I agree to an extent. The journey for me was too many mid-fi headphones that I ended up losing money on since I didn’t like a lot of them, and a lot were similar. I prefer to just buy the higher end stuff as a lot of it is a decent amount different for me to justify it. That is just my personal taste.
And that makes sense, with higher end stuff though, if you buy used and find good deals, you can typically sell stuff for just as much as you bought it for, and only take a small marginal hit, think of it as a rental fee lol. You are now in the range where mostly anything is going to be good stuff, it’s all about finding the thing that aligns with your preferences and your system the most
I don’t think M0N is suggesting for you to buy more mid-fi for the sake of mid-fi. I think he is ensuring you to refine and reflect upon your tastes. Once you are clear what you want, you can invest big in that particular sound. I agree wholeheartedly and feel that I would have been pretty frustrated with the amount of money if I didn’t go this way.
Personally, hate used electronics, I stay away from them, as they could go out or die any second as you have no clue how they were taken care of. Too risky for me personally.
I actually found that as I moved up in tiers, the owners that sold their gear to me treated them as meticulously as I did. Keep in mind that we all have alike minds in that sense.
It’s extremely safe in the high end side of things for audio, mostly everything I own is used, people baby their stuff, and imo you overpay for new in the high end market. Look at a focal utopia for example (similar to a vertie in some sonic respects), they retail for 4k but used commonly come up for 1.8k, you are paying a more realistic price for what you are getting (the higher you go, the higher the new markup gets)
I do think that getting new stuff from zmf is viable though, as you can personalize it and also they tend to hold their value better after sale since there is a constant wait for them and people will pay more for an immediate sale even if it’s used
Just something to think about, but if you really can’t get past buying used, then no problems either. Also this is only regarding the high end side of things, buying used midfi or lower is much riskier
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I enjoy warranties. And usually new electronics have very long warranties. I build Pc’s all the time and love the 5yr+ warranties on all of my parts. I treat headphones similarly as that is how I work. I know you can get great deals that can last forever on used, but in the back of my mind personally it is always telling me no. Doesn’t mean I wont ever do it, but that is just how I am. 
Sucks to an extent, but have never ran into problems all my friends who buy used have.
Most high end headphones and electronics have transferable all encompassing warranties, it’s pretty different from pc hardware
Fair enough, some just don’t want to and that’s just fine
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Yeah, I think it’s a preference thing. I have a friend that would tell me, “no amount of rubbing alcohol can scrub off the feeling that these were used by someone else.”
All I know is that I would not be able to sustain this hobby if I had to buy my stereo amp and DAC brand new. I saved about 35-50% on each item.
@Photo Anyways getting back to the headphones, I think if you are set on going for something distinctly higher tier, the verite closed is not a bad option and for the most part aligns well with what you are after and what you listen to, and would work nicely for the time being on your future source gear you have on the way (down the line beefing up source gear is worthwhile tho). If all else fails, verite closed hold their resale value really well so it would be a safe investment if nothing else.
I could prob give you more info on what you might like or not about the verite with more detailed experiences of what you like about the arya and also your experiences when the higher end source gear gets to you
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So doing a short quick comparison of the verite closed vs the arya, the vertie closed is more detailed, a bit more natural in it’s impact and time domain, has a more organic timbre than the arya, more 3d in it’s staging, and also has a great sense of refinement that you get with higher end headphones.
The arya would have more impact and physical slam than the vertie closed, and also would have a larger more grand presentation where the verite closed would be more proportional in comparison.
The vertie closed is very quick in the treble and midrange, but the arya is quicker in the bass.
Also the arya is a fair bit more physically open as you would expect lol. Regarding spatial recreation, I think the vertie closed creates a bit of a bubble around your head and places things inside that bubble very accurately, with great depth and a very holographic sound. The arya is a bit more speaker like in how it stages with things being more laid out in front and to the sides of you.
Regarding signature, the arya is more neutral whereas the vertie closed is more warmer leaning overall but still somewhat neutral (with the universe pads, it gets a bit less organic sounding but more neutral with autuer pads).
Regarding refinement, the vertie closed sounds more refined and overall thought-out and coherent than the arya does in it’s overall presentation.
