Well, this is my first post here (congrats are accepted).
After I failed to find MX400/500 in my little town of Moscow I found myself at this forum (and on a headwize.com one) and found invaluable info. In short, the choice of earbuds/light ports is not that big MXs, EX70, 888s, KSC-35 and top-of-the line Aiwa (though Aiwa is sort of terra incognito)
Since Sony rarely provides best price/quality ratio, KSCs cost >40$ here, MXs were absent, I decided that I'll bet on a "dark horse". Today I've bought Aiwa ED500 headphones (its the same ED400 headphones blr+ was talking about, with a volume control). There is some confusion about namings, but thanks to another forum (at headwize.com) I found the light. North American V551/V553 are the same headphones as European ED400/ED500 (btw v161 is ED100, so fi you want smth near top of the line look elsewhere). There is also ED700 (that with some sapphire coating and so on, but nearly all ppl who listened to them on the web say they suck in comparison with ED400/500). So ED400/500 is "de facto" top of the line. I paid 14$ for my new earbuddies.
Now for impressions. In noisy places it was hard to judge, since I didn't manage to achieve good isolation - that rubber things suck IMHO (I think I'll mod headphones in a way Blr+ did it - will put foamies instead of that rubber thors). But when I got to more or less quiet place, I was more and more amazed. I'm not an audioexpert or smth (all I can compare my buds to is behind-the neck-Philips HS501 and old AKG K4 (btw does anyone knows smth about that AKG phones?), but it seems that no detail can hide from that ED500s. (on Bach CD every push on pedal and even at one moment some subtle and strange vibration of organ, that clearly was not welcomed by sound engineers were clearly audible; on "the 3 Tenors" CD I could easily hear every movement in orchestra band, chairs and floor squeaks and so on. On Queen CD in "Somebody to love" during most important point of Freddie's solo I was surprised to clearly and unexpectedly hear like he swallows saliva before going to another peak (never heard it before).
Highs and mid-highs are very clear. I'd like bass to be stronger, but IMHO the modification will improve it. Mid-lows, hmm there's smth I don't like about them in some moments, but I don't understand what - sound was a bit muddy a couple of times (or maybe some recordings are not so clear).
And finally, at some moments the sound is VERY realistic. When I was walking alone on a road, listening to "Wish you were here", and in one track there is that laughter in left channel, well when I heard it, I started from suddenness and looked over my left shoulder as if someone was behind me. I believed the sound of human voice that much only while watching "StarWars1" in Dolby-equpipped cinema (I looked behind my shoulder everytime the mother of Anakin called her son - i was thinking the controller wants to ask me about smth
All in all, very pleased with my first quality earbuds (but not totally blown away - all in all its earbuds), but I think I'll also buy MX400/500 for comparison.
P.S. Woooooh.