Yup, all signs point to this being the case. It’s just that in the past there wasn’t a sufficient analysis of the data to make sense of it. Nowadays things have gotten a lot better there. With that said, we shouldn’t ignore other factors to do with the perception, like sense of openness and so on.
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Perhaps this has be discussed before. Maybe not precisely the same way, but essentially.
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That pretty much nails the pragmatic approach, leaving only the difficulty of finding such opportunity.
A headphone meet with all the exciting gear is ideal for not being able to properly listen to anything, while for most folks finding a local retail establishment with a non-mass market selection is not even an option for most even in a major metropolitan area.
The used headphone market such as headphones.com’s Buy & Sell is a great way to listen to a representative range of headphones within a certain budget range without excessive cost, though there are quite a few other such markets and the emptors have been caveated.
Having purchased, sold and kept quite a few headphones in my preferred budget range, I find it easier and more entertaining seeing new headphones as they are released and reviewed while reminding myself that I don’t need any more, that they are not so great or different or valuable… until it doesn’t work. At the same time I can enjoy headphone porn outside my budget.
As if there aren’t enough variables to make this too complicated, there are mods. Even if just cheap pads from a large Chinese market, a small increment in cost and effort can transform a horribly designed headphone and practically unwearable torture device into a 70mm driven soft cushioned warm audio bed, then the value assessment has another dimension. Then there is EQ.
Then there is the question of matching attire.
Nectar Hive. I love mine. Took some breaking in, but it’s my at home favorite. For not silly money I bought one of Spritzer’s (Birgir’s) modified STAX hybrid amps in the $1400 range. I have not spent smarter money on audio, unless we drop way down market to Koss Porta-Pro.
Yep. Should have mentioned that some audiophiles just want something novel or cool to wear on their heads, or to look at on a shelf with the rest of their collection. And maybe be taken down and listened to once in a blue moon… The sound is probably secondary or tertiary to other considerations. Or just plain irrelevant.
People collect all kinds of ridiculous things. So if you can get a cool piece of art or engineering to decorate your room, and also get halfway decent sound quality from it, you’re probably ahead of the game.
I was lookin for the video where DMS mentions the Koss KSC75(X?), I think. Bandwidth is
a bit limited on the KSC75X, and it sits over the ears. But FR looks not too terrible. It might be a little too forward/glarey around 2k though (which is not my favorite range for forwardness).
This is a bit OT, but it is interesting to see some of the headphones that appear to have had decent FR that have apparently fallen through the cracks over the years, or which remain largely unrecognized (maybe for good reason?) by the headphone community.
I’m thinkin of headphones like the Onkyo A800. FR looked pretty stellar, and the one person I ran across who had one said it sounded great and was quite comfortable. But it had that uber wide headband.
A couple others I ran across recently on squiglink are the AKG K245 and Sony MDR-MA900. FR looks about as good on these as some of the better reviewed headphones here. But I don’t remember hearin much about them on the forums. It appears these just flew beneath most folks radars. Or maybe were not sold/available in their area?
Porta-Pro with Yaxi pads. Still over the ear, but they do sound better. Is it the extra 1/8 inch of separation? Maybe.
I’ve started several teens and a few adults down the rabbit hole with a gift of them. My M.O. is to give them a new Porta-Pro and show them a bag of many colors of Yaxis. Pick two. Steelers fans pick yellow and black. Nerds blue and red and put the red on the right.
The other Koss like the KSC sound similar, I am just used to the old Pros.
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The “cheap” Koss will always be part of my headphone portfolio,
because their sound quality regularly reminds me that it isn’t necessary to spend thousands of dollars to ENJOY music.
That’s grounding… occasionally… until the next ZMF comes out 
By the way…..
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Saracen,
I hope you’ll forgive me (a fellow “good value for money” headphone adventurer) for submitting a non-headphone-related reply; it is this:
To you, and anyone having received an indeterminate “terminal” Dx, I recommend Stephen Jay Gould’s book, “Full House: The Spread of Excellence from Plato to Darwin.” It’s most enjoyable if you happen to be a baseball fan, but well worth the read, even if you aren’t one. Also: Atul Gawande’s “Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End.”
As for the value vs. price calculus: I don’t think my Focal Clears (OG) are twice as “good” as my Focal Elegias. But while I spent $790 for the former, and ~$400 for the latter, I thoroughly enjoy both. FYI, the Clears are the most expensive phones I have ever bought; I don’t intend to pay more than that for anything else, as I believe (even if erroneously) that I’ve reached the point of diminishing returns.
