[Yukicore]

So I have my eyes on this headset SteelSeries 9H, it is basically everything that I need, only I have heard that the sound quality is not too great.
 
I have been looking for anything that could compare to them, and only I have found expensive alternatives or worse alternatives. Looking at the Sennheiser PC series headphones0, but they are expensive and I have read that a lot of people have complained about their drivers and microphones breaking down after a few months of days of usage.
 
Would they really sound better than SteelSeries 9H? Also the microphone looks like a giant antenna, which makes going outside of home with them a living nightmare. I have seen a guy wearing a headset with a small microphone hanging out, looked pretty ridiculous, I can't imagine how it would look with a microphone big as this.
 
Any suggestions that you can give will be greatly appreciated, because I am not sure what to do. Maybe there are headphones sounding a lot better and without microphone, and then I can buy a separate microphone. Although having it hidden inside the headset is pretty cool.

 

[Yukicore]

I have tried my father's Sennheiser HD 555 just now, and for electonic music in MP3 320kbp/s format, they sound quite bad actually, I understand that at that quality a better, clearer driver can only may make the MP3 file sound worse, true?
 
The highs for these headphones are pretty quiet and the bass seems to start pressing on your ears a lot, after some time of listening, and in the result you begin to notice even less of the high frequencies. They sound quite muffled overall.
 
It might be because I'm just not used to them, or maybe they just don't suit the music style that I'm listening to.
 
I'm currently using Pioneer M-390 headphones. The highs and mids are quite terrible actually, but when you get used to them they sound quite nice.

 

[GaryWA]

  Budget is about 150$, and I can tell you this, I tried my father's Sennheiser HD 555 just now, and for electonic music in MP3 320kbp/s format, they sound quite bad actually, I understand that at that quality a better, clearer driver can only may make the MP3 file sound worse, true?
 
The highs for these headphones are pretty quiet and the bass seems to start pressing on your ears a lot, after some time of listening, and in the result you begin to notice even less of the high frequencies. They sound quite muffled overall.
 
It might be because I'm just not used to them, or maybe they just don't suit the music style that I'm listening to.
 
I'm currently using Pioneer M-390 headphones. The highs and mids are quite terrible actually, but when you get used to them they sound quite nice.

Do you live near a Frys? Sennheiser HD598 is on sale for $150.

 

[Yukicore]

 
Do you live near a Frys? Sennheiser HD598 is on sale for $150.
 

 
No, no, no, I failed to mention... I live in Europe.
 
Do you own Sennheiser headphones youself? And which model?
 
Because I'm not really sure they suit my needs, they do have quite clear sound output, and nice bass, but I think they fail to deliver the treble or whatever the key to make electronic music sound good.
 
Maybe it's because the HD 555's have some specifics, I'm not sure...
 
Also where I live HD 598's sell for twice the price of SteelSeries 9H

 

[Yukicore]

I have found Audio-Technica ATH-M50 for a pretty low price, lower than the SteelSeries 9H, they might be a big contender. What do you guys think about these headphones? I am very interested in bass performance, because my current headphones have 10Hz lower frequency response than ATH-M50's, comparing both headphone specifications.
 
For my in-ear earphones I have got one's with balanced sound (with frequency response from 20 to 20 000Hz), and I am quite satisfied, balanced sound is more important to me, than heavy bass, but I also really like the low frequencies.