I’ll start!
- Fiio FA9: my most critical listening sessions and overall best sounding. Also one of my remaining wired headsets that make work calls sound fantastic. These rarely leave the house with the exception for work travel, no intention for mobile listening with these.
- Sony WH-XM5: these are my go to for work travel/ out in public when I have a backpack to lug em around. The ANC and mic quality are 10/10. Sound out of the box was meh but after using the commonly used Reddit EQ, their sound is fantastic without any of the distortion. Never seen a set react to EQ so well without any distortion. Having great sound wirelessly has been a big QOL upgrade for me. Love having LDAC with high quality streaming.
- Fidelio X1’s: were my daily driver’s for about 7 years until the FA9’s. I now use them when the family is asleep, I click em into my BTR3 and connect to the TV, and get a cinematic experience. Their sound signature and soundstage make shows/movies/games MUCH more enjoyable when I cannot use the home theater setup. Otherwise, for music, they’re a little too easy going, I prefer something on the warmer end of neutral. Lacks the texture and resolution of the FA9’s.
- Google Pixel Buds 2: These are my grab and go’s, my daily beaters that integrate well with my pixel. Meh sound quality, decent call quality, sweat resistant. Most likely will upgrade to the WF-XM5’s as their sound is becoming evident as a dramatic downgrade to my other sets
Meze Empyrean for daily drivers at home. Use them for work, gaming, TV, movies, and surfing the web. When I’m in the office I use focal elagia because they sound really good with an EQ, are good at cutting out surrounding noise, and don’t leak audio at louder volumes. I also got them cheap at like $400 since they were being discontinued. But sometimes on the weekends I’ll use them when I want to listen to something from my phone and don’t want to be tethered to my PC. I used to use my momentum 3 for that and travel but the focal connected to my qudilex 5K sounds much better than them so they sit in a drawer most of the time. I’d like to get a new pair of headphones to compliment the Empyreans one day but everything I’m looking at is expensive.