The Orpheus headphones by Sennheiser debuted with significant fanfare at CES 2016 and are being billed as the best and most expensive headphones in the world. Both claims are equally pompous… but they just might be right.
With a price tag of €50,000, the second claim is not that hard to imagine. The first? iDigitalTimes went to the Sennheiser booth for a demo and to talk with the people that made the headphones.
“This is something for someone who wants a sound reproduction system that would rival even super premium speaker systems,” Scott Houston, Sennheiser product specialist for the Americas, told iDigitalTimes. “And it’s something for those that want the best and do not settle for anything … and they do have the means.”
Sennheiser’s Orpheus features include: the lowest total harmonic distortion that has ever been measured in an audio reproduction system, an innovative tube amplifier system, a hand-crafted Carrara marble base as part of the more than 6,000 individual components that went into making the Orpheus.
It’s hard to imagine (for most of us anyway) being convinced to even consider a piece of technology being sold for around $50K. For Sennheiser, it knows who it is targeting and knows just how good its products are.
But why? Why spend s much on particular device?
“The same reason why anyone would by a Bugatti. You can barely drive it on the street legally, (you do it) because you can,” Houston said. “This is more for the true audiophile that would have that ultra high-end home theater system and wants to take it up a notch.”
Development for the Orpheus began almost 10 years ago at Sennheiser and Houston said the company made zero compromises in designing the device. Even the cables connecting the device (not included btw) meet their high standards.
“This is a project where we say we spare no expense, we make it crazy just because we can,” Houston said. “That’s $5,000 worth of cable for just three cables because we wanted to make sure we were presenting it in the right fashion.”
The connectivity options for the base include a USB and coax so “you can play iTunes off your Mac or a $50,000 turntable.”
The Sennheiser Orpheus headphones don’t have a firm release date yet, but are scheduled to be available for purchase in mid 2016.
During our demo session we were given a few minutes to listen to the Orpheus headphones following a presentation about Sennheiser’s 3D immersive audio technology (we’ll have another article on that later) and while our time was brief it was impressive.
Playing “Hotel California” (seriously?) if you closed your eyes you seemingly were transported to the room where the Eagles recorded the song in 1976. Every pluck of the bass, snap of the drum and pitch of vocals were crystal clear. It was an audio sound that could make all other listening sessions inadequate.
The Orpheus was a bit heavy on the head, but with the built in amps on the ear cups, there was zero noticeable sound degradation. We’re not sure if they’re the best headphones in the world, but we’re not sure if they're not either.
For more information on the Sennheiser Orpheus, you can visit sennheiser.com.
