[tan1415]

Hi All,
 
Need help I guess.
 It seems I cant stop buying gear.
 
Always said once i am happy with what i have...i will stop and just enjoy listening to music.
 
In the beginning..it was fun. Listening to gear and learning what signature I like. Finding out whicgh gear fits my budget and tastes.
Now I am pretty happy with what I got.
got a bassy IEM, A balanced IEM. Got my closed on ears and closed over ears...got a few bassy headphones...got my balanced headphones....got my open ear headphones. And these are my go to headphones.
 
I have also a bunch of discarded ones that i dont use anymore.
 
But someway somehow..I keep buying gear or at least seriously considering them.. If it's a great deal or has great reviews...I tend to buy.
 
|Now looking at the following: COPs, WS99, AKG 545, Hd 650, DJ7,X2, L2 A5pro and a few headphones more. 
Pretty shocking to  read the list and these are just headphones.
 
So i wonder when do you guys stop buying?
How do you stop it?
 
Heheh I am actually super curious in headphones. Just want to give them a listen after readin about them. If they are what i want..keep them. If not..i hope to sell them on. Not always succesfull sadly.

 

[squallkiercosa]

I stopped when I listened my sennheiser cx300ii and I was perfectly happy with the sound, even enjoyed them a lot more than the w4r and the day I realized my Grados were more intimate and guitars sounded better than my lcd-2.

I still buy headphones from time to time but not with the same frequency besides, I only have one pair of ears and we usually neglect many of our adquisitions. My fiancee got mad at me for spending too much time in front of a computer as well.

 

[Muinarc]

I stopped when I decided to stop splitting hairs. When you buy your first $2,000 component and you realize that, yeah it's better.... just not $2,000 better, you kind of lose your will to keep aquiring gear.

Most things under $1000 in headphones get you 90%+ of the way "there" (wherever that is). How much effort you want to put into getting that final 10% is up to you and differs for everyone.

 

[ProtegeManiac]

 
So i wonder when do you guys stop buying?
How do you stop it?

 

Think about the following:

1. All the money you spent buying and lost reselling gear could have gone towards better gear. While price isn't the only determining factor, particularly with diminishing returns in play, if for example over time buy ten headphones at an average loss of around $50 when you resell them, that's $500 that you could have spent on a better headphone or associated gear, like the amplifier.

 

2. Other nice things you have to spend on. Back when The Fast and the Furious came out there was an article on Stuff (I think) where they interviewed a street racer who ate nothing but instant noodles for around 18months so he can save up for a T66 turbo. As much as I love audio, I am not going to risk my kidneys and liver eating nothing but salty borax for that long (especially when I have a Dutch oven for slow simmering meat broths for real soup), nor am I going to miss out on weekends with my friends grilling at somebody's house - I usually spend on the steaks (or roast) since I'm the one who'll be cooking, and $50 per party on beef is a lot better than $100 on a bottle of Blue Label (and if there's enough of us, we're gonna need at least two of those).

 

Also I have other systems to worry about from time to time, but I also don't do perpetual upgrades. I installed Focal and Vifa drivers in my car along with a receiver with a good processor and I left it at that. I even removed the subwoofer and its dedicated amp at some point. I won't be getting a new system until I get a new car.

3. Necessary things you have to pay for. What's the point in nice audio systems when you rack up credit card debt or don't have anything that resembles an investment portfolio? I have life insurance naming my cat lover friends as "beneficiaries," but they're basically going to get just 10% and then keep the rest in an account to care for whatever cats and dogs I leave behind in case I croak unexpectedly. I also have some mutual funds investments, and some stocks I own directly.

 

4. Just get a rig that you will really like and can maximize. Others blame "temptation" like forum hype, but I attend the annual hi-fi show every year, basically just to get to listen to the stuff I would really, really, really like to have, but I know that even if I can afford to buy them now, the crappy acoustics in my house won't do them justice. I already have rough sketches for my house that has a listening room within a room, the antechamber serving as a display/storage area for collectibles (and CDs, HDDs), books, as well as a small reading area; ventilation and cooling will be via a split-inverter A/C; and it won't even have flagship speakers. The idea is that the room itself will not get in the way of the speakers' performance, and while it may cost a lot, that'll be part of what I loan from the bank.

 

For now I make do with this:

 

[fmzip]

I haven't bought much gear since I found JRiver.
 
Being able to tweak the sound with EQ and plug in satisfies the need to upgrade quite a bit

 

[Makiah S]

  Hi All,
 
Need help I guess.
 It seems I cant stop buying gear.
 
Always said once i am happy with what i have...i will stop and just enjoy listening to music.
 
In the beginning..it was fun. Listening to gear and learning what signature I like. Finding out whicgh gear fits my budget and tastes.
Now I am pretty happy with what I got.
got a bassy IEM, A balanced IEM. Got my closed on ears and closed over ears...got a few bassy headphones...got my balanced headphones....got my open ear headphones. And these are my go to headphones.
 
