(after the fact note: this post ended up being waay too long, I must have just been venting during the wee hours. I think it turned out to be a decent read, so I’ll go ahead and post this sucker. Scroll to the last paragraph for the relevant part)
ARRRRRRRGGGG!!!
Ok, now that that's out of my system, let's take a min to recap recent events for our friend azure here.
First you spent a year agonizing about whether to take the plunge and buy a decent set of headphones. Then after you finally decided to stop worrying about it and just buy them already, you encountered an extreme case of buyer’s remorse. Then you tried blaming your purchase on all of us for supposedly misleading you. Now you want to drop another 200 bucks because you weren't satisfied with the first 100 you spent. <sigh>
Ok, look I’m not trying to be offensive here, so if I’m coming off all haughty.. Please just bear with me.
First of all I’m going to reiterate that sound is a very subjective thing. Not only are there differences in hearing, but here are also differences in listening attention, musical preferences and expectations. Good sound isn't something you can quantify; you just have to listen to it and decide if it's enjoyable for you.
Second, if you haven’t figured it out already let me be the one to tell you that we're not all perfect. Just because one person makes a recommendation or tells you that 128 mp3's are crap or tells you that you need to run out and buy ms-1's doesn’t mean you should listen to them. I mean really, this is all subjective anyway. I say I love my etymotic's and you will find many other people say they can’t stand the sight of them. Also you will often find that we all become fanboys or haters of one piece of equipment or another. If I didn’t have more important obligations, I might be inclined to buy some koss ksc 75's in bulk and roam the earth spreading the good sound love. When you hear me recommend the 75's you need to keep that in mind, because I’ll swear up and down that they deliver practically the best sound anyone in their right mind would need. I’m sure there are more that a few here that might disagree with that statement.
Thirdly, and here is where my real recommendation to you lies and please don’t take this the wrong way.
GO AWAY!!!
I really mean this is most helpful sense possible. You just spent a year hyping up your 500's and you're going to need at least another year to readjust your expectations. Audiophile headphones aren’t like buying a 52" plasma TV. You aren’t going to always get that in your face wow this is so much better feeling. It’s much more akin to sipping a fine wine. Essentially everyone here is a wine snob; they just use their ears to do the tasting. As much as people here will tell you how dramatic and universal the improvement in sound is, such statements really boil down to nothing more than opinions. A wine snob may not be able to fathom how a person could eat a pasta dinner without a 78' merlot, but they are failing to remember that there are people out there who hate wine and would rather have a good draft. Sound quality isn't hugely relevant to the appreciation of music, just like the wine isn't hugely relevant to the appreciation of a meal. Only a wine snob would really care to notice, the rest of us would probably rather have a coke. Good gear won’t make bad music into good music. No system, no matter how highly priced is going to get someone who’s not that into music in the first place to start tapping their foot. I put my mom on the receiving end of 600$’s worth of signal path, and after 20 seconds she just gives me a little smile and says, “sounds nice honey” and wanders off. In fact, no one I’ve ever let listen to my system comes even close to “getting it”.
I’m not saying that there isn't any gratification in this hobby, because there's plenty to be had. But like many hobbies, it's not as simple as popping down a 100 bucks and calling it a day. When I got my first headphones (grado sr-80's) I went through something very close you what you’ve been going through There was a difference, but it wasn’t the night and day difference that I was expecting. Sure I liked what I got, but I was a little embarrassed that I’d gotten suckered into paying 100 bucks for them. It took a year of use before I really started to appreciate their finer characteristics. Looking back on it, the subjective experience of listening to them has completely changed over the 3 year period I’ve owned them. Some might call it burn in, but its really much less the cans burning in as it is your ears+brain. As I became more familiar with the sound, I was increasingly able to pick out details and nuances in the music that would have been lost on me when I first got them. I went from disliking the grados to being non-pulsed to enjoying them, to loving them. My ety's were a similar story. When I got them the sound was detailed but unlistenable. As I got more acquainted to the way they put out music and how to deal with their idiosyncrasies, I went from almost returning them to relishing the near-perfect sound they now give me.
In short, once you get over a 100 bucks, the sound gear stops being a means to an end, and starts being the end. If you want good sound, pick up a pair of koss 75's and never come back here ever again. If you want to enter into the head-fi hobby, a serious commitment that you'll derive years of enjoyment (and loan payments) from, I suggest you look into the grado sr-225's, or many the senn 600's... oh possibly the akg 240's i hear thoes are good... and ray's coming out with a new pocket amp called a hornet or something, eveyone seems to be getting in line for that( you'll be after me) or maybe you should check out a allasan..........
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