[illissius]

 
Hi everyone,
 
I'm in the market for a new pair of earphones after my Vibes finally gave up the ghost (or, at least, half of them did). Before the Vibes I had Shure E2cs, which, coming from plain-old earbuds, made realize I might after all be an audiophile (somewhat to my surprise); the Vibes helped me realize that I really, really love bass. So I'm looking for something with great sound quality, great bass, and in a relatively lower-end price range.
 
More specifically, I think my criteria are something like this:
 

1. Relatively inexpensive ($50-100ish with some flexibility in either direction)
2. Great bass, soundstage (I'm not sure if that term refers to a thing, a quality, or both), and over-all sound quality
3. I don't use an amp so low impedance is a plus
4. Either durable or has a long warranty (my last four earphones/earbuds died from the cable breaking below the ear)
5. Comfortable
6. Looks neither goofy nor gaudy (metally rather than plasticy would be preferred)
7. 'Straight down' rather than behind-neck or over-ear cords
8. Available in or ships to Hungary (which implies shipping/VAT/import fees, but ignore that)

 
On all of these criteria except for durability I was quite satisfied with the Vibes, so you can use that as a reference point, though I think I'm looking for an upgrade.
 
After several hours of researching last night the Monster Turbines seem like an extremely desirable option, but the price ($150) is at the very high-end of my range.* I can spend that much if it's really, really worth it, but if there's something else nearly as good for less, I might rather go for that instead. The variety is so great though that I couldn't really narrow it down to any other specific options. Does anyone have any recommendations?
 
Thanks.
 
(Edit: The Fischer Audio Silver Bullet, Xears TD100, and ViSang R03 look sort of interesting, but I kind of picked them out at random so it doesn't really reflect any particular comparing and contrasting on my part, and there's probably a ton of other great options I missed. I also don't know how these would compare to the Monsters given their much lower price.) 
 
* When I discovered they had been on sale at Amazon for $60 only a few days ago I nearly stabbed myself. Is there any significant chance of a similar sale anywhere else in the near future?

 

[QuantumXL]

I'm sure you are able to find the turbines for that decent price. Even if it was $60 bucks, the shipping would have probably been a pretty pricetag anyhow; however, those are pretty easy to find. Might not be $58 USD but pretty close to it. Maybe 70-80 if you are lucky. Klipsch Image S4's are very popular if you are really interested in bass. Many good reviews have came out for these. The S4's are where my origins were original. But I do have to say the build quality was crap. Sound stage was pretty good, bass heavy, and decent mids; although highs were fairly tinny. They cost MSRP $80 USD and you can find these for $65 USD on ebay if you are lucky. There is going to be a sale this weekend on saturday (11/27) on the amazon gold box deal from ultimate ears. You might want to keep your eyes split for what comes on that day. Last year the TF10's were $100 bucks, and let me tell you that would be the best $100 dollars you would spend if that deal were to come around town again. So you might want to wait until this saturday to make your judgment. Pretty neutral headphones, recessed mids. I don't know if they are going to repeat this sale again, but you might want to be prepared. Just my 2 cents. I'm sure other audiophiles can suggest other headphones, but like you, I am new to this.

 

[illissius]

 
The S4s do indeed look interesting, thanks for the tip. What I'm still unclear on, even after a bunch of searching and reading, is how these $60-80 phones (including the ones I edited into the OP and many others) compare to the more-expensive Turbines. It seems like for any given earphones I can find endless raving reviews about how it sounds better than God and outclasses everything else for their price, which makes it difficult to choose. With regards to the $60-80 options, are they around half as good as the Turbines, in line with their price, or are they more like nearly as good, and going up the price scale follows the law of diminishing returns rather than being linearish? Obviously experience is subjective and you can't quantify 'good', but in a general sense. (And I'm sure there's also options around or below the Turbine's price point which are as good or better... I'm very much suffering from the paradox of choice here.)
 
 
Quote:

I'm sure you are able to find the turbines for that decent price. Even if it was $60 bucks, the shipping would have probably been a pretty pricetag anyhow; however, those are pretty easy to find. Might not be $58 USD but pretty close to it. Maybe 70-80 if you are lucky.

 
Where would you suggest? Ebay? Does this look legit? (What's Dr. Dre got to do with it?) I'm also pretty sure I'd miss out on the warranty that way, which is a shame (though also less of a concern if I'm paying $60 rather than $150).
 
At any rate, I guess I'll wait until Saturday in case Amazon comes out with another super-duper-awesome deal.
 

 

[illissius]

So after way more research and some thinking I've narrowed it down and focused my criteria a bit.
 
When I say I like bass, what I like is _deep_ bass, the very deepest end of the range. To take two pieces of music probably everyone is familiar with as examples, both Wherever I May Roam and Nothing Else Matters by Metallica have similarly powerful bass, but in Nothing Else Matters it's a heck of a lot deeper. That's what I really like. It has a soothing quality. I don't want music which isn't bassy to become bassy, but for music which -is- bassy, I definitely want that to come out. Maybe even emphasized, but not at the expense of sound quality in general.
 
With regards to soundstage, I have less of a grasp on what terms like 'wide', 'closed', 'depth', etc. actually sound like (mainly due to limited experience). In any case, I like to feel like I'm standing in the middle of the band, with the various instruments and vocalists playing around me. If anyone's listened to Eléanor by The Gathering, I absolutely love how the drums in various parts of it sound very clearly like they're being played right below you, while the rest of the band is off to the sides or ahead/above, and this comes through even with phones which, well, suck. But the point is it would be nice to have this for other music as well.
 
What I listen to: post- and prog- metal and rock, various experimental things, and chillout/downtempo/trip-hop probably covers a lot of it, though I try to keep it varied. For details.
 
I've narrowed my options down to three: Monster Turbine ($150), Fischer Audio Silver Bullet ($60), and potentially Panasonic RP-HJE900 ($90).
 
Monster Turbine:
+ Description of sound seems to match what I'm looking for, is regarded as high quality
+ Seems to generate the most 'holy crap' moments among first-time listeners, though this is highly unscientific
+ Looks nice
+ 3 year warranty
- build quality is regarded as not so great, especially the cables (has this changed?)
- expensive
 
Fischer Audio Silver Bullet:
+ Sound quality is regarded as one of the best in the price range and seems to be similar to what I'm looking for, though information here is less definitive
+ Looks fricking awesome
+ Not so expensive
- Cables again regarded as low quality, though have gotten better (less bad?) with rev 2
 
Panasonic RP-HJE900:
+ With a cubic zirconium body and detachable cables it seems like the last word in terms of durability
+ Formerly a $250 phone so presumably sound quality should be very good
- Description of sound seems not to match what I'm looking for so much (bass is powerful in the upper- rather than lower-end, said to be sibilant, and I've heard words like 'harsh' and 'aggressive' tossed around)
- Actual warranty is very short
 
 
In the end I guess my choice comes down to the Silver Bullets or the Turbines; the awesome durability of the Panasonics is more of a man-that-would-be-nice-to-have rather than a must-have, as enjoyable sound is. The Bullets and Turbines are both regarded as being very good in their price range, but their price range is very different. Does anyone know how they compare directly? I've found very little information on this. Comparisons to the HJE900 or (first-gen) Vibes might also be informative (or among any of these four). Or, if there's some other phones I've missed which fit with what I want better than any of these three, I would obviously be glad to hear of it.