They were up at $20 about 15 minutes away due to a problem with the cable connection. Owner said the input socket seemed to be bad as you had to wiggle the end of the wire a certain way to get them to work. I asked him if he had checked the cable, his hesitating response made it clear he had never thought of that. Since I had a spare "upgrade" cable from eBay for another set of Sennheisers that is actually really nice and I had found a web page on opening up the 570, I decided to take a chance.
Seems to have been the cable, mine works fine. The original makes a weird fluttering, warbling sound I have never heard from a bad cable. Looking at the original cable I wonder if some of the bad reviews might be due to the apparently horrible quality of that stock one. Should be interesting with the new one.
First they need to be cleaned up. The main phones are in very nice shape. The pads are pretty used and dirty. I tried removing one and ended up just peeling it off. Is that correct? With my other Sennheisers there is some sort of part that somehow snaps or hooks in place. Do these just glue on? Looking at the eBay replacements that makes sense as they come with two sided tape. I also removed the inner foam that was dirty and about to crumble.
If someone can confirm that just peeling off the pads is correct I will go ahead and do the other. I have tried washing the first one, I will see what it looks like when it dries. I would rather keep the originals as the China replacements are of very different construction and will no doubt change the sound. I will order a set anyway as I need the inner foam and the going price of $5 for the whole set is less than $3 more than just the inner foams alone. Might as well have the spares.