The M570 was a big disappointment to me, so I am probably ruling out the Sivga P-II.
The R70x is available locally as used but they only seem to excel as tube headphones so I am hesitant.
I never heard of Helm, but that looks really interesting and cheap enough to chance it. 
Variety is the key. I put on my HD600’s yesterday for the first time in several weeks and they sounded Great. I then hooked up my Schiit Loki to my Monoprice Liquid Platinum and Violectric V220.
The chain today was SMSL SU-8 TO Schiit Loki to LP to Sundara’s, via balanced. Sounded Awesome!
Hello,
I can sympathize with you.
I have been working on this topic for almost 2 years now.
And in the first year I bought a lot of things and quickly gave them away.
Also because it was great in the beginning and after weeks quickly boring.
It was getting on my nerves myself although the equipment was not bad but did not meet my requirements.
I wanted to have more constancy, which I have found with the Dac and it was not even necessarily expensive.
Since I have the Singxer Sda 2 Advance I don’t look for Dac’s anymore because it offers me this constancy and I argue with myself which earphone I take today to listen to music with a cigar and a sip of whisky 
.
I’m already thinking about buying one or the other headphone and I would like to try a good Planar headphone and hope I like it.
Also because the taste of music develops slowly and the listener notices that it is not suitable for this direction, but still good enough for it.
That’s why I don’t buy expensive headphones and even more expensive because there are still some available that are priced
Are still attractive and could even be better in terms of performance.
My personal choice where I would like to test is almost there, but I will consider it next year.
So buy what you like or believe that it will give you the pleasure or meet your requirements.
Whether you have 20 pairs at the end or only two makes no difference.
Surely there are no limits on the top but whether it makes you happy is on another sheet of paper.
At the moment I am personally happy about my converted Denon D2000 and Fostex Tr x00.
Gotta know my sh*t… You don’t even know how many great headphones there are on the market, yet they are hiding in the shadows.
iBasso SR2’s are amazing. They are quite sensitive so look out for that, you need a good amp that can handle sensitive cans… otherwise you will experience audible noise.
Gold Planar aren’t the most expensive on the market, can’t speak as to how they sound… but Direct Sound cans are 300 bucks, and they do need better pads and lack the horizontal rotation of the earcups (which is a bummer), but they sound so enjoyable - deep bass, clean mids, clean and detailed highs, and also crazy isolation.
Phonon’s are like completely unknown, I discovered them from a thread on Head-Fi, but from what I can tell - they take their headphones really seriously.
Sivga Phoenix = yes. I think it has the best bass performance, especially for the price. That thing is a monster. Sivga is still working on the new pads.
Kaldas Research cans are amazing. I think they are 98% in-house production, only the earpads aren’t (yup you read that correctly). Kaldas Research isn’t an audio company, it works with all kinds of materials and I think they make stuff for other companies (completely unrelated to their headphones) - this is why they can make the headphones 98% in-house, they have the machines, materials, and technique to do so. The owner is a very big enthusiast and he is one of a kind - I don’t think we will be seeing somebody like him anytime soon. Again, to fully understand what I am saying, you would need to read all the threads where you can see his activity.
Cleer Next is not cheap, but definitely a special one.
Wow. You just added a company and headphone that I haven’t found before. Do you know of any other models/companies?
@ShaneD I think I’ll be hanging around in “Mid-fi” world with you for a little while. There are still a lot of different things I would like to try. I’ve been working on putting together a workhorse setup that will see the most use and give me a sound signature I know and love. The headphones serving in that role are the Elegia.
I’m currently focused on getting a solid foundation of source gear so that I can adequately drive any moderately priced headphones to their full potential. Once I get that finished up this year I’ll probably start exploring some more headphones. I got a little impatient in the meantime and impulse bought the Porta Pros with Yaxi pads yesterday and they should get here today! I still find a lot of enjoyment in playing around with solid performing budget gear and I think I always will.
