I used to listen to headphones about 40% of the time, daily in the evening when my wife is at home. We were both working days. I have a pretty good headphone stage in my DAC preamp (Audio Alchemy), and several pair of ("budget reference") Sennheiser phones, the 600 and 650. Whenever I shopped for possible new preamps or integrated amps, they had to have a decent headphone stage as I didn’t want to run a separate headphone amp (not a big deal though, really)..
Now, since retiring and being at home in the day when my wife is still working, I do most of my serious and loud listening when she isn’t home. I rarely use my headphones! I do have an Audioquest Dragonfly DAC (highly recommended) for listening to Tidal via my phone when out and about or traveling.
I do still enjoy listening to headphones (and room issues disappear), and will often A/B songs back and forth, phones vs speakers. I just prefer the speaker experience more, if the room and setup are dialed in. One true thing about phones is for $2000-3000 you can get some that are comparable to >$20,000 speakers, so they are an audio bargain in that sense. I am happy with my Sennheisers for now, and will hold off upgrading them and put the money elsewhere in my system. FWIW.
Headphones vs speakers….
So I’ve been patiently waiting to buy the final pieces for a Benchmark HAB2 and DAC3 system. I have the Totem 1 speakers and decided to hook them up to an old Naim Nait 5i (probably not the best pairing) and Cambridge Azur 840C CD player. Over the last few months I’ve been on a quest for great sound through headphones and a headphone amp while I’m waiting and after maybe five sets of headphones I’ve found what I was looking for and I’m very happy.
After hooking up the Totems and Nait today I’m very disappointed. However, my room is far from treated yet - I have installed a large carpet, furnishings and will be hanging thick floor to ceiling curtains on the three walls - one behind the speakers and two side walls. However, wether I’ve been spoiled by the incredible sound of my headphone setup or I’ve been expecting too much from a full system I can’t imagine after room treatment and dialing things in that I’ll be anywhere close to being as impressed as I am with my headphones…..do any of you guys feel this way or am I being too pessimistic?
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Exactly... And it can beat on many acoustic factors even speakers systems of superior cost , especially those which are not in a dedicated acoustic room... They dont compare , ....but with a BACCH filter system they may became IDENTICAL... Anyway my Headphone system will cost me 1,600 dollars, 100, headphone, 200 dac, 300 amplifier, 1000 pre-amp or headphone amplifier and they will beat many if not most very costly speakers system in a living room...
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@simonmoon The recreation of the soundstage, like a holographic image of the band or musicians arrayed in front of you (not between your ears), with soundstage depth and width—that is something headphones won’t do same as speakers. It makes a huge difference to me too.
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@thomastrouble Since you like the Maggies so much I would suggest the LRS+ with a KEF KC62 sub. I have this setup in a small room with a Sanders MagTech amp. My preamp is the Benchmark LA4. I would not use the Benchmark AHB2 with the LRS+. The PeachTree GAN400 ($1500 used) is rather good with the LRS+ but the MagTech is better. The LRS+ setup is sonically very similar to my RAAL SR1a earphone setup. I turn off the LRS+ system when it gets late at night and crank up the SR1a system. I sold my RAAL VM-1a headphone amp to raise some money. I found out that the $800 RAAL TI-1b amp interface can get me to 90% of the VM-1a using the expensive CODA #16 amp. It is not quite as good with the PeachTree GAN400 but close. The VM-1a is so amazing that getting to 90% of that is still great sound. I hope to get a Class A Schitt Aegir 20-watt amp today ($800) to hopefully rival the CODA #16 with the SR1a earphones + TI-1b interface.
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