As guru has noted above, this is the key to the Abyss. You can tune most any ortho to have a reasonably flat frequency response, but to get it right without any real damping - that is a manufacturing challenge. The TOTL stats do this , but you need a stat rig to enjoy them and I am with purrin that I am not a fan of the "ethereal" stax sound.

I know people are making a fuss about the looks, truth is the SR009 looks like a POS when sitting on someones head - it has that funky spring arc that sticks up 10 cm above your head


and good looks don't make it look any better


I absolutely don't care about the rugged industrial look, in fact I think they look quite rugged and industrial . I like it and the fact that they are comfortable and sound spectacular is the real kicker

price - having seen what it takes for Alex to get his amps to production, I can see many hidden manufacturing costs in the Abyss. I have a hard time justifying costs in audio as it is , but when I look at some of the craziness that we accept in the stereo world, paying $5K for a high end transducer seems far less crazy than paying $100K for the equivalent in a speaker. Even if we do not go to the extremes, take the $200 pioneer speakers which rocked the stereo world with their fidelity, does this mean that manufacturers such as sonus faber should rethink their product and not sell monitors for $15K. I am not trying to justify things for JPS BUT I can see where some of the costs come in ( without the whining and misguided assumption that they are trying to pay for expensive tooling required for the manufacture of the headphones) Most people drop $500 - $1000 on aftermarket cabling. Joe being a cable guy made what he considers the best cable suited to his headphone as part of the boutique accessory package. Many may ask why do they need a customized leather carry satchel , a complement of cable adapters and a headphone stand as part of the deal. If these were not included could the cost have been dropped by $1500 ? If I am reading into the idea behind the Abyss, you are buying the ultimate headphone package , "just add an amp" deal. I also think the package is seriously cool. Far more lust worthy than the stax briefcase of the SR007 series. Why did JPS not farm out the CNC work to another fabrication house - well they did initially and after suffering the seriously defunct manufacturing chain , they decided to do it in house . This was after RMAF ( when the price had already been announced, so not a factor in cost of the headphones at all ).

enough rambling , looking forward to more impressions. To my ears, music has never sounded more "real" , the LAu synergy is probably part of this experience.

..dB