I wish you all the best.
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Humans are biologically hard-coded and trained to “make sense” of audio data in the way that humans make sense of audio data. This happens mostly passively, naturally, and not consciously, per evolved genetics, quality of nutrition (good or bad or deficient in some way), and the environment (e.g., lifelong noise avoidance vs. guys who shoot rifles at rock concerts while riding motorcycles next to jet airplanes). Adults certainly have some potential to learn about what they hear if they set their minds to it, but there are practical biological limits.
Perception arguably equates to an arbitrary, quirky, and organic information processing system. Human learning and perception were routinely compared to computer technology in the 20th century – even as it involved lots of abstract hand waving and logical crudeness. With the rise of AI today…hmmm…?
I see it as an issue of people wanting simple answers to complex problems. Or in audio terms… we focus on the wideband solutions, the “this is better”, rather than “this is best”. If you can provide an imperfect solution to a complex problem, that may have been better than having no solution at all.
NOW… the downside is that the simple answers have become so entrenched that the more nuanced and sophisticated solutions that actually do solve the problem (or even just solve it more thoroughly than before) don’t gain any traction or are outright rejected.
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Yeah, I mostly feel like my ZMF Bokeh Open is functional art. I can’t listen to speakers so I tend to use my stuff a lot. Plus I value FR.
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My short contribution to this topic would be:
I take two of the most recognized ~300$ headphones, paired with the best tuned sound chain in my opinion and in my possession.
And compare these with the latest $1000 headphones on the market, also with my favorite player.
And the result could not be clearer.
I’m not talking about better or worse here, because both the HD600 and the Sundara have their qualities, but can’t even begin to keep up with the Bokeh Open from the technical capabilities alone.
1.) Powerful, cleanly defined bass.
2.) Speed, the BO is incredibly precise and dynamic in the driver control.
3.) Tonal overall picture.
While the Senni shines in the mid range, the rest of the sound image appears -comparatively- sluggish and dull.
With the Hifiman it is the airiness and the imaging that stands out otherwise it has -comparatively- weaknesses in bass reproduction and occasionally some shrillness in the highs.
Everything is bearable, but very clear, and certainly not only for me to hear.
So my modest experience and opinion there are very clear differences that even easily justify the triple price in this comparison.
Between, let’s say, 700-800$
and 1400-1600$
it gets tighter with the rating.
But may be this is only my opinion 
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There is a lot of “what’s your point of reference”. And this is true of almost all hifi regardless of components.
If you currently listen to whatever headphones with a mass market tuning and want something new, you pick up a HD600 or whatever, you might prefer it, or you might hate it because it’s bass lite.
Given enough time with it, you’d probably come to appreciate it and “learn” to like the “Hifi” presentation, not listening to something else, that’s your frame of reference. From that frame of reference it’s probably easier to appreciate what other “Hifi” headphones bring to the table.
Over time and with experience you literally learn to listen, and you can distinguish to a point between something that does some aspect well and what you like. And in the end the whole point is to provide an enjoyable experience.
There is a lot of consensus around things, but it’s common for individuals to not like specific concensus good headphones. I personally dislike every Dan Clark headphone I’ve heard, I can appreciate they are objectively “good”, but I’d never want to own one.
The problem with questions like How much “better” is they don’t define a scale (what does twice as good even mean) and they don’t define “better”. The longer your in this hobby, the more you tend to get tied up in the details, and those become more important to you, and their value increases.
I own a lot of headphones (I hate selling stuff) and I can honestly say a HD600 with a good entry level tube amp, (SW51 used to be my pick but it’s no longer available) is really really good.
There is a lot that sounds better to my ears most of it considerably more expensive, but if we’re trying to be objective the gains are incremental. Move to something like an HD800S, which is a headphone with a lot of detail for the price point and a very open presentation, and a lot would call it clearly better, but once the initial wow where’s off living with it, you have to deal with the aggressive upper end.
There are people who consider the HD600 to be endgame, and throw insane $ into electronics to drive it, to me it’s good but there are many other headphones I prefer at higher price points.
Having said that if I couldn’t afford the insane expenditure I have in equipment and headphones, I could absolutely live with a HD600 into a good tube amp for listening.
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Indeed. I have examples of each, such as Senn HD6?? fr direct, and Focal as well fr Direct, Audeze for Planar and Stax for electrostatic.
