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I'm researching a nice pair of headphones to buy. I'm looking to spend about $100.

I've been leaning towards Grado SR80's or maybe Audio Technica ES7's.

Are the Grado SR80i's a significant improvement over the older model?

Can anyone tell me which they'd recommend and why?

I'm not sure about the new Grados, but the old ones were fantastic. Even the SR60's sounded good, although the SR80's sounded sufficiently better that you were willing to spend the extra money. And so on with the 120's and onwards, until you quickly doubled your initial price estimate, iPod-style.

Audio-Technicas have really nice fidelity, but a slightly exaggerated bass response, even for closed cans. The ES series isn't as bad as the M in that regard, but it might be a little annoying. For a similar (but more balanced) sound, I'd recommend the Sennheiser HD-280's, but those are a bit pricier.

And finally, if you're only going to use these headphones at home, I'd recommend getting an open set, namely the Sennheiser HD-515's. They're not quite as good as the old HD-555's I own and adore, but they're nearly there, and something like half the price.

These days, I'd heavily recommend Skullcandy. (For something that isn't exotic and hard to find) - excellent sound quality and build, especially for the price (especially for the "relatively" low price), and a lifetime warranty.
Hard to beat that .

In reply to DEATH I wouldn't recommend skullkandy; shitty sound quality, poor build quality, over priced. Just get some senheissers.

JointStrikeFighter wrote:In reply to DEATH I wouldn't recommend skullkandy; shitty sound quality, poor build quality, over priced. Just get some senheissers.

In reply to that: Seinheisser are overpriced (Though worth it if you can afford it), and the most recent ones I had (a 95 dollar pair) crapped out after less than 2 months of light use.
Skullcandy has a lifetime warranty. Which is awesome.

Sadly they look like shit, sound average at best, and mark you as a complete retard. But hey, you had a single item fail once!

YT, those 515s look pretty boss. If only normal people had a reason to buy such a limited item.

Max out your budget and get the Alessandro MS-1. This gets you about 95% of the way to a Grado SR225 at half the cost, and I find that it's better than the SR80 & 125. I haven't heard the new i models yet other than the 325i so I don't know how they compare to the old ones. However, based on that model I'd say the sound is very similar to the old models.

I haven't heard the Audio Technica ES7 either, but I don't really hold out high hopes for it. Every A-T I've heard so far, and that's about half a dozen, has had wonky issues in the midrange. With simple jazz music you only hear the odd note that sounds wrong, but with electric guitars or even acoustic guitars playing chords, there's a horrible echoey feedback sound that makes you think someone's punched holes in the guitar and knocked it completely out of tune. Add a violin section for classical music and it gets even worse, the sound isn't even recognizable as a violin.

DEATH wrote:These days, I'd heavily recommend Skullcandy. (For something that isn't exotic and hard to find) - excellent sound quality and build, especially for the price (especially for the "relatively" low price), and a lifetime warranty.
Hard to beat that .

I'll corroborate that. I had a pair of their earbuds and I'd buy them again in an instant if the ones I have now ever broke.

They've lasted me a few years, too, and don't show any signs of giving up, either.

I was thinking about Skullcandy headphones until a colleague of mine who is quite the audiophile slapped me silly. According to many reviews I've read Skullcandy are the epitome of style over substance. I was going to get these Skullcandy's but got these Sennheiser's instead and it turns out to have been a very wise decision.

I got a pair of Sony MDR-7506's for my birthday last year for mixing my sound projects on, and I love them. I use them for day-to-day listening as well, and they hold up nicely for that.

You could also get the MDR-V6 which is the same thing, except: It says "Digital" on the side, has a nickel-plated connector, and a shorter warranty.

Lord Pounder wrote:I was thinking about Skullcandy headphones until a colleague of mine who is quite the audiophile slapped me silly.

They're a little heavy on the bass, but if you ask me, that's only an issue if you're listening in utter silence.

According to many reviews I've read Skullcandy are the epitome of style over substance.

The ones I got did seem rather "trendy", but for $10, I didn't really care that much. They sounded good enough for listening to music on my commute, and loud enough for use when playing keyboard with the band at my church (we can get pretty loud, too.) Not so much for, say, mixing.

I highly recommend the HD280 pro by Sennheiser. I bought my pair off a friend about five or six years ago and they are still going strong today. They have very good sound and in my experience, had better isolation than the noise-canceling Bose headphones. Then again, finding products that beat out Bose is like shooting fish in a bucket, but that's a topic for a whole other thread. Anyhow, on top of it all, I found that the company really supports their product. At one point, the cord on my pair had broke and so I figured I would simply solder on another. I called their tech support to find out what the wiring scheme was and they sent me a new cord free of charge! Needless to say, I highly recommend.

In terms of support, Grado's also a winner here. My SR225 had one of its drivers fried when I forgot to reset my tube amp from speaker mode to headphone mode. I called up Grado and explained my user stupidity, they offered to fix it for the cost of shipping. In 2 weeks my headphones came back good as new.

Thanks for the input everyone.

I decided to go with some Sennheiser 555's since Amazon has them on sale for ~$90

I think the deciding factor was comfort.