[obobskivich]

I think the Denon price fluctuations were related to a supply shortage (since the prices seem to have gone down and stayed down since all the OOS messages went away), not Amazon's normal roller-coaster economic model (see the W5000 for an example of this in action).
Quote:

My HD-650 sound better when Amazon sells them for $500. At $350 they don't sound so good. The Denon D2000 and D5000 had also huge Amazon price variations in the last months. At Amazon you can call them for a price adjustment after 30 days of purchase. I always check for price reductions after a purchase. On occasion I've gotten a refund. Best Buy has the same policy.

 

 

[zuk0v]

I bought a pair on Amazon on Jan 1 2012 and they were brand new, for around $350. Was stoked when I saw them go up in price the next week.
 
IMO just wait it out.

 

[gogators]

HD650 and K701 price increase a lot in Asia from the beginning of this year. I guess a theory of the " Chinese and Indian start to listen Hifi headphones" is being cooked. 

 

[stuge(original)]

I remember buying them for similar kind of price ,but that was in 2008 lol

 

[NoGoodNameslol]

Should I go with an alternative (ie. k701 and dt880) instead of waiting for the price of Hd650 to go down? 

 

[Dubstep Girl]

both my hd 650s i've own i've paid around 350. so the price increase is kinda interesting to see. they haven't dropped from 499 in a while now...

 

[obobskivich]

What part of enforced MAP didn't make sense? I don't mean to be nasty, but it just boggles the mind how that seemed to go entirely unnoticed. 
 
And neither of those headphones will sound like an HD650...period.
Quote:

Should I go with an alternative (ie. k701 and dt880) instead of waiting for the price of Hd650 to go down? 

 

 

[Master Chief]

This is depressing news, I was looking to buy a pair of HD650's and hate to pay $500 when a couple of months ago they were ~$350
Quote:

There was an article somewhere, can't remember where now, that explained why this is happening:
 
Sennheiser is going to start enforcing MAPs through authorized retailers more aggressively now (hence why everyone wants $499.95 - SRP - for the HD 650 now, and $249.95 - SRP - for the 598), and requiring them to conform to the MAP in order to be authorized (and hence be able to provide a legitimate warranty). The HD 598 has seen the same re-pricing to SRP in the last few months (alongside many other Sennheiser products). 
 
 
 
 

 

 

[CloakedMistborn]

I was going to buy the 650's but by the time I got my money together it had jumped to 499 so I purchased the DT880s instead. Oh well. 

 

[sinphase]

Quote:

I was going to buy the 650's but by the time I got my money together it had jumped to 499 so I purchased the DT880s instead. Oh well. 

i contacted the guy who runs razor dog and he agreed to sell the HD650's for $350. His website lists the price at $499 and he sent me a paypal invoice of $350 after I asked for a reduction. 

 

[vid]

A permanent 43 % increase in the price of the HD650, seriously? That's pretty depressing...

 

[GL1TCH3D]

Dang... 150$ increase? Too bad I'm saving up for the ED8 or else I'd get myself a pair of HD650s while there are still a few cheap places.

 

[elecsheep9]

I bought my 650s from J&R Music World early this January.  I asked them to match Amazon's price, which at the time was about $360.  The manager wouldn't come down that far.  He would only go down to like $450 of something. 
 
Frustrated, I took the salesperson to the display and showed him that the displayed price tag still said $351.  He went back to the manager who got very upset but realized he had to honor the price tag (false advertising laws prevent them from not honoring a displayed price.) 
 
I was able to get them for $351, and the salesperson immediately removed the price tag from the display.
 
I was willing to pay the amazon price for them because I figured the $351 price was a mistake, but when they wouldn't match Amazon for vague reasons (it was being sold by amazon direct and they were in stock), I went for the even better deal.
 
However, now everywhere seems to sell them for $499.  Glad I got mine when I did.

 

[Taowolf51]

I don't really understand why they would do this. They've just made all of their competitors a better and cheaper option. You can just look at some posts on this thread to see how consumers are going to react when they compare senn to other companies now.
 
I'm guessing its because the high end market is such a small part of their revenue. What they probably wanted to change with the MAP was the price of their consumer level gear, to appease their brick and mortar distributors. But even so, enforcing their MAP will not make them make any more money per sale, only their distributors will, and what they really need are raw sales numbers, which would be higher if they didn't enforce the MAP.

 

[obobskivich]

I agree with this, but I also think that they're trying to re-position their higher-end products in the market in light of newer offerings from Beats and so on; at $499 the HD 650 is now "better" from a consumer's perspective (of course it is, it costs more!), and that may well increase their profits even if they lose a few sales. It would be interesting to see the result of this a year or so out; it apparently works for Grado. 
 
I agree entirely with your appraisal of the downside though - $499 is a lot more cutthroat today than it was when the HD 650 was new; it's easy to outsell the RS2, it's not so easy to outsell the RS2, AH-D5000, ATH-W1000X, a few HiFiMan products, the ESP/950 (depending on the season), etc etc. Then again, Sennheiser is "popular." 
 
Quote:

I don't really understand why they would do this. They've just made all of their competitors a better and cheaper option. You can just look at some posts on this thread to see how consumers are going to react when they compare senn to other companies now.
 
I'm guessing its because the high end market is such a small part of their revenue. What they probably wanted to change with the MAP was the price of their consumer level gear, to appease their brick and mortar distributors. But even so, enforcing their MAP will not make them make any more money per sale, only their distributors will, and what they really need are raw sales numbers, which would be higher if they didn't enforce the MAP.