Oliver :)
Headphoneus Supremus
- Joined
- Apr 14, 2002
- Posts
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I received my In-Ear Headphones along with my new 3G iPod and gave them a spin right away (amped by my XIN Supermicro). Here are my first impressions.
Apple manages to amaze me again and again. The unpacking experience of any given Apple product is unmachted. Even accessoires such as the named headphones and my additional firewire cable are packed as if they were jewellery.
The In-Ear Headphones come on their own small plastic box. Very neat if you want to stow them away, but I guess it will not see much use from me as these phones appear to be sturdy enough to be shoved in a pocket without much protection. Very neat and organized though.
You get two pairs of medium sized earpieces, one large pair, and a smaller one.
There is a piece of plastic on the cord to organise the length/play of the headphones which can be used to keep them from tangeling up when stored, something I always missed on my 1G buds. The cord might be a little short if used without the remote.
The phones are very light and comfortable and inserted with ease (you will have to check the writing though unless you can indicate by differently sized earpieces which is the left/right one) It is almost as if they were not there at all. They do not fall out of my ears. The cable does tansport quite a bit of microphonic noise, but you can eliminate a lot of it by moving the plastic shover closer under your chin. I noticed that the phones pick up a noticable hiss when used with my Supermicro, but it will only come apparent once there is no music playing and it is quiet otherwise. When walking with the phones the microphonics are there, but they are nowhere as noticable as with Etys. I do not feel a great need to clip the cable somewhere or take other countermeasures. They provide sufficient isolation for the bus and subway, as in you will not feel a need to crank up the volume to deafening levels. Nowhere near Etys level though.
Soundwise I was quite impressed. The phones pack a serious punch in the bass area, which surprised me as they are not truely sealing the ear canal at all. I listened to Eurythmics "Greatest Hits", Darran Byrne and the Backyard Bards "Entertaining Hans Sachs", and Kristin Shey (go check her out at http://www.kristinshey.com , she is *great*) after burning the phones for about three hours on my Cosmic.
As I said, the bass is impressive, but I found the high end to be a bit shrill, and a strange underrepresentation of the upper midrange which was most noticable when listening to Eurythmics. I had this "Everything is poppin' loud but the vocals" feeling, with the upper bass sometimes totally playing over the vocals. They are getting better though. Now, after about 8 hours total playtime, the shrillness is noticably going away, and Kristin's voince sounded phantastic. Soundstage is nice and wide.
I used them in combination with my Supermicro all the time. Without it, I had to turn my iPod up quite a bit for some tracks (this is a Euro-Pod though and I did not feel like hacking its firmware in order to make it louder as I never use it ampless anyway), but the iPod is def. able to drive them very well.
Overall I have to say that I like these phones. They do need much more burn in time before I can draw any final conclusions, but anyway:
- The are comfortable and isolate a good bit
- They are very convenient
- They provide impressive bass for this kind of construction.
- They look good and have at least some of the supplied iPod buds token quality (if you care for that kind of thing).
I cannot say whether these are good In-Ears for 39 bucks, ans I do not own anything in that price range, I would have to cross check with my friends' Koss The Plug, but I do not feel like they are a bad purchase at all. They are fun & and sound fine. I am not thrilled, but also not disappointed. Possibly the best and most convenient everyday phones for me personally.
Apple manages to amaze me again and again. The unpacking experience of any given Apple product is unmachted. Even accessoires such as the named headphones and my additional firewire cable are packed as if they were jewellery.
The In-Ear Headphones come on their own small plastic box. Very neat if you want to stow them away, but I guess it will not see much use from me as these phones appear to be sturdy enough to be shoved in a pocket without much protection. Very neat and organized though.
You get two pairs of medium sized earpieces, one large pair, and a smaller one.
There is a piece of plastic on the cord to organise the length/play of the headphones which can be used to keep them from tangeling up when stored, something I always missed on my 1G buds. The cord might be a little short if used without the remote.
The phones are very light and comfortable and inserted with ease (you will have to check the writing though unless you can indicate by differently sized earpieces which is the left/right one) It is almost as if they were not there at all. They do not fall out of my ears. The cable does tansport quite a bit of microphonic noise, but you can eliminate a lot of it by moving the plastic shover closer under your chin. I noticed that the phones pick up a noticable hiss when used with my Supermicro, but it will only come apparent once there is no music playing and it is quiet otherwise. When walking with the phones the microphonics are there, but they are nowhere as noticable as with Etys. I do not feel a great need to clip the cable somewhere or take other countermeasures. They provide sufficient isolation for the bus and subway, as in you will not feel a need to crank up the volume to deafening levels. Nowhere near Etys level though.
Soundwise I was quite impressed. The phones pack a serious punch in the bass area, which surprised me as they are not truely sealing the ear canal at all. I listened to Eurythmics "Greatest Hits", Darran Byrne and the Backyard Bards "Entertaining Hans Sachs", and Kristin Shey (go check her out at http://www.kristinshey.com , she is *great*) after burning the phones for about three hours on my Cosmic.
As I said, the bass is impressive, but I found the high end to be a bit shrill, and a strange underrepresentation of the upper midrange which was most noticable when listening to Eurythmics. I had this "Everything is poppin' loud but the vocals" feeling, with the upper bass sometimes totally playing over the vocals. They are getting better though. Now, after about 8 hours total playtime, the shrillness is noticably going away, and Kristin's voince sounded phantastic. Soundstage is nice and wide.
I used them in combination with my Supermicro all the time. Without it, I had to turn my iPod up quite a bit for some tracks (this is a Euro-Pod though and I did not feel like hacking its firmware in order to make it louder as I never use it ampless anyway), but the iPod is def. able to drive them very well.
Overall I have to say that I like these phones. They do need much more burn in time before I can draw any final conclusions, but anyway:
- The are comfortable and isolate a good bit
- They are very convenient
- They provide impressive bass for this kind of construction.
- They look good and have at least some of the supplied iPod buds token quality (if you care for that kind of thing).
I cannot say whether these are good In-Ears for 39 bucks, ans I do not own anything in that price range, I would have to cross check with my friends' Koss The Plug, but I do not feel like they are a bad purchase at all. They are fun & and sound fine. I am not thrilled, but also not disappointed. Possibly the best and most convenient everyday phones for me personally.
