Shure Cable Problem! (w/Picture)

everyone knows that shures have cable problems... time for u to send it inn

Of course, the good thing is you'll get a brand new pair of SE530...till it break again.

Yeah i would to if that was my $500 investment. It seems there is no cable relief on the se530, the cable just terminates at the black piece.

Not to place blame...but how are you removing the IEM's from your ears after use?

I could see how pulling on the cable would definately lead to this problem...

what do you guys do with your hundreds of dollars headphones??? the OP's shures look like they have taken years of punishment, notice how the black grip looks scratched and worn and...trashed in all honesty, these are $500/£330 earphones and some guys on here dont seem to understand that they are still very small and fragile and need to be kept clean and in their case when not in use.

These are my se530 after about 9-10 months constant use now and i know for a fact i have an older cable (the so called split prone edition) and the very worst i have witnessed so far is a very slight kink in the cable where i tried to straighten the cable up after about 2 months and created a kink. To my suprise this kink has not come to a point where its split or damaged at all.

can you believe it! i cant make my phone take images below 30kb and ofcourse it takes jpeg images and head fi wont let me attach images above 19.5kb, that is strange, if anybody has a quick way around this please tell me so i can upload images to head fi which i have been unable to do for some time. cheers

anyway take it from me for now that mine are in as new condition and it baffles me how bad some guys must treat thier phones to get them looking like the cat has been at them seems to me that more care must be taken for most people

excuse the poor quality pic. n95 overexposes.

but these are in superb condition after like i say about 9 months so if yours look like that after a month i pity how you take care of your more expensive luxuries

i would not say the ops look so bad. ive seen much worse. i feel sad that this has happened - it is obvious that shure dropped a ball of shyte on cable manufacturing with this model - too bad as they are rather excellent monitors

They're under warranty so send them back.

But it does look like you're pretty rough on them...

dont get me wrong the OP's phones dont look terrible but after a single months use i dont see how you can get the rubber grip looking that bad, i know its the part you grip to take em out of your ears but what are you gripping them with to get them looking that shredded?, i dont get it??

anyway no offence ch28kid, dont tek my comments the wrong way its just odd how many complaints you see on head fi about shure cables and then when we see the pics they look like they have never seen thier home (the case) when not in use. anyway im off out ill check back later and hopefully somebody can tell me how to get images up on head fi easy enough so you can see how shures should look after some good use

well they are roughed up but a pair of 300 dollar phones (or are they more?) should at the very least incorportate strain relief of some sort, not fake stuff and have only the rubber sleeve. no matter how poorly they are treated, this should not happen. this would not happen to a much cheaper phone - poor workmanship

thank you


i had just went to shure last month for my se210 replacement. 2nd time in 10 months. i treat my audio stuff extremely careful because a) they cost a lot and b) i just love them. i got proof too, my 4 year old white er6i still white and sound good. i use it almost daily for the first two, three years. i really don't think i'll buy another shure earphone. i love shure ear tips/foam though.

There are several long threads discussing the issue, as well as Shure's warranty service. There has been talk that there was a new cable formulation but I am not sure if that is a fact or not. Depending on the date stamp, the cables have changed in their formulation but I am unsure if there has been any improvement

oh right, nice one, thats my theory out the window. but yeh you do appear to treat them correctly then. the only other theory is yes yanking on the cable hard could cause that damage...and yeh there should be some strain relief really but lets not forget that, ALL earphone manufacturers advise never to tug on the cable when in the ears because ofcourse it would take a significant tug to remove them from the ears causing damage.

i think to be fair to shure, in this case i would guess the cable is not the problem because it is not split, cut or torn in any way. apart from the obvious strain relief plea, the only other reason for the damage you have is tugging at the cable when in the ears because lets face it...the cables simply dont come away from the earpeices unless forced to because they are soldered in many places like all other earphones. As far as cables go i think shure has one of the best built, up there almost with westone. its just unfortunate the earlier models had compound problems

I am not sure how you can defend shure like this so whole heartedly, when there have been so many reports of cable cracking issues in the e500/se530 line. You have to think, even though it is frowned upon to tug at earpieces, it just happens- everybody does it, and I don't think shure e500/se530 owners make is a point to tug at their earpieces more than owners of other IEMS. So why then, does this model and the SE line have this cable issue in excess compared to other manufacturers?


Obviously Shure's cables are NOT the best built out there...there are pages and pages and large number of members here with the same issue. And I don't think that actual brute force is the only means of separating the cable from the rubber sleeving as in the OPs first post. This would definitely happen over time, and depends on the oils from your skin, as well as depends on how snuggly you pull the cable over your ears. It is just wear and tear - and in this case, the e500/se530 line cannot hold fast to the wear and tear as some other IEMS can.