I think a lot of it comes down to whether you are a music enthusiast or a headphone hobbyist. If you are into headphones as a hobby and have the disposable income, expensive headphones and gear is absolutely worth the price.
But what would be considered expensive? I realized the other day that I was cross-shopping two pieces of source gear and one was $300 and the other $1,100. And the thing is that the sound quality wasn’t even a differentiator for me. I’m sure they both sound excellent if not identical to me. It’s really coming down to design and build as they have a similar feature set.
But that’s not even the realization that interested me. What I realized was that I wasn’t comparing prices as a multiple (one costs almost 4x the other) or even as a difference (one costs $800 more than the other). It was both more vague than that and also less of a difference. It felt more like “does the improved design and build justify spending $1,100?” And for me the answer is yes, absolutely. It’s like the price of the $300 option didn’t even factor into the decision.
It’s always a major consideration for me. I think the question is what value I give the money vs what value I give the purchase. And that is not always the same for all purchases or even all sources of money.
Yep that much is a given or I wouldn’t be on this forum. I was attempting to elucidate how the value of the gear is perceived by me. That I just recently realized it isn’t a mathematical concept like I have seen many others assume. The phrase “that costs 4x as much” might not mean much if you can afford the more expensive option and you are only buying one anyway.
And then there is the missed opportunity cost. That’s what it costs you mentally every time you look at the cheaper option and say I should’ve gotten the other one.
Or, the opposite. You regret spending extra $$$ on a headphone after someone introduces you to a model that sounds better (to you) at a lower cost, usually from a different manufacturer. This can occur when one buys into the hyped reviews, only to discover their “house sound” does not align with your preferred “house sound”. Happens all too often in this hobby, especially with headphones.
Hell, even the “experts” don’t agree on headphone rankings.
