$1,000 Ear Buds from Sennheiser
For close listening on my iPhone, a switch between a pair of Shures (excellent for airplanes) and a set of Sennheisers (good for walking the dog). Both are slightly different but offer far superior sound when compared to standard ear buds.
Now Sennheiser wants everyone to know that they’re launching a new pair of in-head buds called the IE800. Featuring “balanced-armature multi-drivers”–whatever that means–these things have a retail price of $1,000 USD.
As far as I can tell, these are the most expensive ear buds in the world.
Ten bucks says they still wear out at the connection between the jack and the cable in exactly the same amount of time.
That's a lot of money for non custom ear buds. Guess there is a market for people with entirely too much money though. 1964ears.com makes custom quad-driver buds for $525 USD, best quality vs cost I've found.
Just get the new Apple EarPods for $29.99.
Guarantee you the EarPods won't sound as good as say $60-90 buds. (Granted they'd be a third to half the cost.)
A major difference though, and one reason they may appeal more to some people is that they specifically do not seal sound out.
I much prefer sound-isolating earbuds. But I think it's also a major factor in hearing loss — non-isolating ear buds need to be turned up LOUD to be heard over the din of traffic.