, audio mixing plays a much larger part in your experience than headphones. After owning the 701's, I would much rather choose different cheaper 'colored' headphones for different genres, than use a headphone that is able to reproduce sounds more accurately. YMMV.

amelius 11y ago

I'm also curious about the price of "high-end" amplifiers. Amplification of electrical signals was solved a long time ago, even before the first home computer was available, and we've not seen a corresponding, dramatic price drop.

mrob 11y ago
Audio amplification was "solved" a long time ago only if you didn't care about energy efficiency. Good class-D amplifiers are more recent, and they give real improvements in battery life over older designs.

_asummers 11y ago

http://www.head-fi.org http://www.head-fi.org has always served me pretty well for audio reviews. I don't often dip into this market, so this might have changed in recent years.

jseliger 11y ago

And all Bose products, which have always seemed egregiously overpriced to me. AFAICT, their noise cancelling headphones still have by far the best noise cancelling. If you work in a noisy environment or fly frequently, they're amazing. If your primary concern is audio quality in a normal or quietish environment, buy cheaper headphones (or I suppose more stylish ones, if that's your jones). I actually just got a pair of very expensive Jabra Evolve 80 headphones (http://www.jabra.com/Products/PC_Headsets/Jabra_EVOLVE__Series/Evolve_80 http://www.jabra.com/Products/PC_Headsets/Jabra_EVOLVE__Seri...) primarily for their mic. The noise cancelling is dramatically worse than Bose and the headphones make me look dramatically stupider because of the mic. But clients can hear me better so that's a net win.

SyneRyder 11y ago
Love my QC25s, they're one of my favorite tech purchases ever. I prefer the sound to my Etymotics and AKG K270S. Can't believe I put off buying them for so long, I wear them everywhere, even working at home at midnight. I wonder if Bose is doing something beyond noise-cancellation in the QC25s when you turn them on. It sounds similar to a BBE Sonic Maximizer, as if they've licensed the algorithm and tweaked it to the characteristics of the drivers in the QC25s (which sound lousy when the headphones are turned off).

rorykoehler 11y ago

Bose sound quality is shocking. A pair of €300 Bose headphones sounded worse than a pair of €20 Sennheisers to me. This is not an exaggeration.

slashink 11y ago

Sennheisers are great but i swear by Beyerdynamic. I have a pair of DT-770's that lasted me for 9 years. You bring up an interesting point that there's no real center in the U.S. that carries audio gear online, Europe has Thomann (thomann.de) that basically carries everything but now in SF it's hard to find something else then B&H Photo Video NY to deliver stuff.

ksk 11y ago

Well, they just evaluated the BOM. That tells us nothing about the sound quality, just the margin. I'd say the audiophile market is a more resilient to style than the general population, but not completely. Flat response headphones, like the AKG-701's are reviewed as not being "fun". The thing is, audio mixing plays a much larger part in your experience than headphones. After owning the 701's, I would much rather choose different cheaper 'colored' headphones for different genres, than use a headphone that is able to reproduce sounds more accurately. YMMV.