I don't think you can demand anything "flawless" at $2,000 or any price for that matter. That price can at best buy you a decent mid range power cord in high end speaker systems. I just hope that they are a bit more comfortable to wear this time, and if they sound better (at least not worst), that's a plus. I don't intend to become a collector so I will probably sell one of the LCD-2 Rev 1 or the LCD-3 after I have heard for myself.

I have no time to read all the comments  and I also don't care those, sorry because they may be pure guessing.
I believe in Alex and Sankar who are quite honest , if they set the price at almost 2000$ I know it's worth it.
I went directly without hesitation and made a preorder at Moon-Audio.

Wow, 14 pages of "impressions" and canjam hasn't even started. Haha, looks like the LCD-3 thread is well on its way to overtaking the LCD-2 mega thread

I was thinking the same thing.

Personally, I'm quite excited for these new headphones though they are certainly expensive. I'm hoping they are going to be able to go toe to toe with the Stax 009 in sound quality.

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googleli said:

I don't think you can demand anything "flawless" at $2,000 or any price for that matter. That price can at best buy you a decent mid range power cord in high end speaker systems. I just hope that they are a bit more comfortable to wear this time, and if they sound better (at least not worst), that's a plus. I don't intend to become a collector so I will probably sell one of the LCD-2 Rev 1 or the LCD-3 after I have heard for myself.

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I think Hennyo lied, you have closer to 60 grand in your signature.. No offense but I think your opinion doesn't count concerning "is the pricing fair." because you have one of the most biased financial positions ever lurked here on HF... ; )
 

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khaos974 said:

Seriously at $2000, they'd better be flawless if they want to sell, Audez'e's track record at getting small details right hasn't been quite good. Beyond subjective sound quality, I'd expect
 
- excellent workmanship, the veneer of the wood, tighter tolerances and margins between each piece, polished inner sides for the wooden housing...
- consistency of the enclosures.
- driver matching and consistency. There better be very little variations between drivers.
- Little measurable flaws: linear FR, controlled ringing, low distortion...
 

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I didn't think the LCD2s were poor in any of those categories to start with.  It would be nice if the LCD3s were lighter and therefore required less clamping force for the sake of unfortunate members, such as Googleli, that love the signature but could not adapt to the weight.
 
I would never purchase anything that would cause me physical pain, fortunately, I adapted to the LCD2s weight easily - even to Grados odd ergonomics!

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sp wild said:

I didn't think the LCD2s were poor in any of those categories to start with. 

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<cough> <cough>

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dyl1dyl said:

Wow, 14 pages of "impressions" and canjam hasn't even started. Haha, looks like the LCD-3 thread is well on its way to overtaking the LCD-2 mega thread

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That's because people are so disgusted with how much bs is already surrounding this product. these things cost.
 
Purrin: I hope you're right. I really hope you're right, however I think the Sr-009's 5K greed may have done this one... Expect more 2k 'products' from the following companies to well... follow..
Without being too melodramatic, this is a sad day for Head-fiers everywhere.. That much is certainty.
 
We do not give in, and We do not agree. But we certainly DO NOT purchase. LCD-3.
 
You're right. Stax is a market geared for the insane (in a good way =) ) and represents the pinnacle of well... audio in general. It's ok for them to have niche products, but even 5k is pushing it. The sr-007 approached the realms of reality for any headphone (which was about $1350) when it was newly released. This arbitrary 5k - 2k nonsense is rubbish.
 
But HD 800 is the worst example of bullcrap in the market and it started the whole "lets chase after the Japanese arbitrarily!" effect. Bottom line. I don't think any headphone should be more than 1250$ and most of the flagships should be around 600-750$. Perhaps one or 2 @ 800.
 
The analogy of the market being a sinking ship is dead on. Again, democracy always dies with thunderous applause.
 
Fast forward to reality! Well folks, here come the 2k flagships from the other companies. *Facepalm.* It's as if they're 'competing' but not competing. They collectively want higher prices on their 100$ or less to produce product. At least stax has some lineage, common sense, and more complexity and high result to their claims.
 
Effing Orpheus and Sennheiser coming along and messing with the status quo.

IMO, the LCD 2s are already great, though they are probably the least comfortable flagships apart from the Grados imo, but for double the money, the LCD-3s better have fantabulous sound as the comfort and design looks to have remained the same./deproved.

