V MODA CROSSFADE DESIGN FLAW! (ANYBODY KNOW IF THIS IS TRUE OR NOT)
Feb 20, 2011 at 5:19 PM Thread Starter Post #1 of 4

smittyryan

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I just purchased the crossfades and i saw this review on amazon. ill be posting it at the bottom. Tons of people are saying that its true and i was wondering if anybody here has experienced it. If so if theres anyway to prevent it. "I strongly urge anyone considering these headphones to go see them in person first.(like at the apple store)

I got these headphones in August after a coworker recommended them. He got his off Amazon and I got mine from the Apple store.
The speaker drivers themselves are great. Good balance of bass and treble across a wide range of music. The Crossfades seem well constructed and light. I use them only at work for about 4hrs a day and was happy for about a month. They stay on my desk when not in use and have never left the office

Unfortunately after a month I noticed the the inner plastic band where the metal adjustment bar that connects the phones to the padding the goes over your head had completely cracked on both sides of the headphones. If you look at the pictures Amazon provides, look at the 6th picture(for the gunmetal version - [...]). The cracks appeared right above the crossfade logo where the 2 screws secure the plastic housing on both sides of headphones(tops of the V). The plastic wasn't just cracked on one screw on each side, it was crack on all 4 screws. This leads me to believe that they had some over-tightening problem when putting in the screws during manufacturing. A day after I discovered the crack, one of the plastic cracked fragments actually fell off the headphones, making it impossible for the headphones to keep tension on the metal adjustment bar.

I was sad to see this issue, given I had just dropped $250 on these headphones a month earlier. So I went and had a look at my co-workers set. SAME exact problem, cracks along the plastic on both sides of the headphones in the same 4 places where the screw look to have been over-tightened. The plastic had not fallen off on his yet, but he was equally pissed off at the quality of manufacturing.

Seriously, the rest of the headphone is well constructed of metal and solid plastic.... but the one location that would get the most stress has the cheapest made component??!?!? I don't have a particularly wide head, and I've DJ'd for years and know how to take care of expensive headphones. What a shame that an otherwise great sounding set of headphones could be wrecked by a defective 50cent plastic part.

Thankfully the Apple store allowed me to return the headphones beyond the 14day regular policy. We went over to the iPod demo section in the store where they had 4 crossfades out for display to use with the iPod/iphones, and guess what!!! 3 of the 4 had the same exact issue.

I think these headphones are so new that this problem will start to become more prevalent in the next few months for folks who bought them early on. I don't think this is a hard issue to fix with a redesign of that particular part (using metal). However it's probably going to require folks to send them back to the manufacturer."
 
 
Apr 4, 2011 at 4:18 AM Post #2 of 4
I've had mine for 2 months, and they have had heavy use (6-8 hrs. per day) and I've had no issues. I saw that review also, and after buying, I went to the apple store, and 2 pairs had that crack he described. But as for mine, no problems. Maybe they fixed the flaw?
 
Aug 5, 2011 at 8:43 AM Post #3 of 4
This is absolutely true! I've had 3 pairs, first a chrome with the same problem, I sent those back and got another pair but the gunmetal.  The gunmetal was perfect for about 3 months and then the same problem with cracking near the screws, but this time so bad a piece broke off.  I bought another pair (nero) for my girlfriend and they were fine for a week then the plastic started cracking on both sides as well.  I called customer service and they were no help whatsoever, I only got; "I can give you a 50% coupon off your next pair or we'll look into it with the engineer and I'll email or call you back" I said I don't want to buy another pair because these work fine so he said he'd look into it.  Well its been over 3 weeks and 2 messages I left later.  I tell you if they didn't sound great and look sweet and the price wasn't right, I would never buy a pair of v-moda's again.
 
Apr 14, 2020 at 8:19 AM Post #4 of 4
Yo. Old thread but I'm chiming in from 2020 to let you know that they haven't fixed this quality issue at all. I bought a pair for my birthday last year and that plastic piece is absolutely toast by now.

Their customer service was... less than helpful with my issue as I am now out of the warentee period.

Otherwise great headphones ruined (willfully at this point) by an easily addressed flaw. Company has no intentions of improving, so I will no longer be using their gear.
 

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