I had the MDR-E9LP (flathead instead of IEM) a couple times instead. They do just randomly die, once it was the cable which was repairable, but eventually the actual drivers just follow. My TE Holas already lasted more than them and are still going, even after going through the washer once.

One consideration with power is that headroom is convenient. Nobody probably listens at 120dB peak spl for most music but there’s media like podcasts with low average volume, and significant EQ also means significant negative preamp. 120dB would basically satisfy my wants, 110dB is workable and 100dB peak would make me put artificial gain sometimes. Wattage limits are mostly hit by low impedance, low sensitivity headphones, but high impedance ones are capped by voltage instead.