Name one other thing they make that another company doesn't do better at a similar or lower price.
Tell me again how this is acceptable for a $100 pair of headphones.

http://i.imgur.com/yaguTrR.jpg

I'm sensing purchase justification.

a) i don't own 598/558s
b) gasp your beloved beyers crack http://i.imgur.com/tKyzOVU.jpg

Beyer sells replacement parts and it is MUCH harder to crack Beyers than HD558s. It's not even comparable. I know this from exspirience from actually having owned both at one point (Sold the Beyerdynamic DT-770 Pro and cracked the Sennheiser HD 558).
598/558s are EASY to crack the even the 600s have issues to a lesser extent (haven't owned these but i can find tons of forum post about cracked headbands).

And you know what else? I would not recommend the 770s to anyone BECAUSE THERE ARE BETTER OPTIONS AT THAT PRICE POINT NOW (I now recommend the Audio Technica MSR7s for closed backs at around the 150$ mark).

There is nothing on the planet that images like an HD800. Not Stax, not the Utopia, and definitely not any Audiotechnica. Please educate yourself.

K so I've been reading this thread and looking up a bunch of stuff but I still need help. I have a pair of HD650's from the massdrop coming in next month and I'm still not confident as to what DAC and AMP I should get. Would any recommendation do? I'm trying to make sense of the information I'm finding online about what DAC and AMP to choose with regards to your headphones' specs but things just aren't adding up for me :/

Audio-Technica ATH-AD2000x image better and to top it off they do it at less than 1/2 the price.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3jVSKCRSYRU
Review from guy who has used both and has done a direct comparison.

get bose theyre the best lol

https://i.imgur.com/6TtnIJI.jpg

that said I would recommend hd558s and I'm pretty sure the only ones that crack are 10+ year old ones, they fixed the cracking problem years ago iirc

as for amp/dac I don't think it's necessary to spend a lot on them. I think you should get separate amp/dac if you're not spending much though, as I said earlier I have topping d30/a30 and they power everything fine so far

They haven't existed for 10+ years. The hd558s came out in 2010. I got mine in 2011 and they did not survive to see 2012. Granted i'm rougher on my headphones than most people but my usual failure point is cables. I have never had another 100+ $ pair of headphones except for my 558s fail in this manner. They use thin cheap plastic where they shouldn't. IDK if that is to reduce weight or cost but i can't personally justify buying them again or recommend them to anyone else.

I'm not saying they are bad headphones. Im saying they are overrated, overrecommended, and overpriced.

using zeos as a point of reference for anything outside of comfort and build quality

OMEGALUL

Does that mean you owned 598/558s? Did someone's 598/558s crack and Sennheiser didn't honor the warranty because they fell off a truck instead of being purchased through an authorized dealer? Just because Sennheiser doesn't sell some replacements parts because they don't trust you to be able to pull off the repair doesn't mean they don't have them and won't repair headphones that are sent in.

> Takes headphones out of the box
> "There will be suffering"
Looking forward to this completely unbiased review.

I can show you the math on monday if someone else hasn't done so by then.

EDIT:

Aaaaand I was right.

well the hd 555s which are essentially the same thing have been out for a long time, but yeah obviously they didn't fix the cracking 10 years ago in that case. I definitely remember reading about the problem being fixed a few years ago when I was a big headphone nerd though

Zeos is not only an enormous meme on account of his anime brain cancer wallpapers, but he is literally deaf in terms of his ability to understand sound. If you don't believe me, he's said that the M50x and the Shure 1540 are "neutral", that the ODAC is flawless, and that the Stax SR-207 has better bass than a TH-900 (lol).
Also, "I don't like the HD800 bass. It's distorted." is a real gem from him.

Skeez is right in that he is usually ok at evaluating the comfort and build of various headphones, but is simply terrible at talking about and describing actual sound. I don't blame him in this regard, because he really can't hear the differences. So I don't think anyone should give a rat's ass about what he thinks about the 2000x's soundstage compared to the HD800, which is widely agreed to have the widest stage of any cans.

budget?

As a 598 owner I have no idea what people are doing to their headphones to break them. I would understand if they were closed and you were running in them but they're open so you're sitting in a chair.