[raypin]

  Some may say the Sennheiser HD598 is probably 80% to 90% as good as the HD800. I guess some might say the Sennheiser PX100II is 80% to 90% as good as the HD598. I guess some would say the Soundmagic ES18 at $13 sounds 80% to 90% as good as the PX100II. See where this leads?

 
 
Mmm......exactly. It is the law of increasing stupidity at work.

 

[Me x3]

  I was just thinking about how long someone in a very poor country would need to work to afford a $1600 Sennheiser HD800. Let's assume they earn 30 cents an hour, and luxury goods have a 100% tax on them. So 10,667 hours of work would be needed. The average American works less hours than that over 5 years. 

 
Here in Argentina you need 2 month of work (considering average salary) to buy a Sennheiser HD800.
 
In other words, it's harder to get HD800 here than SR-009 in the US.

 

[jibzilla]

   
Mmm......nope. @complin's post can be quoted.

 
Well I tried to quote him and nothing would pop up. More than once. Kind of littered throughout the last few pages as well... so yeah.

 

[jaycalgary]

Can't understand why this thread keeps going on and on about the price. Hopefully in a couple years they come out with a plainer less expensive audiophile version. Do you really want a marble amp with motorized tubes and knobs? Probably has a remote. Finally a headphone for the people that run drug cartels.  The 80's must have been the pinnacle of high end audio to drool over and had an unreachable price tag for most. Still I am just hoping they eventually sell the headphones by themselves at a price that will hurt but can manage and can run on a Stax amp. Truth is the headphones will probably wont even have the build quality of the 009s

 

[bmichels]

Any new techno am infos about this "orpheus succes or" ? So you believe that they will really bring it to market or did they just wantto create some buzz ( which they succeded) ?

PS: I would have prefered a HD800 successor which will Fix the treble issue some people have.

 

[complin]

From personal experience parts of the 009 build are not as good as previous models. Particularly the headband height adjustment which is rather poor plastic.  After it breaking twice I have resorted to superglue!
 
Quote:

 
probably wont even have the build quality of the 009s

 

[JK1]

  Well, 10,667 hours of work would be needed, but only if they're going to spend all those earnings on the Sennheiser and nothing else.  For someone who needs to work for 10,667 in order to earn $1600 (which would be hardly sufficient for the needs of basic daily subsistence), blowing that $1600 on a luxury item such as a headphone is practically guaranteed never to happen, for obvious reasons (beginning with the reason that the concept of "savings" may never come to represent a practical sustainable option for such an individual, let alone the idea of accumulating any kind of "disposable income" for luxury-item purchases)...  I can't help thinking that in order to arrive at a fairer estimate of how many hours a person in that income bracket may really need in order to be able to afford a $1600 pair of cans, you would have to apply a far less generous/forgiving method!  This is not to say that a person in such an income bracket in such a poor country can never own a Sennheiser HD 800 in the real world...  Of course they can, but in order to make that acquisition, they would have to resort to means that are different from (and have nothing to do with) those that they rely on for their usual annual income  

 

I was not thinking that the person earning 30 cents an hour is buying $1600 headphones. I was thinking about a relatively prosperous person in one of those countries, perhaps someone who owns his own business considering buying $1600 headphones($3200 with a 100% luxury tax). Thinking that the amount he needs to pay for the headphone represents 5 years of working for the average person in his country might get him to decide that buying such luxuries is not reasonable, and perhaps paying $200 a headphone($100 headphone plus $100 in luxury tax) might be much more appropriate, and perhaps donating the remaining $3,000 to some good charities makes much more sense.

 

[sahmen]

  I was not thinking that the person earning 30 cents an hour is buying $1600 headphones. I was thinking about a relatively prosperous person in one of those countries, perhaps someone who owns his own business considering buying $1600 headphones. Thinking that the amount he needs to pay for the headphone represents 5 years of working for the average person in his country might get him to decide that buying such luxuries is not reasonable, and perhaps paying $200 a headphone($100 headphone plus $100 in luxury tax) might be much more appropriate, and perhaps donating the remaining $3,000 to some good charities makes much more sense.

Okay, understood.  Sorry for mis-reading the point of your earlier post.

 

[Makiah S]

  I don't buy into this. To be leading edge high end, there is NO WAY Sennheiser will manage to build a DAC to do it justice in that tiny space.
Cramped compromised power supply, heat from the circuits all affect that.
 
Those 'moving' tubes must be on a cradle, more things to go wrong, wires to snap off. Are those tubes in Push-Pull configuration, why 6 tubes of the same type?
 
The case for the phones doesn't look deep enough for the width of the frame and driver housing, so more space used for that inside the amp.
 
