Wanting to buy my first pair of good headphones

Hi, I’ve been researching a lot since at the start of the year I wanted to buy a new headphone to replace my Bose QC35, and ended up knowing that wireless headphones sound bad compared to these and for even a better price range. So I was wondering what I could get, I have no store near me that I could test the sounds for and I need help.

I am trying to limit my budget to 200-250$, I am eyeing towards the DT 990/880 (250ohm). Although I am also considering maybe I should just save up for a 500$ headphone such as the dt1990s, which i could get by either next year or the end of the year. Also, I will use it for listening to music, genres I listen to are J-Pop, EDM, Classical, a bit of Jazz. Hoping you could help me out, thanks!

Also note, I couldn’t buy any of the massdrop versions because I live in South East Asia, and it would be hard to buy such items.

The issues with Beyers are they generally require more power than most so you might need a dac amp depending on your source.

What alternatives do you prefer? And anyways I’d be happy to invest into a dac and amp for future use as well, would a Fiio E10K be good enough? And I was also thinking if should just save up for a 880/990 600Ohm, and buy an amp/dac for it so that I would have a good amp/dac setup by the start.

Also, thanks for the reply!

Hmm. If you are willing to drop at least $150 on a fiio k5 pro then the 600 ohm all the way up to the 1990 are definitely good considerations.

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Also I would point you towards the 880 as they tend to be the best as an all rounder out of the Beyer cans

Which part of SEA are you at? I know of places in Singapore and Malaysia that have quite a fair selection of headphones for you to audition actually.

Thanks for that recommendation! I’ll list that down as one of my options.

Sadly I live in the Philippines :((

Damn dude which part? The fact that you have access to Beyers are already impressive

I live in Quezon City. There is a distributor here, although they don’t really sell the 600 ohm versions. At least on the Amazon equivalent here which is Lazada, haven’t gone to a store and I couldn’t seem to find any near my area.

Prices are whack though, DT1990 = $688 (at least when it goes on sale, 577$ which is cheaper than importing through amazon) DT880/990 (250 Ohms) 216$, 173$ respectively.

Im considering buying from Amazon since it’s cheaper and at least I’ll get other options such as the 600 Ohms, and the K5 pro. But those two combined will cost me around 491$, so I’m still thinking if my brain could stop thinking about headphones until I earn the money or just buy a 250 ohm version and buy probably the fiio e10k since I have found it being sold in another online shop similar to Lazada, Shopee, which is around 74$.

Hey man if it hurts financially I wouldn’t jump in that much. The Philippines has a Poppen iem scene. I would start off there it’s a cheaper way to get quality sound

Just be aware that ordering from Amazon from the US might incur tax charges for you though.

Maybe try scouting for what are your best options over there?

Not really, since I’m still a child, I get money from my parents through allowance, and I’ve nothing better to spend it on, (I’ve probably spent around 400$ on switch games already in a span of a year and I want to stop and possibly even sell some).

And I’m turning 18 this year, so I would like to gift something for myself, and I feel like headphones are the one best thing I could get, since even the first time I bought something for myself is the Bose QC35, not even the model 2s, which I bought for (442$) at the time.

But I do agree that it might be a bit expensive to go for the 600 Ohms with the K5’s, I just feel like it would be a waste if I would go for the 250 Ohms, since I could save up for the 600 ohms and K5’s by the end of the year.

Well I’m going to do more research, and see what are my other options. Probably just going to see if my tolerance of not spending will push through.

Thanks for the recommendations, but I don’t feel like getting IEM’s since it feels so weird to me for wearing in-ears since I became accustomed to wearing headphones.

True, postage options for K5’s and DT880s combined are around 80$ already plus the 40$ shipping.

My other options that I have seen are either the Audiotechnicas, although I don’t want to buy a closed backed, and Sennheisers but are priced more insane than the beyerdynamics, for context HD600 = 518$, HD660S = 699$. I tried finding AKG but doesn’t seem to find here.

I wonder if massdrop… Drop might still be a better option for you. The 58x or the 4xx might still come in below $200 for you incl tax. Lol I’m not too sure what the current prices on those are though.

*Just checked (excluding shipping and tax):
58x - $150
4xx - $130

Checked it as well, massdrop doesn’t deliver to the Philippines, although I could use another service that gets it delivered to the US and delivers it here, also could use it for Amazon although I’m still not sure if I need to pay postage but it seems to be and it is of no assurance what that price will be. I’m probably going to either buy just from Amazon or through local sellers in our e-markets around here to be safe for now.

Thanks so much for the effort on replying and searching for me!

You may also like the DT770 250 ohm. It is closed back, and has more bass and treble than the 880 600 ohm, but you may not like how sharp the treble is.
I would definitely recommend the 880 600 ohm and the Fiio K5 Pro as a Desktop amp/dac combo.
The DT1990 is even more amazing from what I hear. If you do end up saving up for that, you should still probably get a decent amp for it.

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Thanks for the suggestion,

Can I ask if you know other alternatives for the K5 Pro’s so I could see if there are some in my country so it would be cheaper than buying those from Amazon?

hey man you got any family over in the US? maybe you could send tem cash would open up options

Hi

You’ll use the headphones on the go and with people around in a quiet environment? Or at home?
For public areas you’ll need closed headphones… and efficient ones… unless you have a powerful DAP [digital audio player]. Or in ear monitors straight from your phone.
For home use you can use open back designs. And for a major sound improvement you should look at basic and good amps. Like JDS Atom , Schiit Mani etc… Or a dac+amp like JDS amp dac or one by FIIO etc.
HIFIMAN 4xx new or as new on ebay is a good start. l have the 400i which are similar, l put larger pads on them… and they sound terrific. Not that difficult to power but needs a good amp. Good luck!