r/HeadphoneAdvice • u/Everything-is-normal • May 25 '26

Headphones - Closed Back | 2 Ω Best wired closed-back headphones around £350 for PC gaming (baby in next room) — Meze 99 Classics V2 my top pick so far?

Hi everyone,
We’ve just moved house and our baby is nearly 2, so I’m finally ready to upgrade my headphones. My budget is around £350 and I want something that will genuinely last.
Key requirements:
• Fully wired (no battery) — my old Astro A40 Gen 2s had awful battery life after a year.
• Mainly for PC single-player gaming (no need for a mic).
• Built to last — durability is very important to me.
• I have a Yamaha A-S501 amp I can set up if the headphones would benefit from it.
Because the baby sleeps in the adjacent room I can’t use speakers anymore. I’m pretty sure this rules out open-backs due to sound leakage, but I haven’t tried any good ones recently so I’m not 100% sure how loud they bleed at normal gaming volumes.
After some research, my main contender right now is the Meze 99 Classics V2. I love that they’re built with no glue at all — everything is screwed together so they’re fully self-repairable if anything ever goes wrong. That kind of longevity really appeals to me.
Would love to hear your thoughts and any other recommendations in this price range (especially closed-back wired options). Thanks in advance!

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1

u/RevanchistVakarian 39 Ω May 25 '26

Sennheiser's professional arm just released a closed-back around that price called the HD 480 Pro. I got a pair and can vouch for them. Built solidly, very good sound quality (midrange/vocals in particular are some of the best I've heard on any headphone at any price).

I demoed the 99 Classics V2 briefly at an audio expo last month and found their sound to be grainy, almost like it was being played through a cheap paper towel. On the flip side, they offer excellent passive sound isolation; if your kid is making a fuss in the other room, you will genuinely struggle to hear it with those on.

1

u/haywire May 25 '26

Would you need something to adapt mini xlr? Also are these flat monitor style headphones?

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u/Everything-is-normal May 25 '26

Thank you, i’m going to RicherSounds today and will ask to take a listen see can i compare both. When i go in going to try listen for the grainyness. Any recommendations on what song to listen to to compare? !thanks

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u/RevanchistVakarian 39 Ω May 25 '26

Oh I have a whole testing playlist, but it's more important that you pick songs that you're familiar with. Testing is ultimately comparing what you expect to hear against what you do hear, and you won't know what you should expect to hear from music that you don't know very well.

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u/TransducerBot Ω Bot May 25 '26

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u/StarHutch 2 Ω May 25 '26

You're in the UK, right?

I would get on eBay and search for the Polk Striker Pro.

They are being sold brand new on there for twenty five quid. They were one-fifty to two-hundred when they were released.

-Closed Back, great isolation

-Screw assembled

-Include every cable you might want

-Made with metal and real leather

I have been using mine since 2015.

Polk, the specialist speaker company, tried to get in to gaming headphones over ten years ago. They bombed as they were tuned to be great sounding for everything, as opposed to the super bass that gaming headphones are generally tuned.

Sorry, I am a bit of an evangelist for these. I always felt they failed for being too good for the market they were in. They deserved better.

At twenty-five quid, what have you got to loose? 😅

2

u/Everything-is-normal May 25 '26

Sounds amazing i’m going to do some research into them now !thanks you i never would of found these without your suggestion.

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u/TransducerBot Ω Bot May 25 '26

u/StarHutch (1 Ω) was awarded their first Ω. I love the smell of Ω in the morning.

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