The design of the USB input is absolutely  crucial to the level of sound quality. Unless they buy that in from MSB or similar it will be not be right IMO.
 
This is hi-fi jewellery to me. I hope I am wrong. The original Orpheus gained legendary status, but the world has moved on. Many who heard the Orpheus say it is not accurate.
 
What I would prefer would be a top stat headphone to compete with the 009. I have no interest in an Amp + DAC & Phone combo - too many compromises.
 
Lets wait till someone we trust has heard it.....

So it's a $40K System... hmm yea kinda think we'd better wait 

 

 

[ScuderiaHeadFi]

I try not to confuse populism and consumerism.  Many seem to think that things that look like they can be purchased (as a consumer good) should actually be made purchasable (to a wide base of people).  I beg to differ.  Some things in this world are made not for the sake of purchase but as realizations of human capability.  It is an attempt at designing/engineering, and actually creating in real life, an object which is meant to stand at the pinnacle of what human beings can achieve at any point in time.  If Sennheiser actually sell some of these audio systems - just as if Naim actually sell some Statement systems, Lamborghini actually sell some Veneno roadsters, or Jeff Koons actually sells some balloon animal sculptures - then good for them.  But that is not the point, relative to society.  The point is to realize something that otherwise would exist only in fantasy, something that is surprisingly concrete but touches on our brains' most unbound idealizations of familiar objects.  We should not obsess with these objects' market potential.  We should view them more as Faberge eggs, Aztec sun calendars, Ming vases, and Mona Lisas - singular, emblematic, monumental.  If you own one, it is not because you bought it with your money.  It is because such an achievement rises to the place of shared human heritage, and we as humans collectively own those objects in the abstract.

 

[JK1]

  I try not to confuse populism and consumerism.  Many seem to think that things that look like they can be purchased (as a consumer good) should actually be made purchasable (to a wide base of people).  I beg to differ.  Some things in this world are made not for the sake of purchase but as realizations of human capability.  It is an attempt at designing/engineering, and actually creating in real life, an object which is meant to stand at the pinnacle of what human beings can achieve at any point in time.  If Sennheiser actually sell some of these audio systems - just as if Naim actually sell some Statement systems, Lamborghini actually sell some Veneno roadsters, or Jeff Koons actually sells some balloon animal sculptures - then good for them.  But that is not the point, relative to society.  The point is to realize something that otherwise would exist only in fantasy, something that is surprisingly concrete but touches on our brains' most unbound idealizations of familiar objects.  We should not obsess with these objects' market potential.  We should view them more as Faberge eggs, Aztec sun calendars, Ming vases, and Mona Lisas - singular, emblematic, monumental.  If you own one, it is not because you bought it with your money.  It is because such an achievement rises to the place of shared human heritage, and we as humans collectively own those objects in the abstract.

There are companies that make a very expensive flagship model not to profit directly from its sales, but rather to gain publicity, and to make plenty from the sale of its lower priced models. If the lower priced models are 1/5 to 1/10th or so the price of the flagship model, then they are likely affordable for many more people. Besides which, for example after seeing a $5,000 portable music player, the model priced at $500 doesn't seem as ridiculously expensive to many than it would have been if they hadn't seen the $5,000 model.

 

[bearFNF]

Kinda like this...HUH? Do it cuz you can not cuz it is useful/affordable or anything...

 

 
This is a joke so don't get bent.
 
As far as this orifice..er...Orpheus 2 or whatever they will call it...it could sound the best (to someone), it could look the best (to someone), but to me the best is what I can afford and use, don't much care what other people think is the best as it really ultimately comes down to what I think in the end anyway.

 

[mscott58]

  Kinda like this...HUH? Do it cuz you can not cuz it is useful/affordable or anything...

 

 
This is a joke so don't get bent.
 
As far as this orifice..er...Orpheus 2 or whatever they will call it...it could sound the best (to someone), it could look the best (to someone), but to me the best is what I can afford and use, don't much care what other people think is the best as it really ultimately comes down to what I think in the end anyway.

What you think "in the end"? Hmmm...nicely played pun, especially given the graphic! 

 
Cheers 

 

[wink]

Sennheiser - just look at the name....... the first 3 letters are the same as the first 3 letters in sensible. But, as in all things, it's the complete word that counts.
 
Consider sensational and senile as further examples.....

 

[JK1]

  Sennheiser - just look at the name....... the first 3 letters are the same as the first 3 letters in sensible. But, as in all things, it's the complete word that counts.
 
Consider sensational and senile as further examples.....

Sennheiser was founded by Fritz Sennheiser just after WW2, and is owned by the Sennheiser family.  Their revenue is now probably over $600 million per year.