[technetium]

Well my littlebrother is soon having his birthday (15 nov, 13 years) and I am looking for a gift, and what better gift is there than some good headphones.

Remember I live in Denmark!

He will be using them for games on the computer and for his psp, and perhaps with his mp3.

I know the following list is very "colourful", but they all have advantages and disadvantages.
I think he will like closed cans, that look "cool", he does not know much about good sound, but soon he will become one of us... I hope

I have had my eyes on these:

DT 231
Sony mdr xd 200
Koss portapro/75
sennheiser 400-500

other surgestions???

I hope you can help me, I really can´t deside, so I need some fresh eyes on the case.

 

[apnk]

I would say the dt231. Over at headphone.com they say that they are some of the best under $100.

 

[sgrossklass]

With a warm-sounding source, DT231s are quite good indeed, though they're generally regarded to be more ugly than stylish - well, space age silver Senns are definitely worse

. (They can be improved a bit with some foam behind the drivers - I used soft foam ~2 cm thick. Quite a decent soundstage for inexpensive closed cans, though they can be a bit bright. Not much isolation where it matters, but decently comfy in return [velour pads]. I'd suggest to break 'em in for a few hours before giving them away, mine sounded somewhat telephone-like straight out of the box which quickly improved after an hour or so.) In terms of Senns, the HD497 is the most attractive model of the old series (sound wise at least

), followed in quite a distance by the HD477. Perhaps look at the HD465 as well, or if isolation is required, the 212 Pro (though this has rather monstrous bass). XD200s are more like HD201 competition, pricing is quite similar here. When considering PortaPros, you can look at PX100s as well (they're supposed to have not particularly good positioning though). KSC-75s are always a nice budget option, but don't expect much soundstaging here either. I don't think Philips has much in this price range, HP805s are more like open competitors of HD201/XD200, dunno about the qualities of the (closed) HP830.

BTW, it wouldn't hurt to post your budget and what the cans would cost you.

 

[azncookiecutter]

KSC-75s are a great way to start off a budding audiophile, and they're cheap to boot too.

 

[Greisen]

You have a little brother! What a horrible thought. More people like you…

Of those you have listed, get the mx450 or the ksc75.

You could also get the senn px100. They are available in white, since that seems too be popular amongst the young ones…

 

[technetium]

Greisen... You have a littlebrother and a littlesister!!! Now thats scary! And you are named (first name) after the most losing tennisplayer in the world! Ha take that.

Well the budget is about 30-50 euro, the dt 231 cost about 40 euro, ksc75 is 33 euro.

 

[sgrossklass]

That Koss stuff is a tad expensive in .dk. Here in .de you can get 'em for 21.95 shipped from Amazon. (IIRC my KSC-50s still cost at least 10€ more about 2 years ago, and the first sample didn't even work properly. Incidentally, I never really liked them all that much since they still have a bit of that "cheap" sound.) PX100 pricing starts from 32€. Interestingly DT231s are similarly priced here, not quite 40. (I was lucky to find my "PRO"s for <40 shipped on Ebay, apparently from a hi-fi store clearing out old stock.)

 

[Kameleon]

Do Komplett have a Danish store? They've got decent prices on Koss phones, I'd recommend UR-40 (same drivers as the rest, just full-size) if you're looking into full-size cans.

 

[wolfen68]

Quote:

Originally Posted by technetium Well my littlebrother is soon having his birthday (15 nov, 13 years) and I am looking for a gift, and what better gift is there than some good headphones.

Well, another good gift would be to grant him a few weeks rest from being your personal slave

 

[technetium]

Well finally a package from Germany arrived, to be precise from thomann.de.

I ended up buying the dt231, i got them in the same delivery as some 414 pads for my and "Greisen"´s grado´s, which we had been waiting for for four weeks

Now I just hope my brother like them, I sure have a hard time keeping my hands of them...cause... they are just lying there... waiting.
Hmm perhaps they would like a burn in before my brother gets them?

They look so innocent, in a way only new headphones can.

 

[Chri5peed]

Quote:

Originally Posted by technetium Now I just hope my brother like them, I sure have a hard time keeping my hands of them...cause... they are just lying there... waiting. Hmm perhaps they would like a burn in before my brother gets them? They look so innocent, in a way only new headphones can.

Yes definitely, leave them running until the night before.

 

[sgrossklass]

Quote:

Originally Posted by technetium Now I just hope my brother like them, I sure have a hard time keeping my hands of them...cause... they are just lying there... waiting. Hmm perhaps they would like a burn in before my brother gets them? They look so innocent, in a way only new headphones can.

Do give them at least a few hours of playtime at normal to higher volume. I found that they improved greatly after roughly an hour. After the first few hours, I didn't really pay attention to changes any more.