Hello all hi-fi ers :)
I joined today but I read many threads in here before
P.S: please pardon me for my bad English, English is not my mother tongue
a background story about me,
I'm just a normal university student who really like music, I liked many type of music such as classic, pop, rock, trance, and especially ethereal wave
got my first ipod nano around 6 years ago (and ipod touch 2 years ago). I used ibuds for a while, and it seems pretty decent, however it broke after 2 year
I bought cheap Sennheiser MX300 for US $10 around 4 years ago, and satisfied with it as it is much better than ibuds
since I used the MX300 for too long (I feel like it's a prehistoric item) I decided to buy new sennheiser (as that's the only brand I know which makes good earphones)
I want another earphones since I hate IEM and headphones is too big and too uncomfortable for me
I read many review in head-fi to get a new earphones that is not too expensive but good, and decide to get Sennheiser MX581
hopefully I did my homework before buying the right eaphone
In my head one question appeared: would the MX581 better than MX300? or maybe those hi-fi ers have something wrong with their ear like those water tester (which try to taste the water, they said it would be the new wine, water from mountain XXX, from country YYY, bla bla bla, but at the end, the most favorite water is tap water in London)
I mean, MX300 is already pretty decent for me
also, I take a look at portable amp
and I am very interested with one of the member here said: an amp could make a cheap $25 headphones into $200 headphones.
so, I researched a good and cheap amp, and it seems ViiO E5 is cheap and decent enough
but when I take a look at its price, oh wow, it cost almost as expensive as the MX581
but then my curiosity beats me, so ****** it, I bought one from ebay straight away
the amp came first, i opened it and tried to turn it on, tried it straight away and I was like 
never thought a small device like this can make big differences.
the MX581 came 2 days after I got my amp (I checked my mail box three times a day, it's like a kid waiting for santa claus to bring a present for him)
I was curious about it but I need to go IKEA so, sadly I need to stop the urge to try it straight away
went back to my home, I tried the MX581 straight away, but.. woot? the first song it played, I did not notice the differences between MX581 and MX300! 
something must be wrong, I bought an earphone twice the price than the current one and there is no differences between them?
thankfully I remembered in one of hi-fi thread, they said, you need 10 hours to accustomed with your new earphones.
no need to wait that long, I played the next song and the differences is like WOW
the vocal is pretty clear, I can hear the detail of the background music 
I was amazed, I felt like a fool, I believe MX300 is more than enough for me, and now I'm sure I would not want to go back to my MX300 as I just realise how crappy it is
it seems you guys right, good headphones makes big differences, I spent a lot on ipod nano, ipod touch, and an ipad and I never thought about new headphones or amp!
I just want to say, thank you Head-fi for introducing me to my new world full of color 
this makes me wondering, how good are those $100-1500+ cans? or $500 earphones? or high end amp?
I will increase my budget next time as I am satisfied with what I have right now (except I can win an HD800 from the sweepstakes)
I might not going to go online here pretty often (as I am also has another hobby which is badminton and pretty active in badminton forum)
I will come back again when I need something and will recommend this forum to anyone who needs a headphones (and will advise them to avoid beats by dre as many people said it's not good value for money)
Again, Thank you Head-fi :)