I don’t have to compare build or comfort because you already have the aeolus which is similar in those regards.
Overall, the verite closed sounds a decent bit more natural and generally a higher tier/class than the arya, but I can still see the justification for keeping the arya around as it still does something that most headphones don’t with it’s grand presentation and large planar impact.
For amp pairings I think the arya is clearly more of a power hog, but isn’t as sensitive to some aspects of amps, as long as it gets it’s quality power from a well crafted solid state it’s happy. The vertie closed does sound good on most things, but it does pick up alot of what the amp is doing, and imo sounds good on solid state but in the end I prefer it on a higher quality tube amp for most enjoyment as it makes it more natural overall and enhances the 3d aspect @Veritas mentioned
Other than the Bass impact being a little less on the Verite Closed it is sounding more of what I truly like.
I don’t care if I have soundstage if I’m being honest. I kind of like intimate music instead of hearing it far away.
About build I can feel more comfortable owning a ZMF product as I know they are built like a tank and have a warranty to back it up.
It sounds like the Verite Closed isn’t bright which is a good thing since I’m sensitive to it, as well as not being able to hear my fans in the background like the Arya.
3-D staging to me is more worth it and different to sound stage, as with 3-D staging it isn’t as much as wow everything is further out, more of wow, I can hear that symbol right behind the piano. Which I prefer more.
The only thing I’m worried about is I hear the Verite Closed shows if a song isn’t mastered well and I listen to literally everything, so I can only assume I have songs that are crap quality in there that I wouldn’t like anymore because of it showing.
So that might be the case for some things, but that’s also something I forgot to mention lol, the verite closed is pretty forgiving compared to other headphones in this range, it’s still pretty revealing but it’s still enjoyable to listen to less than idea recordings, you are rewarded when you listen to higher quality source material though. Some of the other stuff in this range will make poorly recorded stuff sound like garbage
Treble can get up there but never really in an unpleasant way (with a good amp and dac that is)
I feel like you will also find this to be the case when you get your new amp and dac, you aren’t sensitive to treble, just that the electronics you were using already were just poor preformers in treble
I have been hearing some people saying something about wanting to pad swap them as well for a better sound?
So the verite closed come with 2 pads, the universe pads and the auteur pads. I would personally just stick with these 2 pads as really I think it’s not worth it to get more pads. The universe pads give it a more organic sounding timbre and a bit warmer response, where the auteur pads give it a more neutral sound with also a bit better separation and spatial recreation. Neither vastly transform the headphone tho. I wouldn’t bother with the special be2 pads as imo they didn’t sound right, and I don’t really think any of the other pads do anything super special where it would be worthwhile picking up imo
What about the Eikon Suedes? Heard Zeos mention something about them on this headphone.
I have tried the eikon pads but not suede so I can’t say for sure, but the regular eikon pads on the vc was pretty meh imo. From my experience I preferred the leather pads for the most part sound wise
Z’s review of the zmf headphones are pretty confusing imo, especially his verite review, as he really didn’t seem to like the vertie open, but really liked the closed, even though for the most part they are closer than you think to where you would most likely end up having similar feelings about both. Also amp and dac pairing wasn’t really done well either in those reviews
Quick Message change, I like it. Lol. Anyways alright, I will go by your judgement on it with the pads if I pick it up. Still debating it, as like you said, for that much money, I better know 150% that I want them and they will suite my needs.
Since all I listen to is EDM, Japanese, K-Pop, Normal pop, rock, and bass songs.
So is the open back version of it better for what I like or worse in your opinion.
Realized it was conveying the wrong message lol
Do check out other pads if you are interested for sure, but I would just advice initially only grabbing the stock pads and one of his balanced cables. Later on if you feel the need then grab other pad options
So for those genre, I think the vertie closed work well for the most part, although for more bassy tracks I might prefer something like the eikon for the enhanced impact and presence in the bass to subbass range
I think you would prefer the slightly more fun tuning of the closed, and benefit from the extra isolation. Also since you mentioned heat, since leather can get warm, I think zmf offers hybrid pads where the part that touches your head is suede but the rest of the pad is leather and it won’t affect the sound too much so that is also worth a look