I've always wanted to get into audiophile equipment, but never had the money. Now things are looking up and I think I'm ready to get into it.
I bought myself a pair of Sennheiser HD595's on eBay two years ago since they were the highest quality single-corded headphones I had found at the time. I also have a Creative X-FI Titanium sound card. I run it in audio creation mode with bit-matched playback enabled with Foobar2000. The media is generally 320kbps MP3's at the moment.
I'd like to think that this is a pretty good beginner setup, although it's probably not. I have a few questions if any of you would mind answering some:
1) Would I benefit from an external AMP and DAC with these headphones?
2) If so, is there any equipment you would recommend ($100-$400 preferably)?
3) Is using a sound card even a good idea? Or would a firewire/USB interface be better?
I listen to mainly rock, metal and alternative rock types of music.
