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Earphones...

AJ

AJ

110 HP of FURY!
What is everyone using for earphones?

i've alwats used the smaller ones in the past, but once I got the big Uproar Fest Skull Candy phones i've hated the ones I have that go in the ear.

So now I'm looking for a good set of buds and wondering if anyone suggests others outside of skull candy.

This is a pic, though a bad one, that resembles the set I use now... and I really like the quality.

 
D

DrWebster

Guest
So you're looking for earbuds instead of in-ears? I've found Audio-Technica and Sennheiser make some very nice traditional earbuds. Skullcandy/Monster/Dr Dre/Justin Bieber/whoever makes some very popular models these days, but popularity doesn't necessarily mean quality...the sound from those may be punchy and dynamic at first, but it won't be long before you'll find it fatiguing.

If you were looking to get in-ears, I'd wholeheartedly recommend Shure IEMs. If you can scrape together an extra $100 on top of that, you can get custom earmolds made that will make them the most comfortable earphones you've ever worn. You're looking at a minimum of $250 for a setup like that though.

In terms of over-the-head cans, again, I'll recommend Audio-Technica, Sennheiser, Shure and Sony. Going that route, you have many choices to make -- open-backed vs. closed, around-ear vs. on-hear, etc. Regardless, don't waste your money with Bose headphones; even if you like the sound, the build quality just isn't there.

Another excellent resource for headphone recommendations is www.head-fi.org. Lots of members there do reviews and comparisons, and there are plenty of "This is the kind of music I like, what headphones should I buy?" threads to help steer you in the right direction.

(Can you tell I'm a bit of a headphone whore?)
 
YSOSLO

YSOSLO

is the word, beotch
+1 on the Shure products. Amazon is another decent place to read reviews on what people think of various products. I've had a set of sound isolating E3c earbuds for about 4 years now (I think that's right, because I bought them at Circuit City before they were going out of business at all) and I absolutely LOVE them. I just pop 'em in and with my old school iPod shuffle not even at half volume they block out all surrounding sounds and all I hear is dynamic music flooding my ears as I walk into work in the morning. One of the best parts of my day. Shure has a variety of models available at different price points, but I've always felt you get what you pay for. I took a quick look on Amazon and it looks like the SE310 is the newest version of the E3c buds. They're a little spendy, but they come with a really nice variety of sizes and type of ear bud sleeves in a nice case, so you can customize the fit for your ears and the better the fit the better the sound isolation is. Read up too, because I think you'll find most people have much better things to say about the "sound isolation" versus "noise cancellation."
 
AJ

AJ

110 HP of FURY!
Just the posts I was hoping for! Gonna do some reading before I get my next buds (I dislike in ear, they never fucking fit right and stay put).
 
jr6290

jr6290

New Member
I do some radio production and engineering work. Sony MDR-7506 are about as standard as anything (I love them). They have great frequency response. I personally have a set of sony and Kicker earbuds (they have a cloth lining over the wires, so it's a bit more comfortable than plain rubber wires). I also have some older Sennheiser headphones. They are good, but I've noticed some distortion in the high ends. Audio-Technica makes some very impressive high end headphones.

Another thing to consider:
What are you listening to? MP3's and AAC's are data reduced formats. There are audible artifacts. If your music is all MP3 128kb/s no matter what you listen to them on, it's not going to sound perfect. In fact a high quality pair of headphones might allow you to really hear the difference! Of course there's a trade off of quality versus filesize.

In my line of work, I need to hear exactly what it sounds like without any coloring by the headphones. (cheaper models will color or have a smaller frequency range.) If you're looking for monster bass or pristine trebles, look for specifically marketed products intended to do that. Professional or higher end earbuds and headphones will offer great reproduction and great audio transparency. Just don't expect them to gloss over a bad 96kb mp3. They'll reproduce what you feed them with. Garbage in, garbage out. (garbage in, Hilary Duff out) Quality in, quality out.

Good luck! Earbuds with a price around $40 are generally of better quality than the cheapos, have a larger frequency range, and are cheap enough to buy without feeling guilty. If you can, give a few different models a try. Listen using a CD and a mp3 version of a CD.

JR
 
M

mazdamn02

Guest
Shure ear buds, nuff said. Everything else is marketing hype. Not sure which model I've had for the past 3 years but they've been rock solid and sound great.
 
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