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Comment by rdl | Hacker News Reader

A $100-500 set of headphones, decent headphone amp ($50-500), and FLAC files will probably get you to "98" on the log scale, too.

(I'm a little wary of buying used headphones, at least without replacing all the soft parts and cleaning thoroughly, though.)

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I thought that way for a long time too - but ultimately I think the limited/artificial soundstage with headphones has to hold them back a bit, in the realm of merely "very good" rather than "nearly perfect".

My headphone rig objectively sounds better than my speaker rig, but the speakers ultimately sound more natural, even if by objective measurements (e.g. frequency response) they're markedly inferior.

(Neither rig is super high end, not too far above the ~$1000 system at the end of the article, but they are all properly chosen and installed components.)

You can fix the soundstage somewhat using an xfeed filter. It's simplistic, but does help move the soundstage out from inside your head to being perceived more in front. It's pretty easy to set this up for most software sources, sadly not typically supported by hardware players or phones.

The bs2b crossfeed plugin is pretty good for that purpose: http://bs2b.sourceforge.net/

I'm using it on Linux (alsa) for my in-ear-phones.

From /etc/asound.conf:

  pcm.crossfeed {
    type plug
    slave.pcm "ladspa"
  }

  pcm.ladspa {
    type ladspa
    slave.pcm "plughw:0,1";
    path "/usr/lib/ladspa";
    plugins [
      {
        label bs2b
        input {
          controls [ 700 4 ]
        }
      }
   ]
  }

One of the best crossfeeds is the VST plugin hdphx from Refined Audiometrics Laboratory. They don't offer it anymore on the original site but you can still find it. I am sure crossfeeds built into an amp are better but for a software solution it sounds the best to my ears.

Well, the xfeed filter is really only trying to mimick the way the far ear can hear more energy from a speaker at frequencies low enough that the head doesn't shadow it. So it doesn't need to be a particularly complex filter. Trying to make the correction curve too detailed will likely just result in clearly heard artifacts.

For me part of the music experience is also feeling the music. That's not something you can get with headphones (well, safely at least :-)

Am I crazy for actively preferring the inside-the-head soundstage? It's one of the main reasons I've switched to using headphones even when speakers would be more convenient.

This would be true if they used a head simulator for recording. Since they don't, you will get the wrong projection. All headphones sound more like "the concert is happening between my ears" than "the concert is happening on a stage in front of me".

A $20 USB soundcard also seems to help, if your source is a laptop.

But read extensive reviews first. There are a lot of cheap and horrible USB soundcards, and many times the built-in audio out is better.

Yeah, what I meant by "amp" was integrated USB DAC + amp. I use a Headroom Total Bithead, which isn't the best, but isn't the worst. I am not really sure what the best in various price ranges would be.

There's huge variation in quality of headphone-out on computers. I'm sure some are good, and most Apple products are at least ok, but I've usually found even the lowest end (CMOY, Filo, etc.) is a big improvement.

(plus, the amp is really helpful for high-impedance headphones. Mine range from ~30 to ~600 Ohm.)

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