[Graz]

So you’re moseying through life…maybe it’s at home, or at the office, or cruising mobile…and somebody happens to notice your headphones/headphone gear. Usually the people doing the noticing aren’t into head-fi…no big deal there, I mean granted it’s a fairly exclusive club.

So on the semi-rare occasion that this does happen to me, I tend to sigh inwardly a bit because I’m pretty sure how the next few minutes of my life are gonna go down. It usually goes something like this:

You begin to describe the gear. This is almost invariably met with polite nods and smiles, but the nods and smiles are a front for the utter lack of real interest in what you’re saying. In my estimation, what these facial reactions and body gestures are really saying is: “Crap, I wish I hadn’t asked anything about his guy’s headphone gear in the first place…where’s the eject button?”…and…”This guy’s insane, I can’t believe he’s wasting so much money on this crap.”

So after you describe the gear, there’s generally (but not always) an invitation offered to give said gear a listen. Your captive audience (while still fumbling for a graceful out) will generally accept your offer at this point out of sheer politeness, but with no real interest in giving the gear a serious, meaningful listen. Almost without fail, the “listening session” goes down something like this:

- He/she puts on the headphones for about 15 seconds (in rare cases 30 seconds, but on no occasion that I’ve ever encountered has it ever been over 60 seconds)
- He/she fiddles with the volume control a bit.
- He/she removes the headphones, smiles, tells you how great they sound and promptly ejects at the earliest possible moment.

And as they’re walking off, they’re rationalizing their 15 second “listening session” to line up with their belief that you’ve wasted far too much money on your stupid headphone crap. But you know with absolute certainty that the amount of listening time given by the listener was totally inadequate to form any meaningful opinion, and basically you’ve both wasted 5-10 minutes of each other’s lives.

So ok…yes, there has been the rare exception when a truly interested audio nut really “gets it”, and really appreciates what you’ve got…but this almost never happens. In my experience, the above scenario is the norm.

Does this happen to anyone else?

Peace,

Graz

 

[robzy]

*nods* Its happened countless times

Rob.

 

[iSleipnir]

I managed to do this to my girlfriend and no one else. I bough her a pair of Sony V6's and she loves them (way better than the ipod earbuds

) and now I managed to get her more interested in music as a proxy. She raves that she can actaully hear things in the music now. My mom can appreciate the difference in headphones and the quality but still gives me the motherly "are you sure thats what you want to spend your money on?" or "I like it but thats sure a lot of money."

 

[fraseyboy]

I played some live Jazz into my pair of Altec AHP-512's and plooped 'em on me mum's head and she closed here eyes and was like 'ooh i feel like im there' and she was kinda annoying when i took them off her....

 

[daba]

So far, my roommate and his girlfriend have tried my HD-650's and both were absolutely enthralled by their performance. Given, they too were skeptical about the amount of money I invested into my setup but the performance was "awesome."

 

[bangraman]

Every time. The sequence is usually "nice" and then "how much?!?". Or in the case of the hardened speaker audiophile, "yeah... that's OK. I suppose it's good if you can't use speakers". I never offer by the way to people who I know aren't into it. I will reciprocate if asked.

Quote:

But you know with absolute certainty that the amount of listening time given by the listener was totally inadequate to form any meaningful opinion

That's odd. The same listening session is thought enough by many on Head-Fi to authoritatively comment on phones / sources.

 

[cosmopragma]

Never respective not yet.
Everyone I know is into a strange and expensive hobby.Yesterday I borrowed my peer's $8500 bicycle during lunch break for a short ride, and he borrowed my current portable rig.(Iriver DAP/Porta Corda II/Grado RS-1).
At the end we both had a smile on our faces and agreed that life is too short to waste it with mediocre stuff.
Even my spouse likes my gear.Sometimes she utilizes my Stax rig to enjoy her favorite "Lord of the Rings" soundtrack, and she often plugs the RS-1 directly into the TV in order to not disturb my listening sessions.
Who can ask for more?

 

[Capt. Z]

Well, your experience kind of mirrors an experience a fellow missionar friend of mine had a while back. We are a bunch of missionaries in Spain and some of us get together occassionally to chat.

Well, one day, my friend Fernado was invited to another missionary - Jeff. Jeff said he loves wine, so Fernado took a $ 50 bottle of wine (which was given to him as a gift) to Jeff. As they poured in the wine, Jeff pulled up a bottle Gasiosy (carbonated Water with artificial sweetner) and mixed it into his wine.

Many people are the same when it comes to music and stereo equipment. As long as it makes boom boom and tsss, tsss it sounds wonderful to them. No matter if this is cheap crap or high end stuff, they just "don't know better".

I usually prefer not to talk about my HiFi stuff with None-audiophiles, since they really have no idea about what we are talking about.

 

[~AZ~]

.

 

[seeberg]

It happens to me sometimes, sometimes it doesn't. It's a mixed reaction with mixed enthusiasm. Sometimes I just like to have people ask: "Hey, what are those/what are you listening to?" And just say, "Here you go. Leave them on for three minutes for best results."

Add that scenario to a cute girl being the one with the questions and that my friends, would be quite the experience, IMO.

,
Abe

 

[Jasper994]

Maybe if you change the presentation order you'll get better results/waste less time.

Person asks about headphone gear--> You reply, listen first ask questions later --> You hand them your headphones --> Play something they like --> If they're not interested, terminate here--> If they're mildly interested just tell them it's hi-fi and leave it at that -OR- If they're some what interested, give short discription -OR- If they are fairly interested, give medium discription, etc.

Also, when you tell them about your gear you might try the F.A.B. method of telling them about it... That's Feature Advantage Benefit. In other words, explain the feature, its advantage, and then tell them how it will benefit them.

If all this is too much effort for you, give 'em the blow off...


BTW, Seeburg, I like the new avatar much, much better

 

[seeberg]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jasper994 BTW, Seeburg, I like the new avatar much, much better

Hehe, everyone does! It helps to be one smooth lookin' mofo

,
Abe

 

[arielext]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Friend those phones cost €900,- ? DUDE!

Nope, never happend to me while talking about my in ears

 

[yaufei]

It has never happnened to me so far, becuase i had never brought my headphones out.

However, people often stare at my e4c when i use them outside.

 

[elmoe]

That's happened to me a few times already