xEcuToR

So I received my pair of RR1 Conquest yesterday #2. I played with it for an hour or so. I will post impressions about it as I get more time with it and hopefully will be able to do some comparisons with 007 Mk1 & Mk2 in the coming days. I got the premium version which comes for 650 USD, in a nice box and longer 2.5-meter cable compared to the base model which comes in a regular Kraft Box (IIRC) and standard 1.5-meter cable at 500USD. Link to some photos of the literature and headphone. https://imgur.com/a/6WeVBRb

As a consumer in this niche market, I have my own criticisms about the industry and though it might not be in line with popular or mainstream perceptions, but I see this becoming a trend parallel to the mobile devices industry where the consumer has a short product memory. And currently if you are looking at the headphone market, from 2009 onwards every other manufacturer is releasing a new flagship in every couple of years, this also goes for the IEM and DAP market, where "THE ULTIMATE" digital audio player is released in every 6 months by South Asian Manufacturers at ridiculous prices with the premise that it is a "LUXURY" product, but it is clearly not, as it is poorly made, sound mundane at best and can't even do what an average smartphone does and few even have problems with oxidation, despite being worth more than 5 times a iPhone 6S. There are some benefits out of this hyper hyped market though, as a few manufacturers and DIY'ers do seem to come out with good stuff once in a while, but it is always a rare find and for me it takes time for gear to grow on you as you get more and more aware of the product from a holistic perspective , which is why I also don't trust these early reviews before the actual product launch.

Point noted.

The new headphones might be the best thing ever, who knows, I don't believe in those type of ultimate statements, its stupid, as it is a subjective matter. But the marketing around it is not fooling me, people should recognise it. The following steps are classic examples of creating hype around products, which has been used. This is a personal opinion and I believe a lot of manufacturers and brand names are doing it these days to increase revenue after getting back the initial money invested in projects. 1. A preview in a social platform (YouTube Videos at popular forum channels) 2. Encouraging the niche segment to spread the word (Various websites, blogs write articles about it) 3. Start Blogs about the product (Blogging related to the constant gushing of the product starts) 4. Announcing a pre-determined launch date (Getting the demographic prepared to pull the trigger on the purchase) 5. While launching a new product, offer a limited quantity to create a sense of urgency among the target market & create more of a demand. This makes the product more valuable, and when the stocks sell out more hype will be created for the products in the next round (Announcing limited stock through most popular sources)

I am in total agreement with you on this. Last year, while looking for a decent floor-standing 2 channel speaker system, I auditioned several speaker systems at various stores and to my surprise I didn't like a single Focal system, but with other manufacturers I at-least liked one out of all the systems I auditioned like KEF, Klipsch,B&O. Ended up buying the Polk Audio RTI A5.

Got my first Electrostatic setup (Stax SRM 1/MK 2 [Spritzer Mod] + Stax SR 407) and I've got to say Stax SR 407 has quite a bit of bass (More than I was expecting to be precise), in fact it has more bass than the AKG K340. Jazz, Western Classical, Folk, Indian Classical, Blue Grass seem to have a good pairing with this combo. Currently setup 3 is my favorite which is closely followed by setup 2. Setup 1- PC +J River 21 + Resonessance Labs Concero HP Setup 2- Macbook Air Haswell + Amarra Symphony + Resonessance Labs Concero HP Setup 3- Questyle QP1R

Couldn't agree with you more. Personally I trust opinions given by Tyll and Nathan and have benefited from that over the years. But there is one guy I can't stand at all, who only has positive things to say about everything he gets his hands on, "Michael Mercer". His tweets speak for themselves. BTW hello, everyone at head case, this is my first post, joined here because am a bit fed up with what goes on in head-fi these days. Just got my first electrostatic system, which consists of a Spritzer modified SRM 1 MK2 , (Yet to see it) . Hope to have great discussions with you all. Cheers