I’m sure this topic could potentially be offensive to true audiophiles, but as the headline states… I want my first pair of headphones to be all I need. For month’s now I’ve become obsessed with closely following this community, and have spent dozens of hours watching every review possible of all the high-end headphones favored by this Sub… What I have narrowed it down to, essentially, is the HE1000SE, Focal Clear MG, Arya Stealth Magnet… If I purchase one of these, will I ever be truly satisfied with just the one pair? Or will I long for an experience that other pair’s of headphones have to offer?
So… I am a hifi dealer, and me and a competitor of mine have different tastes, and would recommend different headphones to you when you ask for “that one endgame with allrounder-capabilities”.
He never liked the Focal Utopia, would take the Susvara any day, and I think that Susvara would be a specialist to me because I don’t listen to the type of music that it is good at often enough.
But: I have found that there is a pretty good middle ground in the Audeze MM-500, so if you ever only want one headphone, I would recommend that one.
But that is just what I would do… it all just depends on the type of music that you listen to, and if you want to stay in that lane or explore other genres in the future. For that, I would at least consider a second one down the road.