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purrin said:

<cough> <cough>

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Yeah, its true, they are HEAVY!
 
I actually find the weight very reassuring for some reason, some part of me thinks there is no better vibration control than sheer weight.  To crank the "old" LCD2s up so freakin loud, but not a trace of cup or frame vibrations.  It would be great if they could lighten them up, but under only the condition that vibration control is not compromised.

I don't know why you are losing your mind so much over the pricing.  Yeah, if it is outside your price range, that's disappointing, but in no way will this be the downfall of the headphone industry in terms of pricing.  High end will always carry a high price and if you won't pay for it, then be happy with the middle ground.  
 
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hennyo said:

 
That's because people are so disgusted with how much bs is already surrounding this product. these things cost.
 
Purrin: I hope you're right. I really hope you're right, however I think the Sr-009's 5K greed may have done this one... Expect more 2k 'products' from the following companies to well... follow..
It's a sad day for Head-fiers.

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Quote:

hennyo said:

 
That's because people are so disgusted with how much bs is already surrounding this product. these things cost.
 
Purrin: I hope you're right. I really hope you're right, however I think the Sr-009's 5K greed may have done this one... Expect more 2k 'products' from the following companies to well... follow..
It's a sad day for Head-fiers.

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LOL. I'll give the Japanese a special exception because they go nuts over stuff. I mean the STAX T2 amp was a major contributor to driving STAX into bankruptcy. This one, the LCD-3, smacks a little bit too much of opportunism and greed, which is worse in my book than obsessive insanity for the pursuit of excellence. Part of this wierd feeling I have comes from the of the poor consistency and probable poor driver matching (I would need more samples to make a stronger statement) of the LCD-2. I've heard about a dozen different LCD-2s and they've all sounded different; and let's not even talk about the measurements. For them to take the next step up makes me extremely wary.
 

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sp wild said:

I didn't think the LCD2s were poor in any of those categories to start with.  It would be nice if the LCD3s were lighter and therefore required less clamping force for the sake of unfortunate members, such as Googleli, that love the signature but could not adapt to the weight.
 
I would never purchase anything that would cause me physical pain, fortunately, I adapted to the LCD2s weight easily - even to Grados odd ergonomics!

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Really, the workmanship of the LCD-2 was poor:
- Check out the insides of the drill holes, if you aren't too careful, you could easily end of with a wooden shard in you finger!
- Check out the surface of the veneered wood, see the irregularity?
- Check out the alignment of the metal plate, is it absolutely centered in the wooden enclosure? do the 4 screw holes fit in a perfect circle? And by the way, directly screwing into the wood with screws that small is asking for problems.
- I have the ADZ5 and let me tell you that they are twisted bizarrely.
- The FR curves shows quite a bit of difference between different drivers and Purrin's measure shows some inconsistency between lift and right side.
- etc... the list of flaws is too long to enumerate
 
Quote:

googleli said:

I don't think you can demand anything "flawless" at $2,000 or any price for that matter. That price can at best buy you a decent mid range power cord in high end speaker systems. I just hope that they are a bit more comfortable to wear this time, and if they sound better (at least not worst), that's a plus. I don't intend to become a collector so I will probably sell one of the LCD-2 Rev 1 or the LCD-3 after I have heard for myself.

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- I'm not asking for absolutely flawless but for a level of polish fitting their price, at least Denon D7000 level or better Edition 10 level.
 
 

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purrin said:

LOL. I'll give the Japanese a special exception because they go nuts over stuff. I mean the STAX T2 amp was a major contributor to driving STAX into bankruptcy. This one, the LCD-3, smacks a little bit too much of opportunism and greed, which is worse in my book than obsessive insanity for the pursuit of excellence. Part of this wierd feeling I have comes from the of the poor consistency and probable poor driver matching (I would need more samples to make a stronger statement) of the LCD-2. I've heard about a dozen different LCD-2s and they've all sounded different; and let's not even talk about the measurements. For them to take the next step up makes me extremely wary.
 

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The Inner Fidelity article http://www.innerfidelity.com/content/comparing-world-class-headphones measures all the top headphones.  The LCD2s go toe to toe with STAX in measurements.  Except the STAX 009s have better distortion.