@andris what if I told you you didn’t have to spend that much and it could still sound better than your Utopia and the most expensive tube amp you own? All I am saying is you might be very surprised. Let me know when you want to run down this speaker rabbit hole with me 
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I use the tv speakers currently. Also, when you have kids, they own the tv. Not exactly a big priority. And, trust me, time away from the kids in any form is what you want. Movie, no movie, really doesn’t matter. Playing scrabble in front of the fireplace is pretty good.
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Do your kids pay rent? Who owns your TV again 
? Listen I am just busting your chops, but no way in hell is my daughter owning my TV and surround sound system. I limit her TV time to very minimal educational programming and the occasional Disney programming and instead we enjoy 2 channel listening to music together. I let her choose from artists on playlists I have created via Roon and we jam together. She knows the artists she enjoys most from my list and chooses them. It’s some of the most fun time we get to spend together. She will be a future audiophile if she wants to, but she already asks to listen to music with me so I am very grateful for it. Anyways, I will get off my soapbox. Again I am a huge passionate advocate of headphones and am just coming at this from a place of don’t go either or if you can have it all. 
Welcome to the forum @Dynamic and I hope to chat with you more soon!
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I listen to headphones with my older son. We each have our own pairs. But, if the tv is on, it’s not for us. It’s very rare to have the time and energy for tv after the kids are in bed.
We also have sonos. There is usually music playing, just not from a 2 channel audiophile system.
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@Dynamic So what is the point of your initial comment? Buying a Home theater system is a bad investment, and we are all better off listening to $3.5k IEMs?
I sold on my Anthem AVR and Monitor Audio Gold surrounds and center speakers this past year. I’m not a movie person, but wanted to able to listen to multi channel hi-res music. Decided to simplify the rig. I’ve gone to 90 percent headphone listening over the past couple of years. I have five headphone amps, and double that compliment of headphones.
It easier to change out headphones for a specific purpose than in a speaker based system. Room correction is a non factor. You can buy a pretty sweet headphone rig for $5K or less.
No?
The point was to see others journeys to personal audio and how they relate.
For me, the quality of personal audio is obviously both very good from an audio perspective and very cost effective from a price perspective. The same is true for @andris
For @MRHifiReviews that is clearly not the case.
The point of the odin comment was to show how value could be different in different situations for different people. And I want to hear from others.
I have had decent home theaters. I will have one again. I miss surround sound movies and an environment that is all around you. But right now? For value in my life, a home theater is way less important and way less effective for my money than other options. Potentially including making the odin look inexpensive because there is no home theater Anywhere near that price that could give me as much joy in my life right now.
When I finally do build my next home theater, the value will likely be different. I will be able to truly enjoy it and the extra cost will be justified.
I want to get others takes on that and a view into their journey.
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I have all three, several IEMs and Headphones, and two 2-channel speaker systems. One speaker system is a pretty high level Genelec. I often listen to all three types in a single day.
I don’t prefer any of them, I love all three for different reasons, at different times. Generally IEMs for raw detail and clarity, great for esoteric electronic music. Headphones for cozy listening to Jazz on my bed. The Genelecs at my desk (treated room) for background music when I don’t want to be tied to a wire. And then, just yesterday, I’ll be on all three for entirely different reasons. I’m not at all consistent, perhaps because I always shake it up and don’t get fixed in my ways.
I seem to be one of the few people that truly loves all three system types with absolutely no preference, other than mood at the moment. Without getting into brands (other then Genelec) they are all fairly expensive (> 1k).
What I definitely didn’t like was my 5.1 surround system. That expensive gimmick got old after a couple of years and I gladly sold it off for just a 2 channel system for movies. That’s to share the sound. When watching a movie on my own I much prefer Bluetooth headphones. Go figure.
I think people like what they are used too, I feel that’s a shame.
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I am almost the opposite. I loved my 5.1 system but largely for movies. I only used sonos or that 5.1 system for music as a background for many years.
Until the recent headphones adventure, I rarely just “listened to music.”
Headphones made me want to do that. And now I listen much of the day.
Do you miss the 3d surround effects? I miss tie fighters soaring over my head. I don’t get that feeling on headphones (except on airpods max to some effect)
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No, I don’t miss “surround” 3D at all for music or movies. I actually spend 2-6 hours a day just listening to music, no other distractions (retired). I have found lots of music, mostly electronic, that sounds very 3D on IEM’s, Headphones, and speakers. The looking over your shoulder kind of thing. To me, its just a spatial effect and rather low on the list of music properties I’m interested in.
I still occasionally still play games and the DSP they use makes headphones pretty 3D to me!
