The cost of the spare parts probably has little relation to the cost of manufacture or their proportional cost of the overall headphone. Spare part cost is more likely correlated with how much you're prepared to spend on the parts (or how much the manufacture thinks you're prepared to spend). If...

Sounds like I'm going to have fun then. i have an M-DAC, iDSD nano, Xonar Essence One and Xonar STX. so hours of playing

Well that's a relief. I bought the hd700s at a substantial discount (~ 40% off RRP). They arrive today so I'm looking forward to giving them a run in

I have a pair of HD600s and just ordered a pair of HD700s as I saw them at a good price. Then I saw this article. I hope I'm not going to regret the purchase of the HD700s

Hopefully the replacement the send you works properly. I've only had mine a few weeks but it's a pleasure to listen through.

Did you get the firmware from this page: http://ifi-audio.com/ifi-xmos-firmware/? I had problems until I downloaded and installed this update. Since then it's worked perfectly

1. Sennheiser HD600 = primary phones for listening at home 2. Sennheiser IE80 = For when I'm on the go 3. Audio Technica ATH-AD900 = very nice but too light on the bass for some music 4. B&W P5 5. Sennheiser IE7