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I mostly listen electronic music and currently have a HD668b on a D-Zero, plugged on my laptop and using Spotify at max quality, I know this is quite low in quality compared to the headphones and systems you are generally talking about on this forum, but would like to know how I may improve my audio system. The DAC is not too bad and the headphones are what can be improved I guess, so what headphones would you recommend me for a price between 100 and 150$ ? HD668b is nice to hear but bass are not precise enough to me, for non bassy music they are great tho. I like warm sound, not neutral, precise and balanced.
Heya,
The #1 way to improve audio quality comes in a 2-for-one-slam:
better headphones and
high quality music.
You will get the
most improvement, honestly, from simply having much better music recordings. Streaming services have gotten better. They can produce some decent audio. But getting a high resolving headphone and using streaming service to me is just not worth it. I've tried a few and it was fairly obvious to my ears that I was listening to compressed streamed material. But that's just my experience. You can however start buying used CD's from Amazon or Half.com and looking at albums on HDtracks.com and building a lossless or very well compressed and high bit rate library of music. You'll get the single biggest improvement in overall audio experience by simply having
good recordings. A lot of stuff produced is actually low quality, even on a CD. Some albums are just a bunch of hiss from junk microphone setups and poor mastering and just cookie-cutter mass output that sound like balls on a pair of headphones, but sound ok from speakers that are a little more forgiving (assuming entry level speakers of course). If you are selective with what music you buy/listen to, it will make a monstrous difference in the overall quality of sound that you enjoy.
The second biggest improvement you can get, after the first, is to simply have the best headphone you can afford that you also enjoy the overall sound of.
The DAC & AMP make the smallest impact, compared to those first two. And I wouldn't bother replacing anything you have until you hammer down the first two.
I would not waste $150 into a headphone just yet. I would suggest you save up a bit more, and get a serious mid-fi headphone. $150 is still just going to get you entry level stuff. And frankly the HD668B is almost as good as a lot of the entry level stuff in that price range. So I don't think you're going to get much of a gain by spending $150 in that sector. But spending $250~300 in that sector will open up a world of end-game quality headphones, like the DT880, DT990, HD600, Mad Dogs, A900X, etc. And if you go used/refurb, you can get tons for your money. I know you probably didn't want to hear "spend more money" but frankly, you're losing more money by spending only $150 and eventually realizing that you want something more later, and spending even more later; when you could have skipped all that and just went with something that will easily be end-game for most people on your first go.
Very best,