following your motto, you could judge Ferrari or Lambo a bad car if you try them on a farm or a small medieval village! My opinion is that everything have to judge in a right context.   You consider lovely place Rome because you don't live there, i'll be in Florida on 15/03 .... my dream...

Sorry, I can deduce that you prefer LCD-2, so I'd like you to note that price and weight are in favor of HE500. i think when you'll drive the LCD-2 with a best amp than yours, you'll notice many improvements.

sorry, i forgot to say that the cable is the same but change the connection i agree with you, amp is very important for the sonic results and also the connection for this headphone

  my experience, i bought the HE 500 first time one year ago, driving it in unbalanced mode, sound was dark and without heart, no impression in no way. (Trafomatic Head One and Naim CD5X) a few month ago, in a trade i took again he500 with all balanced cable because now i have a 300b Amp with...

new upgrade Lector Digicode 2.24 (+ parallel DACKit) --> Tektron TK300B-S-Ref --> DIY Speaker-Headphone Adapter --> HD800 or HE500

that's my signal cable. Bullet Plug and quad 22AWG cable teflon/kapton isulated

  From company site:   "Tube selection is made to achieve sufficient gain and output power with only one triode."

I assure that i use it!   Leaving out Naim, white gloss is elegant, one time WAF is respected! About the sound, IMHO be careful matching Naim CD5X with Trafomatic because all two are slightly warm.  

that's mine!       HD 800/(cable: 8 cores 4N OCC Silver plated hand made) - Trafomatic Audio Experience Head One - Naim CD5X/FlatCap2X

New upgrade! Now I'm very happy! Ipod 80GB - Sony PHA-1 - Westone UM3X-RC  

...and mine is here!   westone UM3X-RC FiiO E11 FiiO lod L9 Ipod Classic 80GB full  

what do you think about Grado + Headroom ? it would be a good match?