What I was trying to get at there was the music concepts, not products, so thanks so much for picking up on my concept (that I wanted mo betta 404 style sound). And recommending for me to listen further...that is the greatest gift, of understanding. So thank you.
Koss 950... still available? omoshiroi, ne? (Interesting, huh...)
Quick evals? Depending on the circumstances they can be highly useful, IMO. Drink some coffee, really zone in, and trust your gut... Sometimes, to advocate always letting the hypnosis set in stymies your critical nature and is doing your greater pleasure centers a disservice - because it keeps you from searching for better things.
Some take it slow, some like it hot... I guess I like to mix it up....
I was in a store called "Akiba" in Tokyo, listening to all these phones. It is like 9 stories high, each level is same SQ FT as a best buy. Every iota of usable space in the entire complex was packed (Japanese style) with every current production electronic device known to man. well, maybe not. But it was crazy.
They had a headphone rack with TONS of headphones, all playing the same horrid J-pop song on repeat (synchronous). It was not a good source either (at all), but alot could still be learned from quick ABing. I had heard alot of these phones before under better circumstances, but this was still a pretty interesting excersize.
They also had a "high end" setup. amongst 6 or so other exhaustive setups of various headphone brands (In a relatively quiet part of the store...), they had all the stax phones with all the stax amps. It was pretty cool. I had my Ipod there, as it was far more useful than their Marantz SACD player because I was familiar with the music, the Ipod's sonic signature, my cable's sonic signature, and also I run CD files off the thing so it actually does not sound half bad.
My headphone hobby initially lead me into dynamic phones because of budget, initial lack of DIY skill, and thinking blindly that "NO OTHER ELECTROSTAT COULD EVER MEASURE UP TO ORPHEUS" blah blah blah....
Seeing recent market developments, and hearing a little of what was also actually good from the past: boy, was I wrong....
Lots of work to do...
So thanks for the heads up, from a (very well read and listened) stax collector.
Gonna go listen to the koss (if I can...).
-Thanks again,
-Clark