The point I was making though, was two specific headphones, both from Audeze and both Planars, are a lot closer in sound (IMHO) than th very large difference in price would suggest.
Others, like two DD models (a Senn and a Focal) both use the same driver technology (though obviously not the same drivers) and are similar in price, but sound very different.
I have to conclude that price alone is no real indicator or what to expect in sound (expenive planars and similarly expensive electrostatics are in my experience, pretty different. Paying more certainly might buy a better sound (but might not), and certainly should buy better durability and comfort from better materials, but it doesn’t always.
But my original question tried to exclude the fact that expensive units might be very good or nowhere near as much good, depending on model and even brand, by asking about the difference in the best (which is itself rather subjective) at a given price point compared to the best a a very different price point.
As for HD600 v Arya Organic, yes, very different but regardless of HOW they each get to a sound, how much overall improvement do people feel they getby spending signficantly more. I wasn’t suggesting which models people select at each price point, though.
IMHO, both the HD600 and Arya Organic are very good, but for different types of sound, and may or may not appeal to a single user.
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I don’t know if I have the time, and certainly don’t have the inclination, to start buying and selling second-had gear. It is, for me, a right PITA and not worth the hassle. As for the condition, it’s certainly terminal, but “soon”? I don’t know. The doctor thught probably 6-18 months, but thtat was well over 5 years ago. My bet? Probably not within 6 months, and I doubt if I have another 5 years. though I could be wrong, on either. I will say it focuses one’s mind and changes priorities, though.
A mix of people in a select group like this is, IMHO, as good a way of getting aenough of a spread of opinion to somewhat neutralise the biases. And all in a few days, without moving from my chair, and at zero cost.
I think this thread might also interest you, because it deals with many of the same questions you’re grappling with here. Even if you do not intend to use EQ, it still addresses the question of whether a good lower end headphone can sound as good as a good high end headphone. I’m still a bit doubtful about this for a variety of reasons. But it’s an interesting question.
Also, when I say there are sonic differences between different kinds of drivers, I attribute a good bit of that to differences in distortion and impedance. If you compare the frequency response of open passive dynamic and planar magnetic headphones though, there are also some interesting differences between them.
This site conveniently has 5128 graphs of both the HD600 and Arya Organic, so you can do a direct comparison of their FR. And the differences between them are somewhat indicative of differences you’ll often see between open dynamic and open planar headphones…
There are other open dynamic and planar headphones in the Earphones Archive graphing tool as well, if you want a more fullsome idea of the differences. And you can change the color of the “squigs” so that all the dynamics are red and all the planars are blue to more easily compare them and see the differences.
You add more squigs to the graph by pressing the plus sign (+) after the name of the headphone on the list. The colors of the squigs are changed with the colored dots to left of the headphones names below the graph. That dot brings up a color wheel so you can make each squig whatever color you like. I’d post a screenshot illustrating this, but I’m not sure what the policies are here and on Squiglink for somethin like this. There is also a dark mode for the Earphones Archive interface if you scroll the toolbar above the graph all the way to the right.
The planars tend to extend deeper into the bass and sub-bass. They also tend to be more withdrawn in the upper mids around 1.5 to 2 kHz. And they tend to have more “air” in the highest frequencies.
Not all dynamics and planars follow these rules. But generally speaking those are some of the more common differences you will see on many of the better and more “neutral” open/passive models of these headphones.
Listener also has a graphing tool where you can do similar comparisons…
I wish there was a Squiglink tool for all the 5128 measurements on Headphones.com as well, with HBK’s stock 1/3-octave DF compensation curve.
My main conclusion about the Driver Story thread was that anything sounds like DSP when processed through DSP. The underlying premise isn’t worth further discussion.
Probably OT. But why would that be your conclusion, generic?
In addition to what’s already been mentioned, another thing that many audiophiles look for in more costly gear is authenticity. Especially to live performances, and the live sound of instruments.
Many audiophiles also enjoy different presentations, for different moods or different genres of music, for example.
On this, I really come down with some other folks here on a good set of speakers. You can listen during the day or when the neighbors are gone. And at more reasonable volumes other times. And imho, probably get more enjoyment out of them than any headphone at any price.
The only areas where headphones really exceed speakers are in clarity/detail and intimacy imo.
And I wouldn’t worry too much about the room acoustics… unless your room is just an unmitigated sonic disaster zone.