I suspect the huge strike going on in my country right now (France) might have influenced what items were shipped. I'm unsure if that's the case, but for the most part, Amazon has been very consistent with what was delivered to me. So, yeah, seems like the most likely culprit.

Drivers are by far the only thing that makes a headphone sound good. That's like saying the only thing that makes a car fast is the engine.

You also have to consider the housing, cables, material, pads etc.
As well as that, a driver is tuned to sound a specific way. Not that different to how vehicle engines are tuned to perform in a specific way. An F1 car and a Suzuki Ignis both have 1.6L V6 engines with a Hybrid motor but the F1 engine performs better.

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Magnets can be physically different and have different characteristics. Speaker diaphragm can be a different shape, material. Speaker coil can be made from different wire - thicker or thinner. It can have a different amount of winding on said wire. The actual winding itself can be different.

You cannot EQ a crappy driver to perfection, as it simply does not have a capacity to reproduce all sounds properly without distortion no matter what you do.

I got mine for under $80 on drop, unbelievable! If my X4 ever kicked the bucket I would 100% buy another without thinking if it is on sale which it almost always is around $99. I prefer the comfort and fit of the X4 over the 400se but that's just a personal thing.

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I've ordered hundreds of items off Amazon over the years, and the closest they've come to ever delivering me the wrong item is that I got the GameOne headphones in black even though in the picture they were white. From my experience they run an incredibly tight ship, although I guess it could vary among different distribution centers.

EQ can change a lot, and completely transform a headphone. One thing though is that it's better to EQ with wider filters, as trying to EQ narrow peaks and dips can cause issues. So in that sense, you can EQ most headphones to have very similar sound signatures, but usually there's small details in the Frequency response that are harder or unable to be EQd.

Remember that the frequency response changes quite drastically on your own head, compared to what you see on a measurment rig. So even if you EQ two headphones to have an almost frequency response on a graph, on your own head the FR at your eardrum may be drastically different.

If you were to measure the response of your own ear, and then EQ the headphones to your own ear response, then you can get something much closer. This is one method that Harman used to blind test headphones, they would virtualize different headphones with one test headphone (as well as using the real ones), and they found the results of prefrence tests using virtual headphones were 95% similar to the results using the real headphones.

I usually put new pads on headphones I'm trying to sell as a courtesy anyway. So yeah, I'd just get new pads. They're cheap and prospective buyers will appreciate it

Thats not natural wear, i wear mine everyday and have had them for at least 3 years and other then some scrape from pick them up and down, my sundaras look mint and no damage

Real. After my Chu's had filter issues and I tried (and failed) to replace them, I simply gave up because they didn't sound any better than my Titan S and the non detachable cable was a pain. The metal housing and fit was awesome, but as long as that cable is stuck to it I don't want any part of it.

drivers are different, yes.
but sound is not just drivers. it's everything else: the shape of the shell, the material, the pads, etc.

Yes, they are different. One is carefully designed to have the desired characteristics, they other isn’t. Are the materials and sizes different? Not necessarily.

That's why I sold my Grado RS1. I simply coulden't tame them without ruining the sound.

no worries.

Sorry if you misunderstood what I meat but do you have any answer or some tangible difference you can point to.

"Fast forward...a few years and we've reached the point where we've actually reached the point where we can argue we have too many options."

I relate to this so much. It feels like with the in-ear market, the options available are overwhelming. The way I used to narrow the products down was by frequency response graphs vaguely adhering to some target. Eventually, it felt like every other in-ear I was considering was measuring somewhat close to IEF neutral, to the point where I couldn't narrow down options any further than the selection available in one weekend's CanJam visits.

Monitoring

you said size. you're comparing the size.

Congratulations on the upgrade!

I am interested to know about the Ayima dac performance. Can you describe its performance compared to your PC model?

Have you considered the Monolith planars? They come with 5 year warranty, and have a metal headband / yokes. And the padding and cups are actual leather (except for the velour cups, comes with 2 sets)

I have the M1070 and M1570 if you have any questions. And I've dropped mine a few times and nothing broke. :) Just be mindful to get them on sale.

Haha I have the X4, run it on the 5K, and love it! It’s my favorite headphone.

what are you talking about they have different engines which is what actually matters and drives up the price you are talking about the superficial similarities. I am refering to the actual components that make up the drivers.

If you have the money and want to do it right, the Qudelix 5k would be my first choice and only choice.

If I need to keep under budget, next on my list would be the Creative SXFI AMP (not to be confused with the X1 which looks identical). The SXFI AMP has a LOT of power compared to other cheaper dongles. 370mW at 32 ohms. It happens to be on sale for 60 dollars. The Creative app for it is kind of trash on PC but it's usable, same with Android. You can adjust bass and treble and select from some presets and there is also the SXFI gimmick which I hate but you can turn this off if you share the same feelings about it. Works on PC/Android.

Last for me would be the Truthear Shio because it suits my tastes for neutral sounding headphones.

There is probably some new hotness out there in dongles but the only one I can confidently recommend that should delight is the Qudelix. Worth every penny.

Cheap headphones have gotten so good recently.
Sennheiser have the HD599 which is almost constantly on sale for less than £100 on Amazon
AKG have the K702 which has a superb frequency response and fantastic soundstage. With technical accuracy which really isn't that far behind the HD600.
The Koss KSC75. £20, supremely comfortable, superb sound signature, especially for visual media.

It barely seems necessary to spend >£200 on audio gear anymore