Moving so rapidly between the different types (IEM, Headphone, and Speaker) blurs their differences spatially to me. If I close my eyes its getting harder to tell the difference as a difference that matters. The Genelec speakers are influencing the sound of the other systems. If I go outside, given the visual clues, IEMs will sound as if they are coming from the heavens (try that with speakers). It’s an odd experience.
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That’s neat. Currently, I only have IEMs, so I don’t get to move back and forth. It will be interesting when I have other options. On headphones, I didn’t care for the crazy large soundstage of the arya. But on speakers, that’s basically the point to me. Environment.
For the last few weeks my favorite listening experience is the Focal Radiance. I can’t seem to put them down.
I realized with this that tonality is the most important music quality for me (at least for now). I thought it was detail/clarity. Perhaps it was but I just got “too used to it”. In other words bored (I do EQ IEMs a lot).
The Focal Radiance is a warm, base boosted headphone that goes easy on the highs. I love listening to Jazz on them and it created a particular appreciation for piano I didn’t realize I had. When someone asks about my preferences I say in what season of the year, what day of the week, in the morning or evening. I have dozens of “preferences”.
What a life to be able bring so much different technology to bear on an ancient love for music.
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My HT and 2 chl system is so much more enjoyable than my headphones, I know Blasphemy. With headphones you are after the space between your ears, but with HT and 2 chl the all important room comes into play and that means the correct positioning of the speakers and a AVR ( or amp and processor) with the power to drive them and then the source. I’ve seen some expensive HT system sound horrid when set up poorly, and it usually comes down to the position of the speakers in the room, or the AVR doesn’t have the power to drive the speakers to match the output of the source ( Movie or music) or the room itself.
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Personally I much prefer speakers and I don’t even mean high end HiFi speakers, I just enjoy speakers in general.
However, I live in an apartment, with an 18 year old and a 2 year old, plus my wife, which means there are usually 4 completely different life styles happening at the same time in a reduced space.
My current speaker set ups are aimed to fill rooms more than focus on a listening space, and they are used for BGM far more than any real music listening.
Once I finally move back out of town and into the countryside again, then I may go back to having a dedicated music space, for now, my dedicated music space is a PC and rack in the corner of the living room 
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The discussion so far has hit on the major considerations for speakers vs. headphones. My take is that headphones maximize experience of the audio sweet spot. When I first set up big 2 channel, 2.1, and 5.1 systems in the 1990s, I’d always struggle with both room treatment and the ideal seating location. With headphones the sweet spot is exactly the same no matter where I am, no matter the room, and no matter if I’m working or relaxing. I no longer sweat absolute quality for room systems, and am happy with less-than-ideal solutions.
Speakers are unappealing and too consuming because I typically work or multi-task when listening to audio, so I’d have to set up near-field speakers for work and separately configure a listening/relaxation room for audio too. And then what about when I’m not in those two rooms? My PCs often follow me around, so the listening room sweet spots cannot not look great or be functional.
The level of commitment required for an optimal audiophile speaker system can be nuts. I demoed a $600K Wilson Audio and Dan D’Agostino 2 channel system in a nearby store. It not only required room treatment, but also resulted in a single sweet spot chair with the speakers spread 10-15’ in a triangle. And lots of empty space in the single-function room. And dedicated, focused use to get up and manually swap LPs, etc.
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I tend to agree that for the musical experience the headphones are able to get you there for a lot less amount of money. If this amount is justified or not, I am not able to tell as I believe I still did not experience loudspeakers good enough to get me wondering about that.
Now there is another issue very important for me - headphones is necessarily a sole experience, while loudspeakers allow us to have a shared experience. And that is something invaluable!
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Could be , but I don’t have that much invested, no where close. You don;t have to invest huge sums to get good sound, that could be saying the same about headphones, spend a lot to get the best sound. OH Like my headphones , but I’m not going to just be tied down by a cable. And as far as HT, hard to watch a movie with friends if you are connected to only one headphone cable. Room treatments, the only treatments I have are my rugs and my plants. No corner treatments or stuff hanging down from the ceiling. Headphones vs speakers, its like CD vs LP vs Download, vs steaming. Just tools to listen to music.
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Oh, I concur. As I said above, it was the room that was the most problematic. But previously I had never taken headphones seriously until that home theater (in our new home) basically completely failed.
And, I will say, even in high end audio stores where they are treated and setup correctly, I currently would still take my headphone experience over them on pure sound quality. But, I still want that sense of 3d immersion that I don’t get on headphones for movies.
I doubt I will ever have a “listening space”. That doesn’t fit my lifestyle. At least not for the foreseeable future.
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You can pipe the same sound to multiple headphones. I have done this with my son. It’s harder with IEMs, but still doable. However, I have also just synced what our sources are playing, and that is a fun way to do it too.
For family listening though, we use sonos. Sound quality isn’t the priority.
Its hard to beat a headphone when you want to keep the house quiet while others are asleep.
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