Having owned several higher-end earphones including from Klipsch & Etymotic, I found that expensive weren't necessarily more durable than sensibly priced stuff

Having owned several higher-end earphones including from Klipsch & Etymotic, I found that expensive weren't necessarily more durable than sensibly priced stuff (such as those Sonys, which I also own), and in fact were sometimes even less so due to the cables & jacks getting "svelte" designs. My conclusion was to always expect earphones to fail in the not-so-distant future, and not to spend so much that it's a major aggravation when it occurs.