Jwu wrote Pretty nice Topic you got.

Thanks! I still can't believe I'm on the 58th page of this! I never thought it would take off this way.

Your budget: $150

Which genres you'll be listening to: Rock, Rap, Hip-Hop, Dubstep, Alternative, Everything lol

What kind you want: anything but in ear

Whether you want open or closed headphones: doesn't matter

What you are listening from: iPod/laptop

Another question, what's the best portable device that will support .flac files? My iPod doesn't support it and flac sounds amazing. PM me please thanks

bradanter96 wrote Your budget: $150

Which genres you'll be listening to: Rock, Rap, Hip-Hop, Dubstep, Alternative, Everything lol

What kind you want: anything but in ear

Whether you want open or closed headphones: doesn't matter

What you are listening from: iPod/laptop

Another question, what's the best portable device that will support .flac files? My iPod doesn't support it and flac sounds amazing. PM me please thanks

The Audio Technica ATH-M50s are pretty much hands-down the best for you. Due to their neutral signature, they'll handle all of your music very well. They're also the best value at their price point.

If you have an actual iPod, not a Touch, you can use the Rockbox firmware to add support for tons of extra features, including tons of new codecs that Apple's restrictive firmware do not support. FLAC is one of the codecs!

If you want a new player, avoid iPods entirely. Assuming this is exclusively for music and you don't want to play crappy iOS games (honestly can't see why you would, I enjoy music so much more), I need a price point and some more info. ITunes is garbage, as well. Again, no FLAC support. If you have 200 bucks to spend, the Cowon J3 is one of the best-sounding (if not THE best) DAPs (digital audio players). The 16 GB model costs 210 bucks on Amazon, but it has a MicroSD card slot. With each card at 32 GB and not too expensive, you can have tons of music with you.

I recommend you switch to MP3 V0 or 320 kbps for portable use. FLAC presents such a small difference, that it's not worth the extra file size. V0 and 320 files come EXTREMELY close to the quality to lossless, which is honestly only useful for archive purposes.

r00t_b33r wrote

bradanter96 wrote Your budget: $150

Which genres you'll be listening to: Rock, Rap, Hip-Hop, Dubstep, Alternative, Everything lol

What kind you want: anything but in ear

Whether you want open or closed headphones: doesn't matter

What you are listening from: iPod/laptop

Another question, what's the best portable device that will support .flac files? My iPod doesn't support it and flac sounds amazing. PM me please thanks

The Audio Technica ATH-M50s are pretty much hands-down the best for you. Due to their neutral signature, they'll handle all of your music very well. They're also the best value at their price point.

If you have an actual iPod, not a Touch, you can use the Rockbox firmware to add support for tons of extra features, including tons of new codecs that Apple's restrictive firmware do not support. FLAC is one of the codecs!

If you want a new player, avoid iPods entirely. Assuming this is exclusively for music and you don't want to play crappy iOS games (honestly can't see why you would, I enjoy music so much more), I need a price point and some more info. ITunes is garbage, as well. Again, no FLAC support. If you have 200 bucks to spend, the Cowon J3 is one of the best-sounding (if not THE best) DAPs (digital audio players). The 16 GB model costs 210 bucks on Amazon, but it has a MicroSD card slot. With each card at 32 GB and not too expensive, you can have tons of music with you.

I recommend you switch to MP3 V0 or 320 kbps for portable use. FLAC presents such a small difference, that it's not worth the extra file size. V0 and 320 files come EXTREMELY close to the quality to lossless, which is honestly only useful for archive purposes.

Thanks, I actually got the Ultrasone HFI-580's. Are those better than the ATH-M50s? I just wanted to see if I made the right choice. It was a hard choice between the Ultrasone's and the Audio Technica's, believe me, then I just went with the Ultrasone's. I was deciding between those two for about a month.

I completely agree with you on everything you've been posting lately. I CANT STAND people who buy Beats by Dr. Dre. The kids at my High School who spend $400 on the Pro Edition are all like, "ohh my headphones are better than yours" and I'm like, "Oh yeah, here, take a listen." Then they say "HOLY CRAP THESE ARE SO CLEAR! These must've been like $1000!" Then I say, "Nope, they were about $120. How much were your Beats?" "Umm..like $400..." Then I laugh in their faces. And sadly, I have an iPod Touch :/...and I'm jobless without a car, I need those first before I spend $200 on a music player.

bradanter96 wrote

r00t_b33r wrote

bradanter96 wrote Your budget: $150

Which genres you'll be listening to: Rock, Rap, Hip-Hop, Dubstep, Alternative, Everything lol

What kind you want: anything but in ear

Whether you want open or closed headphones: doesn't matter

What you are listening from: iPod/laptop

Another question, what's the best portable device that will support .flac files? My iPod doesn't support it and flac sounds amazing. PM me please thanks

The Audio Technica ATH-M50s are pretty much hands-down the best for you. Due to their neutral signature, they'll handle all of your music very well. They're also the best value at their price point.

