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wapiti said:

Except Magnepan is continuing to aggressively innovate.  Leaving aside new products such as the MMG, Magnapan has continued to move its products forward with inmpressive improvements.  Compare, for example, the near perfect integration of the ribbon and the planar-magnetic drivers of the 3.7 v. the older 3.6. 
 
Grado is not advancing its products in the same fashion.  It may not need to however as many are delighted with their offerings as they currently exist.

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Yep, Magnepan has come out with their .7 models inthe past year, but prior to that the .6 line hadn't changed in over a decade. They're by far one of the slowest moving companies in audio, and I'm not saying that's a bad thing. I have owned the 3.6s since 2009 and still love them. Even models previous to the .6 line, such as the 3.5s, Tympanis, SMGs, etc are often sent in for a "check-up" and refurbished...they still sound amazing even though they are 20 years old. I would love to see Grado come out with some sort of update at some point, but for the time being I absolutely love their headphones. Magnepan and Grado are by far my two favorite companies in audio...very proud to be a customer of both 

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focker said:

I have owned the 3.6s since 2009 and still love them.

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As well you should.

I've got a pair of Grado SR-125s from around 1995. They sound very similar to Grado's newest model, the PS500. Sure, the 500s sound better, but there's a definite family resemblance, a house sound if you will. 
I think that's a good thing. When you're talking about dynamic headphones, there haven't been huge advances in driver technology over the last 20 years, so why should the sound be that different?
Good sound is good sound, and changing just to keep up with the Flavor of the Month isn't audio, it's marketing.
 

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wapiti said:

As well you should.

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Definitely  And btw, it's nice to see someone who knows as much about Maggies as you seem to know...they literally changed my love of music and movies and took it to a much greater degree. 

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focker said:

 
Definitely  And btw, it's nice to see someone who knows as much about Maggies as you seem to know...they literally changed my love of music and movies and took it to a much greater degree. 

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If i'm not mistaking, the Maggies 1.7 are pretty much regarded as a best buy among speakers, wich as we all know is a crowded market, so that's says a lot about their sound quality.

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stacker45 said:

 
If i'm not mistaking, the Maggies 1.7 are pretty much regarded as a best buy among speakers, wich as we all know is a crowded market, so that's says a lot about their sound quality.

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Yep, the 1.7s, 3.7s, and the new MMGs are supposed to all be fantastic at their given price points...I've been avoiding listening to the 3.7s for the sake of my wallet lol.  What was really impressive to me was that last year (or maybe two years ago), there were two well respected publications who voted the 3.6s the speaker of the year, even though they had been on the market for ten years! 
 
I enjoy drawing parallels between Magnepan and Grado...

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elysian said:

Grados are nice, particularly as an entry into Head-fi, but I wouldn't recommend spending more than a couple hundred of bucks on a Grado headphone.  I like the GS1000i, but for the price, a used HD800 is much better.
 
Not going to comment on the LCD-2

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Absolutely agree.

Good sound is good sound regardless of any price, form, materials, age, or distinctiveness.
 
LCD's use 30 year old technology rehashed into a now $1000 headphone, but it sounds good so they don't have to apologize for anything.
 
If Grados sound that great for their price 5 years from now and it just so happens they never needed to re-engineer, I think the world will keep turning and they'll still have their market. I just saw a non-head-fier purchase some Grados on facebook and he's kind of a hipster, but otherwise an informed consumer outside of this forum and it made me happy.

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chris_himself said:

Good sound is good sound regardless of any price, form, materials, age, or distinctiveness.
 
LCD's use 30 year old technology rehashed into a now $1000 headphone, but it sounds good so they don't have to apologize for anything.
 
If Grados sound that great for their price 5 years from now and it just so happens they never needed to re-engineer, I think the world will keep turning and they'll still have their market. I just saw a non-head-fier purchase some Grados on facebook and he's kind of a hipster, but otherwise an informed consumer outside of this forum and it made me happy.

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Absolutely. If it ain't broke...
 
The koss portapro is a nearly 30 year old design. It is STILL an exemplary open back headphone at a very low price. It is also lightweight, very portable, and quite comfortable. 
 
If you want more treble, the koss ksc75 is a great alternative/complementary headphone which again is ridiculously affordable. 
 
I'm saddened every time a customer is ripped off buying overpriced junk just because some celebrity endorses it and/or because it has some cheesy, fancy paint job. 

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jaycee1 said:

Absolutely. If it ain't broke...
 
The koss portapro is a nearly 30 year old design. It is STILL an exemplary open back headphone at a very low price. It is also lightweight, very portable, and quite comfortable. 
 
If you want more treble, the koss ksc75 is a great alternative/complementary headphone which again is ridiculously affordable. 
 