IMO there really is little need to go above Mid-fi for almost everyone except those with extra cash laying around. The curve of $ invested to % of SQ improvement (however you would measure that) is a log curve and not linear.
IMO I also would increase the upper level reference point of Mid-fi to around $1000 per component. If I were on a budget I would look at the used classifieds on headfi where you can get great quality components for 50-60% of MSRP. For < $1500 you can get one helluva good setup.
As I live outside the US, I highly doubt I will be able to afford really high-end stuff. Mid-fi is still a fortune for me, so I will still thread about the “lower-end stuff” for quite some time. But let’s see what my Elegia, that should come this week, have to say about it. They will be by far my most expensive headphone in the collection.
Anyway, if we’re talking different/unknow companies in audio, I can add Kuba audio and Audio dream, both companies from Brazil. The first has more affordable stuff: something between 125 all the way up to 1000+ USD, with the current exchange ratio. As I posted here, I now own their over-ear headphone, the Disco, which is about 125 USD now. Still analyzing it, but they are quite good, although definitively not without flaw. May post some impressions on them here in the forum.
(Edit: price range from the Kuba stuff was wrong, corrected value now)
That is exactly how I work it. Although my $1,000.00 limit is in Canadian dollars. That covered my most expensive two headphone and all three amps (one used).
Using the same amp, I am sure I would not see much difference in Elex/Clear. I understand the Clear scales better, but I don’t see me going any higher amp wise. I might switch the V220 out for a V280, but that is about it.
Must ‘hi-fi’ equal “high price” to be considered hi-fi? I don’t think so.
Of course, cost and SQ are both relative and subjective to each person.
True enough. I just set up an artificial value of $1K in Canadian bucks. That number has gotten me some very satisfying headphones and amps.
I get that Mid-Fi/Hi-Fi is a personal thing and different for everyone. This is just my thoughts on it. I am NOT going to drop $2K/$3K on headphones or amps in any currency.
A year ago I liked what I had, but I always felt there was much better available. Now I listen to my gear and I am pretty content. I will always be curious and jump around a bit, but I don’t feel like my current gear needs upgrading.
Of course I will always be adding, when I find something interesting, at a reasonable price.
There’s a lot going on here that might not be obvious. Here’s my take, having lived through a whole lot of audio history:
The term “hi-fi” is short for high fidelity and became a marketing buzz word in the 1950s. It referred to audio reproduction equipment that strives to recreate the live sound as closely as possible. There wasn’t even a thought that the recording (LP or tape) might be tampered with in production, beyond the choice of mics and mic placement, as routinely happens today. I vaguely remember the transition from 78 rpm to 33 1/3 rpm vinyl albums around 1950, but more clearly the subsequent transition from mono to stereo. To own a hi-fi often meant a large all-in-one horizontal furniture-grade cabinet containing speakers on both ends with a turntable and electronics in the middle. To some degree hi-fi came to disdainfully refer to the older mono tech and the term stereo supplanted hi-fi starting around 1960. I don’t remember separate component set-ups being anything more than a low-budget make-do until much later.
Today, the original association between the term hi-fi and reproduction accuracy is no longer taken for granted, especially in headphones. In the context of referring to the entire audio market hi-fi equipment now simply means anything targeted beyond mass-market. Ironically, a pair of Beats or Bose headphones can be higher priced than a pair of workhorse Sennheisers.
The problem arises in a different context when enthusiasts use low-fi, mid-fi, hi-fi and summit-fi as a rough price categorization terminology. I think we really mean low-priced, mid-priced, high-priced and summit-priced for equipment focused on high sound quality (and not necessarily fidelity/accuracy).
So the original high-fidelity meaning of hi-fi, plus the non-mass-market use of the term hi-fi plus the mid-priced use of the term hi-fi can lead to confusion.
