I'm looking to buy a pair, but I was looking for any personal experiences.

I'm looking as far as the SR-225, but I know dick about amps, and I don't really care to learn either. Throw some rec's if you got 'em, 'cause them fuckers get expensive pretty quickly.

Do some digging over on http://www.head-fi.org/.

You'll be able to find out all of the info you need on each of the models. That will keep you busy for awhile. I personally own nothing but Sennheisers, but it's just a preference. Grados are good, solid headphones. Supposedly a little better for heavier rock stuff.

headphone.com is another place to look. Online store front and sponsor of the above mentioned forum. Their reviews are honest and they seem to give plenty of info as well regarding the different models.

When it comes to amps, it's a whole new ballgame. The forum once again has a whole section on amps as well as a section for DIY stuff, if you get into that. I've never bought a pair that of cans that needed to be pushed by an amp, but I've read plenty about them there.

I DON'T WANNA WORK, DAMMIT.

Thanks for the input, but if someone else had posted a headphone thread, I would've made the exact same post you did. Haha. I was just looking to see if anyone around here had any experiences before wading into the accounts of stranger strangers.

What do you use to listen to your music? Portable CD Player, iPod, etc?

Hey Bro.

I have Grado 80s & love 'em!! I listen to a wide range of music: altern., heavy metal, jazz, and pop.

I've had them for five years and the sound actually improves with age (hard to believe, but true). Others can hear them in the room, which may or may not be a concern.

A colleague of mine at work bought them for his son; the son, took one look and snubbed his nose. A day later, he listened to his iPod & fell in love with them. He's alright with the retro geeky looks.

So am I.

Hope this helps,

audiobill

An old ass silver Kenwood receiver I picked up for $10 bones at the Goodwill. Stylin', yo.

(Now that I think about it, you're a Sennheiser PX-100 champion, as am I. When I do use portable, which is rare, I use my PX-100s).

Open is great, I'm usually by myself, and I have a pair of Sennheiser 280s if I need closed.

I have these. They're pretty awesome all around.

I forget which ones a guy a work has but he swears the sonic truth by them. That or he thinks the high price makes him look cool to my $20 Sonys. He has a lower model I think they were still 'round $80. They do sound nice though when I listened briefly through them.

After buying my Sennheiser HD-280s (~$70) and PX-100s (~$40)—neither of which are really high end compared to what's out there—I'll never go back to $20 Sonys. Also, with the 280s, the cord is replaceable, so if they short out, I don't have to throw the damn things away.

You didn't say what you were buying yours for, so this isn't directed at you, but rather a rant in and around itself--I don't get buying high-end earphones for MP3s digitized at 192. It makes no sense to me. Perhaps I just view MP3s as utilitarian and need to get my head out of my ass. If and when I buy nice headphones it will be for my turntable or to watch stereo movies.

I used to have the SR-80s. They work fine without an amp.

I traded mine for some of those Shure in-ear phones though because I didn't like the sound leak and I needed something to wear when cutting the grass or using a saw or something, for which the Shure's are great since they really block out the sound. The Grado's were also a problem when I wanted to listen to music while the wife watched TV.

While I'm really happy with the Shure's overall, I have been considering picking up something a bit more comfortable for around the house, but still need them to not leak as much as the Grados. Ideally, I'd like the sound of the Grados that I could actually listen to without letting everyone around me listen as well.

Any suggestions?

i had a pair of the sr80s (traded for my shure's with Nobody) and was very pleased with the sound they produced, but found them too constricting on the ears after about a half an hour. i've since given the grados to my boyfriend, and picked up a pair of sennheisers (590s - http://www.sennheiserusa.com/newsite/pr ... sid=004590) for myself. the sound is great and they're really comfortable to wear, you barely notice they're on your head. highly recommended

I have the 595s and they're also very comfortable to wear. Easily the best headphones to get if you're going to be listening to music for hours at a time. And actually, you can't go wrong with any of the Sennheiser models in the 500 range.
http://www.sennheiserusa.com/newsite/pr ... id=newHD-3

While mp3 certainly does degrade the quality of a file, it's almost never noticable with the right encoder settings. Using LAME 3.97 final with the -v2 --vbr-new switch (~190 kbps) to encode will give files that are near impossible for most people to distinguish from the original. LAME is even getting good enough nowadays that at ~128 kbps it's more than listenable, but indistinguishable for most casual listening. As for the whole stereo movies thing, unless the DVD you're watching has a seperate PCM audio track, what you're getting most of the time is just the five-channel AC-3, where each channel is ~128 kbps, downmixed into 2 channels. Unless you were talking about those types of movies specifically, ones that have dedicated stereo PCM soundtracks, in which case they will be of better quality than mp3s. Vinyl is a whole seperate story from the digital debate.

Sorry if I sound overly corrective, but I hear people rag on mp3 all the time at these bitrates for not being high enough quality when very few times those people have sat down to do an ABX test to discern whether or not they can actually tell the compressed file from the original. While it's undeniable that mp3s degrade the actual sound file, it all depends on whether or not the difference is audible.