Are there headphones that image in front of you rather than in your head?

I agree, but also suspect that refections off the wall and ceiling or invaluable. I can conceive of signal changes to give the brain changes in the signal to give the impression of being there. This sounds like a complicated process and one that is not yet available.

AKG K-270 headphones have separate tweeters that fire from the front. Perhaps the 1000 mentioned before is also like this.

David and Humand, thanks for your posts. I am going to the Rocky Mountain Audio Fest in Oct. They usually have a large showing of head phones. I expect that AKG will be there.

David, I was unaware of Darin Fong Audio! I'm going to correct this today. Thanks for the heads up.

tbg:

At RMAF the headphone area is quite noisy so except for evaluating physical comfort of the headphone on the head it is rather limited in doing serious evaluations. Look for the few rooms on the upper floors that will have headphones. Evaluate early in the day before the crowds arrive.

The listener - headphone interaction is really the world's smallest listening room. The Smyth Realizer people have shown there is up to a 30 % frequency response variation due to changes in the external ear anatomy. So to maximize their system's function to produce 3D listening, your individual ear's are evaluated with microphones inserted into the ears. Much like testing the acoustic response of a room.

Electronic noise at the wall outlet, RF noise, EMF noise generated by components and all cables have a greater effect on the headphone soundstage than on room speakers.

You can achieve a wonderful headphone experience with the Sennheiser 800 ( some demo units at Music Direct for under a $1000.00).  I also have be able to get an outstanding listening experience using the Enigmacoustic Dharma  hybrid headphones - about $1300.00. This has a conventional driver with a self biasing electrostatic element. They too are comfortable.

But my system has had the whole works applied and evaluated - just as you would do with a cutting edge full room system. That means starting with the wall outlets and evaluating each link in the chain until the music gets to my brain processing centers. Noise, hash, grain really kill the soundstage of headphones.

David Pritchard