Bought a Hifiman Edition XS a while ago, driving it from a 90s Harman Kardon, as it needs quite some power. You can get good and powerful mobile DACs as well, coworker did that, but it's more expensive than the headphones.
So much fun to rediscover my old LPs and even crappy 128kB mp3s sound much better.
Exactly! I also figured out the audio quality doesn't make as much difference as the DAC to me. For example, I definitely don't pass the blind lossless audio test https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45395538
Is it the DAC or the wired headphones that make the difference?
Definitely the DAC. I tried headphones without DAC directly plugged into my MacBook and didn't sound as good. I also tried $19 wired Apple EarPods plugged into the DAC and I felt a difference.
Could very well be more careful attention to the analog signal handling circuitry after conversion has been made than anything else.