There is also the LSA brand (Kennerton made) that is in that range. You’ll have to buy it the old fashion way by contacting the dealer by phone. At the ~$1k you’ll have options for a Magni or Gjallarhorn clone. The dealer will say it sounds exactly the same, but he wants to sell you some headphones.
https://www.underwoodhifi.com/products/hp-2-ultra (gjallarhorn)
https://www.underwoodhifi.com/products/hp-3-nova (magni)
I agree totally!
The only one that would meet my price criteria is the HP-3. Not sure I would drop $1K(Cdn.) on an unknown.
I would rather try out the Cascades or LCD-2 Classics in close to that range. I do wonder if there will be any great sales this week in response to Prime Days.
Going to the way back machine, how does this post hold up?
Exactly, and this ticks me off something fierce. If we respected what the words meant based on their structure we would be distinguishing mid-fi from hi-fi based on SQ/fidelity/realism, not price. In that view I would call:
These kinds of questions are fun.
I have not strayed too far. I did take a detour to a full IEM focused setup and decided I missed headphones too much so I came back and had to build back my desktop stack. Currently sitting with the RNHP as my amp and the Chord Mojo serving as my DAC / portable source. The Elegia was sold off and replaced by a couple other headphones that came and went. Looks like the winner is going to be the Gjallarhorn. (Not sure if that is considered mid-fi anymore or not.)
The Porta Pros ended up being a solid purchase because they go everywhere with me in my backpack and still get regular head time.
I would say I’ve gotten more focused now and most energy goes into my main chain. I have tended to eliminate things that don’t see regular use. But there are still some mid-fi things I want to explore. (tubes and Sennheisers / DT880 for instance.) We will see when I get around to them as I’m getting to a point where I’m pretty happy with my main chain. I don’t think I’m ever going to be truly done exploring though.
The brand and the price of equipments can not represent Hi-fi. My ears are on myself. The most important thing is to suit yourself.
In both sound and apparence, Sivga Phoenix is worth to try, though I think it has a little dark.
Ive been having the itch for new headphones and seeing this thread pop up was interesting. Looking through the many post in this thread, the only thing i still want to try under 1k is the lcd 2 pf.
The hunt for better dac amp combos has taken me and ive found that getting different sound presentations from the same headphones has become very fun but looks so expensive moving up and up. So ive told myself, time to transition from headphone hunts to dac/amps.
For me, Ive thought of the low-mid-hi-fi as just marketing. Segments the thought process of what should I get? How much do you have and what do you like? It can funnel you into the right direction or compartmentalize the way we think of audio tier level. At the end of the day, girls just want to have fun, and boy do I want to hear an expensive Amp paired with my dac to experience it.
Interesting topic. Having just run a DAC test between the SU-8, which to me is more of a good entry-level DAC to the Schiit Bifrost 2, which to me is more of a mid-fi DAC, you can definitely hear the difference between the two. When you consider I started with a Topping MX-3 (definitely an entry-level piece) ,and gave the M200 DAC a good run as well, I now feel like I have some kind of handle on what differentiates each. While The Bifrost 2 is the clear winner in overall performance, I honestly feel that the MX-3 delivered the most value for money spent. Either way, the pecking order is clear; Bifrost 2, M200 / SU-8, MX-3. And so far, the price differential has scaled accordingly. After the BiFrost 2, though, here is where things are going to get a little less clear. I’m sticking to DACs here because this is where I have the most experience thus far.
With this in mind, here is the question… What would be considered the next level up from the Bifrost 2? The Ares II? The RME ADI 2? The Chord Cutest? And are these worth the price jump to that 1000 and up mark?
And up from that, well, screw that. I can’t / won’t do that. It would be easy for me to just scoff at the high/overpriced crap and just call them toys for richie -rich. But that would not be fair. I have never and may never have the opportunity to listen to any of this multi-thousand dollar equipment, so I have no idea if it’s worth it. I’m guessing no, but until I get to hear some of it, I’ll just never know. And that’s fine.
I am good with mid-fi.
