These Headphones Are Too Good — Part 3

It’s time to look at my favorite closed back models

Photo taken by the author.

I spent a good chunk of the last decade writing reviews online of headphones and gaming headsets. As I funded nearly all this out of my own pocket, my personal collection is not vast, but instead a small selection of favorites; the rest have been sold on to help fund the effort.

Now that I’m moving more into gaming content, I’m looking back at some of the highlight products from my audio reviewing time in this article series. You can catch up on part 1 here and part 2 here. After years of reviews, only two closed back non-gaming headphones remain in my house, and both are from the same audio company. Let me tell you about them.

I wasn’t asked by any of the featured companies here to mention their products.

If you asked me to pick the “best sounding” closed back for a reasonable price, I’d be remiss if I didn’t start with the AKG K371. This studio-focused pair goes for a reasonable price of around $160 and is still one of the best examples of a “Harman target” pair of headphones. The Harman target is a science-backed sound signature designed to produce pleasant, accurate, neutral audio for most listening purposes including professional audio work. My only issues with the K371 revolve around its design; it looks more…