For my 50th birthday (eek) I decided it was time to step up my headphone game. I've been wearing headphones now throughout the pandemic so I don't bug my family, so it seemed sensible to kick it up a notch. But how do you go and listen to nice headphones? You kinda don't these days.

Instead, I read too many reviews and went down a bunch of twisty little passages, ultimately deciding that I wanted headphones with planar ribbon drivers, which I already have in my main loudspeakers, so I know that I like the sound. The popular models tend to weigh in at 600+ grams, and owners joke about how they become a workout for your neck. Of course, if you want to spend more money for less weight, you can definitely do it.

This ultimately led me to the Dan Clark Audio Ether 2, which is $2300 new (also eeek), but only 290 grams. So, the used market for the win? I found a guy selling a used pair with some cosmetic scratches. Asking $1050, and way too nerdy about headphones to be some sort of casual thief. We met at a Starbucks parking lot, I plugged them into my Android phone and they worked, so we did the deal. I'm going to have to order new earpads, but otherwise they're good to go.

Now I've got them at home, plugged into my (sadly discontinued) Teac USB-DAC, which also powers the loudspeakers next to my computer. Digression: to get the USB connection from computer to DAC working requires a Mac kernel driver, which Teac stopped supporting. Of course, Teac's newer USB-DAC boxes are standards compliant and don't need drivers. I'm just using an S/PDIF output cable instead. Insert joke here about the joy of having so many standards to choose from.

Some fun observations:

• My Android phone can drive these headphones, but with absolutely no bass.
• My desktop amp does the job just fine, but with the volume knob turned up higher than I ever had it before.
• There's a completely separate and nerdy universe of equalizing headphones, where you can download "AutoEQ" profiles for thousands of headphone models. At least on a Mac, you're paying a few bucks for the software to do it, but the results are solid. Toggle it on and off, and it's clear that the EQ is a good thing.

Is it possible that these fancy audiophile headphones are in need of a fancy audiophile headphone amplifier?

Without a doubt, it's recommended to use a fancy amplifier. I think my Teac qualifies as such.