I have also a bunch of discarded ones that i dont use anymore.
 
But someway somehow..I keep buying gear or at least seriously considering them.. If it's a great deal or has great reviews...I tend to buy.
 
|Now looking at the following: COPs, WS99, AKG 545, Hd 650, DJ7,X2, L2 A5pro and a few headphones more. 
Pretty shocking to  read the list and these are just headphones.
 
So i wonder when do you guys stop buying?
How do you stop it?
 
Heheh I am actually super curious in headphones. Just want to give them a listen after readin about them. If they are what i want..keep them. If not..i hope to sell them on. Not always succesfull sadly.

Curiousity is pretty cool, and I'll say the $1000 range tends to be a cap of sorts
 
I know for me, I have one last upgrade to make, it's running me about $500 and once I make it I'll b done. The only reason I even choose to make the jump was curiousity and longevity 
 
also Instant Ramen isn't bad for you, the "spice" packet how ever is. Cullinary Arts Student... eating Ramen 24/7 q.q [minus the salt packet ofc] 

 

[bobby12]

Just think of all the other cool stuff you can buy Or be responsible and save your money.


I kind of stopped after trying after buying $1000+ equipment and realizing the improvements aren't always that much compared to mid tier gear especially when it came to dac/amps/DAPs.

 

[ProtegeManiac]

 
also Instant Ramen isn't bad for you, the "spice" packet how ever is. Cullinary Arts Student... eating Ramen 24/7 q.q [minus the salt packet ofc] 

 

I forgot one detail: in the US, borax is banned as a food additive, however in some places in Asia you can still get Chinese noodles (or brands from the mainland) that use it as an additive. Remember all the food that were pulled out of stores, and those two guys executed by firing squad over unsafe baby formula? Yeah, don't trust food from the mainland; even the ones that don't come out of factories could have been fried in gutter oil.

 

Also, that example about the guy saving up for a turbo? He was so cheap he just ate what's in the package, so imagine how much sodium that was (and if I did that myself over here, add the borax) over 18months or so. 

 

[Makiah S]

Just think of all the other cool stuff you can buy

Or be responsible and save your money.


I kind of stopped after trying after buying $1000+ equipment and realizing the improvements aren't always that much compared to mid tier gear especially when it came to dac/amps/DAPs.

Yea I'm happy to say my at home rig is FINISHED, like legit... I've got a system that I'm happy with and have no real urge to upgrade it.
 
Now my portable rig...
 
ok wow I could not find a SINGLE gif of water draining in a sink, or the cool spiral you get when you empty out your tub? You know, the WATERY SINK HOLE OF DOOOOM... shame on the internet
 
but yea, portable rig=sink hole 

 

[PleasantSounds]

Originally Posted by tan1415 /img/forum/go_quote.gif

[..]
So i wonder when do you guys stop buying?
How do you stop it?
 

 
Maybe you should start visiting the sound science forum. These guys are masters in creating strategies challenging any kind of upgrade. You'll learn quickly that:
- All amps sound the same. If they don't, it means they are defective. O2 is the reference.
- Following that logic, all tube amps are defective, as tubes can change the way they sound. No need to test.
- The same goes for DACs. Anything more expensive than ODAC is money wasted.
- If in doubt, apply DBT. That'll cure you from curiosity.
 
Here. Saved you thousands.

 

[Makiah S]

   
Maybe you should start visiting the sound science forum. These guys are masters in creating strategies challenging any kind of upgrade. You'll learn quickly that:
- All amps sound the same. If they don't, it means they are defective. O2 is the reference.
- Following that logic, all tube amps are defective, as tubes can change the way they sound. No need to test.
- The same goes for DACs. Anything more expensive than ODAC is money wasted.
- If in doubt, apply DBT. That'll cure you from curiosity.
 
Here. Saved you thousands.

Indeed, these guys are developing a science that's for sure 

 

[bobby12]

Maybe you should start visiting the sound science forum. These guys are masters in creating strategies challenging any kind of upgrade. You'll learn quickly that:
- All amps sound the same. If they don't, it means they are defective. O2 is the reference.
- Following that logic, all tube amps are defective, as tubes can change the way they sound. No need to test.
- The same goes for DACs. Anything more expensive than ODAC is money wasted.
- If in doubt, apply DBT. That'll cure you from curiosity.

Here. Saved you thousands.

You told me too late

Already wasted so much money buying and selling gears lol

 

[ProtegeManiac]

   
Maybe you should start visiting the sound science forum. These guys are masters in creating strategies challenging any kind of upgrade. You'll learn quickly that:
- All amps sound the same. If they don't, it means they are defective. O2 is the reference.

 

You might want to fix how this is phrased. It can be interpreted to mean for example that if the Stax amp driving the Stax headphone sounds different from the O2 driving the Stax headphone, the Stax amp is defective. The difference in sound isn't the amp itself but that some amps may have some difficulty driving certain headphones - the real problem is that this idea has been drastically overblown everywhere on headphone forums.