Analysis of the development status of evolutionary high-end headphones from thousands to tens of thousands

For the niche crowd of audiophiles, headset enthusiasts have now become a very common and basically accepted and recognized group of people in this circle. For headset enthusiasts, there may be no contact with speaker products for various reasons. For example, the local, the environment, the life is not allowed, or the simplest funds are not enough. But with the gradual development of the headset industry, the number of headset enthusiasts is now more and more, and the experience that the headset can bring to the user is more The more outstanding it is.

For headphones, there are many advantages compared to speakers, portability, privacy, and the impact on the surrounding people is relatively small, although most of the flagship headset products are open acoustic design, but compared to the speakers, for the surrounding The impact of people is still very small. But in fact, from the system's composition, it can be said that the combination of high-end earphone system and speaker system is almost the same, the only difference is the difference in the amplification equipment, one is the amplifier, one is the amp.

In the past few years, the headset industry has been paying more and more attention to the rapid development. If you go far, you can say that after entering the 21st century, the headset industry is developing rapidly, and for many traditional enthusiasts. The understanding of the sound performance of headphones is constantly improving, and even for the earphone industry, there are more and more consumers concerned, which is inseparable from the development of various intelligent terminals in recent years.

For the entire HiFi industry, most people are still a kind of declining mentality, but I have to admit that the earphone industry in recent years has shown a good growth trend for various reasons. Headphones enthusiasts The gradual increase also shows that the high-end category of this industry has attracted more people's attention.

To talk about the beginning of the HiFi headset, it may have started in the 80s, but the author did not understand it at the time, and in that era, almost no headset enthusiasts, most high-end headphones can not be returned. In this category of HiFi, many classic headphones in the 1990s and even before were not all HiFi products, including many professional-purpose monitor headphones, such as AKG's 240 series and so on.

In the 1990s, as the author's heart, HiFi headphones began, because there were several products in that period that left an important place in the author's heart.

The first one that has to be said is Sennheiser Orpheus. This earphone with a price of 200,000 in that year caused quite a stir, and it is also the crystallization of Sennheiser’s hard work for many years. The top earphone set. And this product does let a lot of people know that the original headphones can be so high-end, the world has high-end headphones.

In addition to Orpheus, Sennheiser's HD540 and HD580 are very classic headphones products introduced in the last century. These two headphones, especially the HD580, are still very popular, although they have been discontinued for many years, but still You can see that many earphone enthusiasts are looking for this headset product and hope to buy it.

In addition to Sennheiser, it is AKG. As a top-level headphone manufacturer of the same class, AKG launched the HiFi headset flagship product K501 in the 1990s. This product is based on its rich AKG style and relaxed natural sound. A lot of enthusiasts praised, and the price was less than a thousand dollars at that time, although it was not cheap for the income at the time, but compared to Other flagships, it is not expensive. Besides K501 has to say is AKG K1000, I believe that this AKG artifact is still unknown to the earphone enthusiasts. As an experimental product in the 1990s, the output is not much, but after the production is stopped, the second-hand price still has a price of nearly 10,000 yuan. It is not difficult to reflect The popularity of this product.

It can be said that around 2000, the headset industry has undergone no small changes. Many manufacturers have begun to update their flagship products, and more manufacturers have begun to enter the range of Chinese enthusiasts, not only Sennheiser and AKG. For enthusiasts to choose, Goethe, Iron Triangle, Beyerdynamic and other brands have begun to enter China, and launched one classic product after another.

Sennheiser's powerful dynamic empire has actually started from this time. With the release of the HD600 and the release of the HD650, there have been some minor changes in style compared to the HD580, but in terms of sound quality. Although the progress is not large, but after all, the name of the new flagship has attracted many enthusiasts to buy, and the HD600 and HD650 two different styles of headphones products also give enthusiasts more choices.

AKG also released the K601 and K701 products, which also officially opened the door of AKG's HiFi headset product line, and the K601 and K701 headsets have a significant improvement in sound quality compared to K501. It is indeed upgraded according to the model's progressive mode. Although the dynamic speaker technology has not made much obvious progress in recent years, it is obvious that the advancement in materials and manufacturing processes has enabled these manufacturers to find ways to improve.

