jasonite

I'm relatively new here, but have been doing a lot of research over the past several days or so on the listening experience for my PC. I'm planning on buying the Sound Blaster Z card and am looking for a great pair of cans to round out my experience. My budget is $200 and under, and I will primarily use them for gaming, but I'd also like to listen to music as well from time to time. I do some FPS gaming but it's mostly Star Wars: Old Republic- or Neverwinter-type games. Soundstage, imaging and bass are particularly important to me. Imaging for obvious reasons, gotta know where shots are coming from, soundstage I think goes along with this, and bass because I love good explosions as well as digging into some killer Queen songs. I've narrowed it down to several choices: Audio Technica ATH-AD900X, NVX Audio XPT100, KRK KNS6400, AKG K612PRO, Audio-Technica ATH-M50S, Sennheiser HD 558, KAM HP1 and the HiFiMan - HE-400. Normally the HE-400 would be way over my budget but I've managed to find a deal where I can get them for $200. According to David Mahler regarding the HE-400s: "Very few headphones possess as deeply textured, well-extended, and impactful bass as the HE-400" "I'm tempted to suggest that at its pricepoint, the HE-400 is the best at imaging of all the headphones I've heard" and "The HE-400's soundstage is more impressive than most of its similarly-priced competitors. While it is not the widest, it exhibits significant depth and height. It is a fairly natural sound presentation." My understanding of the 900x is that they have good clarity, lush balanced mids and highs, punchy accurate bass, are very comfortable, great soundstage but I don't know about imaging; the KNS6400 are closed cans so the soundstage seems good but not the equivalent of opens according to tdockweiler in his review; the XPT100 is also closed but reportedly has a better soundstage than the 6400 according to keanex, but no word is given about the imaging in his review; keanex also reports on the KAM HP1 (also closed), saying the bass is good after burn in but there is not a lot of weight, "When listening to songs that demand heavy, deep, bass I felt that the HP1 lacked. The HP1 make even the deepest bass regions audible, but there’s no rumble" per his review; my understanding of the Sennheiser 558 is that they have a warm laid back sound signature. Decent bass impact and extension, smooth mids, and slightly rolled off highs, don't know about imaging here though; according to Brooko's review the K612 Pro has a nice soundstage and better imaging than the K702, and also have marginally more bass while remaining flat. Given what I've read I'm leaning toward the HE-400, but are the 400's overkill? It's at the top of my budget but I'd rather pay less of course, unless the 400 is head and shoulders above the competition. I will have some extended music sessions but primarily these will be gaming headphones. I also will having them hooked up to a sound card for surround, not a high end DAC and amp. A consideration also is that they not be too heavy and certainly comfortable, for extended gaming and listening. I'm worried the 400's might be fairly heavy. Having said all this, these are just my guesses from a relative newcomer. Should I consider going for the HE 400's, is it not necessary, or am I missing a factor that will determine what gaming headphones to get? Sorry for the length of this post, but all this stuff is in my head! Jason