Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Stereo Woo Hoo: Best of both worlds!!

Yeah, those open headphones aren't ideal with other people in the room. At least you got a Onkyo receiver for them!

It was a good trade imo, the receiver fit the bill real nice. I am using it with the Hsu Vent system.

I have a pair of Sennheiser HD580s and a nice headphone amp that I listen to pretty much every night before bed. A bit more laid back than the M3s, but still very well balanced and detailed. I've occasionally wanted to get some more up front headphones and I have tried a few others, but suffice it to say I've never once considered selling the 580s - they have a few minor shortcomings but all in all are extremely good at what they do. I actually listen to them much more than I listen to my speakers. That probably wouldn't be the case if I wasn't sharing the house with 2 other people, though.

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they have a few minor shortcomings but all in all are extremely good at what they do.

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Some may consider them a little too tame, or refined, what have you. I think they are generally well-balanced and find them hard to beat for long term listening.

What headphone amp are you using?

I agree that they are a little tame, but like you said, they are very hard to beat for long term listening - my ears never feel tired after listening to em.

My headphone amp is a Gilmore Dynamic V2 (since discontinued) from HeadAmp. Plenty of power, great detail and balance, 2 inputs and it can act as a preamp if I ever wanted to go the separates route with my speakers.

Here's a cool guts picture:

I've read lots of good things about using a Gilmore lite with Grado/Alessandros, and it IS pretty tempting.

The biggest problem I'm having with going with ANY amp at the moment is how easy the MS-1s are to drive. Even our old Sony PCDP is able to drive them easily with nearly no loss of SQ over the mid-level Onkyo phone-output stage of our main system.

The main reason for even looking closely at amps is the fact that I will most likely go with the Alessandro MS-2s as my final stop on the cans train(although the MS-PRO Woodies are pretty darned enticing!!)but I do need to upgrade my source devices as well as final amplification to make the final 'phone update worthwhile.


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What really stinks, is not following the directions listed over on the Head-Fi forum:

"Get your cans and leave this place....FOREVER"

Or:

"Sorry about your Wallet!"

And it's true!! I really like my MS-1s,....A Lot!!

So, why do we humans do this to ourselves??!!

Why do we openly subject ourselves to rampant unbridled "Upgraditus"??!!

WHY??!!

I frequent Head-Fi too, and occasionally I get the itch to get a new pair of headphones, but I've figured out that in order to get a significant increase in enjoyment out of my system, it would take more money than I'm willing to spend on headphones now. And I really am very satisfied with what I have now.

I'll only check out a pair of headphones now if they're of the "incredible bang-for-the-buck" variety. All the "boy do I want that!" money is reserved for photography now.

Yup,...I'm in the same spot what with being very satisfied with that I have now. It's gonna take more than a 20% improvement at three times the cost to get me to part with much more money in headphones at this time.

The problem with the Alessandro MS-1 is that it appears that the cans are sold with very little profit(component wise the $99 MS-1 is very similar to the $150 Grado SR125)making the price/point leader the $300 MS-2!!(the $700 MS-PRO, uh....well.)

On top of it all I've been talking to myself about THIS situation:

"I like my $99 MS-1s as much as I do my $275 M3s."

.....and;

"I will probably like my $300 MS-2s as much as I like my $620 M50s"

I can't argue with my logic to me!

No...no...I can't listen to me!!

(Gads; this is all so entertaining!!)

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I have a pair of Sennheiser HD580s and a nice headphone amp that I listen to pretty much every night before bed.

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Honestly Adam, there is no excuse for you not to be posting more in the What are you Listening to Tonight? thread, especially after seeing your last post there:

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Right now I'm listening to REM's New Adventures In Hi-Fi. Before that it was The Flecktones (Left of Cool). Next up is Calexico + Iron & Wine (In The Reins).

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With some great musical taste like that and frequent listening you should be required to post what you are listening to! It's interesting to hear what others are "digging".

Maybe if I had a laptop, because in order to post at my computer I have to take the headphones off, and then I'd no longer be listening!

Lately though I've just had the iPod on shuffle. And after about 5 songs I'm usually asleep...