If you have an actual iPod, not a Touch, you can use the Rockbox firmware to add support for tons of extra features, including tons of new codecs that Apple's restrictive firmware do not support. FLAC is one of the codecs!

If you want a new player, avoid iPods entirely. Assuming this is exclusively for music and you don't want to play crappy iOS games (honestly can't see why you would, I enjoy music so much more), I need a price point and some more info. ITunes is garbage, as well. Again, no FLAC support. If you have 200 bucks to spend, the Cowon J3 is one of the best-sounding (if not THE best) DAPs (digital audio players). The 16 GB model costs 210 bucks on Amazon, but it has a MicroSD card slot. With each card at 32 GB and not too expensive, you can have tons of music with you.

I recommend you switch to MP3 V0 or 320 kbps for portable use. FLAC presents such a small difference, that it's not worth the extra file size. V0 and 320 files come EXTREMELY close to the quality to lossless, which is honestly only useful for archive purposes.

Thanks, I actually got the Ultrasone HFI-580's. Are those better than the ATH-M50s? I just wanted to see if I made the right choice. It was a hard choice between the Ultrasone's and the Audio Technica's, believe me, then I just went with the Ultrasone's. I was deciding between those two for about a month.

I completely agree with you on everything you've been posting lately. I CANT STAND people who buy Beats by Dr. Dre. The kids at my High School who spend $400 on the Pro Edition are all like, "ohh my headphones are better than yours" and I'm like, "Oh yeah, here, take a listen." Then they say "HOLY CRAP THESE ARE SO CLEAR! These must've been like $1000!" Then I say, "Nope, they were about $120. How much were your Beats?" "Umm..like $400..." Then I laugh in their faces. And sadly, I have an iPod Touch :/...and I'm jobless without a car, I need those first before I spend $200 on a music player.

I just thrash people like that. Think of the kind of person it takes to say "My headphones are better than than yours" unprovoked (assuming they ARE unprovoked). Beats people tend to be a certain kind of people, and I'm not saying they all are. Good thing I've converted quite a few.

Sell the iPod touch, get something else. I was able to get a broken iPod Classic 5th generation off Ebay for 30 bucks and fix it. I'm not one to use an iPod, but the deal was too sweet. It's the best-sounding iPod due to the Wolfson DAC chip, and it's compatible with Rockbox.

Another option would be the Sansa Clip. SD card support and it's dirt cheap.

I'd also say that although the M50s are better, the Ultrasones are still a good choice.

I can't believe this hasn't yet been stickied...

awe wrote I can't believe this hasn't yet been stickied...

The view count is OVER NINE-THOUSAAAAAAAAAAND!!!

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Budget: $250

Music preference: Rap/Hip-hop/Some Dubstep. I mostly listen to Punjabi (Indian) music though.

Type / form factor and portability: I prefer in-ear, but wouldn't mind over/around. I want a nice bass, but shouldn't distort audio. Portability won't effect me much.

Open/Closed: Closed

DDP wrote Budget: $250

Music preference: Rap/Hip-hop/Some Dubstep. I mostly listen to Punjabi (Indian) music though.

Type / form factor and portability: I prefer in-ear, but wouldn't mind over/around. I want a nice bass, but shouldn't distort audio. Portability won't effect me much.

Open/Closed: Closed

I'm going to assume Indian music is not well mastered. High-end headphones will only bring out the flaws in music that is not mastered well. Same goes for rap and hip-hop, which can't bring high-end audio to it's full potential. Dubstep also is often distributed at lower codecs.

I'd suggest you go for some bass-heavy headphones. I don't recommend headphones that have bass that overly distorts other parts of the spectrum, so no worries there. The most expensive headphones I would look at in your position are the Sony XB1000s. However, you might have some trouble finding them under 200 bucks. Don't spend more than 250, and keep in mind that the prices can be very different when you're looking at these. I'd honestly spend less and get the XB700s, though.

If you would rather have on-ear headphones, the Aiaiai TMA-1, Sennheiser HD 25-1 II, or Beyerdynamic DT1350 are all good choices.

For IEMs, the Hippo VB is the highest I would go. They're available here.

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