I'm saddened every time a customer is ripped off buying overpriced junk just because some celebrity endorses it and/or because it has some cheesy, fancy paint job. 

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Portapro = god-tier entry headphone
 
Not once have I heard anybody ever say anything bad about dem schiits. They should be everybody's first headphone, they almost beat the SR-60 for entry level cult appeal IMO just because SR-60 often gets dinged for it's form, cable length, and comfort. Portapro has awesome fit, sound, it looks effin' AWESOME. I picture the original Tron movie posters when I think of Portapros.

The porta-pro's and 60i's are the gold standards respectively, in the under $100 price category. 
 
Each has amazing strengths that other manufacturers simply cannot duplicate. 
 
60i's: these drivers have such a lush warmth throughout the mids and treble which I find simply impossible to duplicate no matter how much I mess around with EQ settings on other headphones. The 60i's are literally like a drug. No exaggeration.
 
Koss: the sportapro's are the FASTEST headphones I have ever listened to. The attack transients are simply phenomenal! In addition, instruments take on a 3-D physical presence and therefore a level of realism which again, is truly stunning. Even the vaunted 60i drivers cannot match koss for their speed and realism.
 
Given the price and quality of the koss headphones, I don't understand why they aren't the most popular headphones on the planet. It seems like goodcans is the only website which promotes their awesomeness, and that's a website which isn't updated very often, or very widely known. 
 
Meanwhile, people are spending hundreds of dollars on closed headphones and IEM's which can't come close to matching koss or grado: the sound of open designs is far cleaner, faster and more realistic by an enormous margin. I guess we simply live in an environment which is far noisier than ever before (actually this is a fact), so it necessitates closed designs and IEM's with a lot of isolation. It's too bad that people live with such an enormous drop-off in fidelity as a result. 

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jaycee1 said:

Absolutely. If it ain't broke...
 
The koss portapro is a nearly 30 year old design. It is STILL an exemplary open back headphone at a very low price. It is also lightweight, very portable, and quite comfortable. 
 
If you want more treble, the koss ksc75 is a great alternative/complementary headphone which again is ridiculously affordable. 
 
I'm saddened every time a customer is ripped off buying overpriced junk just because some celebrity endorses it and/or because it has some cheesy, fancy paint job. 

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It warms my cockles when a consumer spends a little money on a nice set of headphones, even if they're mostly concerned about the celebrity endorsement and/or the cheesy paint job. 
Everyone's gotta start somewhere, and someone who buys a pair of Beats or whatever, has already been convinced that all headphones don't sound alike, and is willing to spend a decent amount of money for a pair of headphones, and then carry them around and wear them in public. 
That's the hard work. 
Once they've shed the earbuds that come with their Iphone, getting them to listen to a pair of 325s or PS500s and hear what they can get for their money is pretty easy actually. 
This "overpriced junk" is the gateway drug to real high-end audio.

I'm pretty much sold on the 225i's as a intro into Grado though I would like to compare with another headphone before I make the plunge.
 
What I am looking for now is a decent DAP for on the go & for my office, I have bought some Heir IEM's for the commute but want to use the Grado's in my office (yes I know they're open back), any suggestions ?

The cool thing about Grados is that they work fine without much help from an amp in most circumstances. 
I'm using the Audioquest Dragonfly direct from a Macbook Pro driving PS500s and it sounds pretty great. 
That said, they still sound fine straight out of the headphone output, or even an Iphone, and I tried the $1600 PS1000s straight out and it's the same story. 

So I might consider putting the money into upgrading the phones to the 325s or even the RS2s and hold off on a DAC or amp right away. 
 
The Dragonfly ($250) is great if you're traveling a lot with a laptop.
If you're set at a desk, I'd consider the Schiit Modi DAC and Magni Headphone amp which are $99 each.
They're also made in the USA which is nice given all the cheap Chinese made DAC/Amp combos. 

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avincent52 said:

The cool thing about Grados is that they work fine without much help from an amp in most circumstances. 
I'm using the Audioquest Dragonfly direct from a Macbook Pro driving PS500s and it sounds pretty great. 
That said, they still sound fine straight out of the headphone output, or even an Iphone, and I tried the $1600 PS1000s straight out and it's the same story. 

So I might consider putting the money into upgrading the phones to the 325s or even the RS2s and hold off on a DAC or amp right away. 
 
The Dragonfly ($250) is great if you're traveling a lot with a laptop.
If you're set at a desk, I'd consider the Schiit Modi DAC and Magni Headphone amp which are $99 each.
They're also made in the USA which is nice given all the cheap Chinese made DAC/Amp combos. 

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Yep, the 500s are amazingly good even from just the laptop headphone jack or my Kindle Fire. It still amazes me to this day. I'm surprised the PS1000s can pull that off, cause my GS1ks can't...they really need an amp...