In addition to Sennheiser and AKG, another brand that has to be mentioned is Beyerdynamic. The launch of the DT880 headset as the new HiFi headset for this monitor company has also received a lot of praise from enthusiasts. The white and detailed sound makes the details of the music appear to be complete, and the sound quality is also the same as the HD600 and K701. Since this era, the earphone industry has entered the three homes of Sennheiser, AKG and Beyerdynamic. The situation of the big factory.

Of course, in addition to these three big factories, Goethe and the Iron Triangle have gradually entered the people's field of vision. Although their respective shares are not as big as the three manufacturers mentioned above, there are many classics in the sound performance of the products. The model is still not lost to these mainstream flagship products, but also cultivated the brand's own "fans."

Around 2010, many of the flagships of these brands have been sold for 5-6 years or even longer. Some flagship products have been sold for nearly 10 years. Since 2008, Sennheiser and Beyerdynamic have started. Update your own dynamic ring headset flagship product, starting from the HD800 to open the curtain of the updated flagship dynamic circle.

As the dynamic flagship headphone product of Senhai's new era, HD800 has made great changes in both appearance and sound style. However, as the giant of the dynamic ring headphone industry, Sennheiser still keeps the HD800 new flagship. The extraordinary sound expressiveness, and indeed in the style, has indeed made great progress, the larger diaphragm area guarantees the improvement of the sound. For the price, the price of over 10,000 yuan is officially put the HiFi headset flagship. The positioning has pulled the price of 10,000 yuan, compared to the previous 2000-3000 yuan price, the heart rate is not small.

Beyerdynamic was not far behind, and soon released the new dynamic ring headset flagship product T1. The completely different model naming method also shows that this product is different from the HD800's increased unit size, T1 By adding the technical method of magnetic steel, it has achieved the magnetic properties of 1 Tesla, which makes the operation of the speaker itself more efficient. It has the same great improvement in sound quality as the previous generation products, and stands completely with the HD800. The same position. And the price is also unwilling to lag behind, the price of 10,000 yuan more determined the price of the flagship HiFi headset.

In addition to Sennheiser and Beyerdynamic, AKG has not been active for a long time. In October of this year, it officially released its new flagship headset K812, continuing the brand's low-impedance design style. Upgrade, and in the magnetic steel design has reached 1.5 Tesla, but this product is not yet listed, as for how the performance of the sound is still unknown, but for the price, 999 euros The price is similar to many flagship headphones.

In addition to these mainstream manufacturers, HiFiMAN HE-6, Audeze LCD-3, Iron Triangle W5000 and many other million flagships are also launched, these flat and dynamic headphones in addition to the same expensive price, in the sound In terms of quality, there are indeed very good performances. In addition to these, there are many high-priced products that are more expensive.

STAX's electrostatic headphones entered the market, of which the 007 package sold for nearly 30,000 yuan, while the 009 flagship package was as high as 40,000 yuan. Recently, American wire manufacturer JPS also launched its first earphone product, Abyss, at a price of 38,800 yuan. It also broke the price of the most expensive headphones, and for these headphones, the expensive price can indeed be exchanged for better sound performance, just whether it costs so much money, it is also a matter of opinion.

For high-end headphones, the top price will give users a top-level experience, but if you want to get the sound that matches the price, you may have to pay more money. More than 90% of the flagship HiFi headphones in the market are It is not designed for direct driving of common devices such as computers and mobile phones, but requires a headphone amplifier to get the best sound.

For electrostatic headphones, the amp becomes an inevitable choice, because at least the plug is not the same, the user needs a special electrostatic amp to drive the electrostatic headphones, and the powerful sound quality and revealing power of the electrostatic headphones for the front The requirements are also very high, that is, even if you spend 30,000 yuan to buy a STAX009 single earphone, you need to spend at least 10,000 to buy an amp to make it sound, if you want it to sound good enough sound quality, Maybe I can't wait for 100,000 to do it.

For dynamic headphones, it also needs better equipment to drive and listen to them better. For the enthusiasts, the quality of the amplifier will be very large for a good enough speaker. The final sound. If you are not an enthusiast and plan to buy such a flagship headset, then if you want to hear its true voice performance, you may have to prepare for 3-5 times the price.

For the current high-end flagship headset market, it is not so approachable in terms of price, but for the crowd of headphones enthusiasts, it is indeed becoming more and more. For these top manufacturers, the previous generation The flagship exit has been around for some years. I don’t know if there will be a new flagship in the next few years. More importantly, will these new flagships in the future be more expensive?