Help with headphone choice
 

I'm in the market for a pair of over-the-ear open back headphones.
I've narrowed my search down to these:

Sonoma Audio Model One
Focal Utopia
Audeze LCD-4
Mr. Speakers Ether Flow
Hifiman HE1000v2

I heard all of them except the focal in quiet rooms at RMAF 2017.

Anybody have any long term listening impressions of these beauties or any other info you'd like to share? Thanks in advance.

Tom

P.S. here are the ones that I have definitely eliminated:
Abyss AB-1266phi - too heavy, couldn't get them to fit me correctly.
Stax SR-009 - with an amp to drive it will be well over $10k so out of my price range.

Just one question: Similar to the Stax, dont the above need a very high quality amp ($3k?) to drive them?

Hope this helps a bit.

https://www.headphone.com/blogs/news...adphone-review

I will chime in later after my Dr visit :music:

The headphone amp in the McIntosh C1100 should drive all of the phones on my list. If I have to get an outboard, I guess I'll cross that bridge when I come to it.

Yes it should. Extracting maximum performance from this group of top notch cans? That’s a different story. No rush though, enjoy and savor the journey. :thumbsup:

Some more food for thought. Hint hint... https://www.innerfidelity.com/conten...e-focal-utopia

Focal Utopia and Elear. Four year R&D project.

https://youtu.be/jVUG6ewo_J4

Everyone seems to love the Focal's. Universally positive reviews all around.
I think at this level it will be deciding which flavor I'd like best.

The Focals are an amazing pair of headphones but personally I prefer the Audeze LCD4. There is an article on innerfidelity where they have several people compare the two headphones and virtually everyone prefered the LCD4.

https://www.innerfidelity.com/conten...s-focal-utopia