[losteden]

As a computer science student at university, I spend hideous hours (read: 14+ hours a day) in the lab. This coming academic year I'm undoubtedly going to be spending more time than ever before there, so I'm thinking of investing a bit into a better setup for the lab. My home setup consists of FLAC --> Firestone Audio Fubar III --> Penguin Amp (LM6171) --> Sennheiser HD485. This isn't really suitable for the lab, because I can't really carry around the Fubar & the HD485 are open back so the leakage will not only annoy other people in the lab but also allow noise from the lab to get in & annoy me.
 
So what I'm looking for is a reasonably priced (~£150) combination of USB DAC+amp & comfortable closed-back circum-aural cans. Primary styles of music in the lab are electronic/trance/chiptune, ambient/spacemusic & a bit of reggae & classical (I either want stuff to relax me or to stimulate me into working harder!) but I don't really want to buy equipment to cater to a specific musical style & generally lean towards equipment that is relatively neutral & diagnostic.
 
Best idea I've had so far is Firestone Audio Fireye2 --> Sony MDR-V6 + Beyerdynamic DT250 pads, but I thought I'd come & get some advice from the experts before buying anything

 

[1Time]

FWIR, the Denon D1001 is what you want for headphones - lightweight, comfy, good at not leaking sound out, good at letting you hear what's going on around you if you want (or else turn up the volume a little). Closing off the sound of coworkers around you can also be troublesome. Then spend any part of the rest of your budget on a DAC/amp.

 

[losteden]

Not sure about going supra-aural for such long listening sessions, but the D1001 certainly looks like it's worth me doing some more research into. I have Senny HD202 which have a similar type of cup that rests on part of the ear & they get painful after a few hours (though they do have a very stiff plastic headband which probably doesn't help).