Would headphones matter?

[jhafner]

Hello;

I am planning to buy headphones with a budget of 100$, but I only have an onboard sound on my old motherboard(P55A-UD3), so the question is: would it matter regarding sound quality which headphones do I buy?

Thnx for you help in advance.

Regards.

 

[VincentP]

Yes.
The quality of the headphones will make a much bigger difference than any improvement you could get from a sound card.
Be aware that some high end headphones have higher impedance and the onboard sound (or low to mid range sound cards) cannot drive them to their potential.

From wikipedia:
http/en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Headphones#Impedance

Headphones are available with low or high impedance (typically measured at 1 kHz). Low-impedance headphones are in the range 16 to 32 ohms and high-impedance headphones are about 100-600 ohms.[2] As the impedance of a pair of headphones increases, more voltage but less current is required to drive it, and the loudness of the headphones for a given voltage decreases.

 

[cozmium]

I'd argue it matters a lot. A decent pair of headphones that are looked after will last your life, whereas you will be through many computers in that time with any amount of unknown hardware. If you've not really used headphones much then it perhaps doesn't matter so much, but if and when you start getting in to good sound quality you will want good headphones.

Incidentally, by 'good' I don't mean Sennheiser like every teenager with a pc would buy, I mean a proper audiophile brand like Audio Technica or Grado etc. It obviously really depends what you're after from sound - quality or just overpowering bass etc.

 

[jhafner]

thnx all for your answers. Quality headphones it is.