Tag: Headphones
Top Ten Geeky Valentine Presents: For Him
It's that time of year again, where we all rush off to Clinton's for a naff card, a syrupy teddy and a box of Quality Streets for our loved ones. Yep, Valentine's Day rears its sickly head once again,…
Sennheiser ready the MM 100 Stereo Bluetooth Music & Phone Headset
Using Bluetooth V2.0 EDR, the headset can connect up to a MP3 player and a mobile phone, allowing quick switching between both devices.
Design your own Sennheiser headphones
To celebrate the launch of the new HD 400 headphone range, Sennheiser announces a global headphone design competition.- Each winner gets an HD 418 pair of headphones made to their winning design. There are 45 prizes overall with 15 to give away during September, October, November. Sennheiser will choose the 30 best designs from all ideas submitted and these will subsequently be presented in an
online gallery. Everyone who has registered will be able to vote and decide which
of the 15 headphone designs should be produced as a unique model. To help you, Sennheiser offers a web-based Online Design Editor package with 70 different background designs – from bright pink, to classic black all the way to hearts and leopard
skin patterns. The Design Editor also includes 200 design elements such as shapes
and icons. Alternatively it’s possible to use your own images or lettering. Easy preview allows users to see what the finished design will look like. You can get started here.
Sennheiser HD238 – open headphones for your iPod
Following the success of the 200 series which launched last month, Sennheiser is pleased to announce a new open back design. Costing £70, the HD238s fold flat for portability and come with a carrying pouch for storage and protection.
Mike Skinner's Glasto headphones – the Sony MDR-XB700s
If you went to Glastonbury last weekend, or even if you just soaked it up on TV with the Beeb, you may have been aware that Mike Skinner of The Streets made a crop-circle impression of his face on a field near the festival site.
In the image he is sporting a pair of headphones. The same headphone he wore whilst he was performing. The same pair of headphones he described had become “part of my soul” on Twitter.
So what headphones were they? Well, they were none other than the Sony MDR-XB700.
The XB700s have a powerful, ultra-low bass response and a driver unit that reproduces low frequencies accurately. The XB stands for ‘eXtra-Bass’ and these headphones are aimed at the bass-heavy music fan. That’s a lot of ‘bass’ in one paragraph but I think you get the picture.
Their manufactured from synthetic leather and the king-sized ear cushions reduce sound loss. The urethane cushion spreads pressure evenly, providing comfortable wear over extended listening periods. The XB700s have a frequency response of 3-28.000Hz and the driver unit is a 50mm dome type.
Keep checking back on TD and we’ll give these headphones the once over in the not too distant future.
Sony Centres will sell you the XB700s for £100 although you can get them a bit cheaper if you search around. £77.49 on Amazon for example.
iPods save lives – it's official
A 14 year-old girl’s iPod could have been her saviour after the headphones attached to it diverted a lightning bolt away from her body during a storm.
Sophie Frost and her, quite brilliantly named, boyfriend Mason Billington were taking shelter under a tree when the incident occurred. Frost wasn’t listening to music at the time, instead the headphones were hanging around her school uniform. She received burns to her chest, stomach and legs and is currently recovering in hospital.
Sophie’s mother Julie told the Sun: “I just thank God my daughter is still alive. The doctors say her iPod saved her. Her nan only bought it a few days ago. Luckily, she wasn’t actually wearing the headphones. If she had been, she might not be here today. Mind you, the only thing Sophie seemed worried about was that her new iPod was frazzled.”
Great PR for Apple then. Surely not even Steve Jobs can conjure up lightning bolts though – can he?
(via The Press Association)
Logitech releases Ultimate Ears 4 Pro headphones
We’ve looked at some of Logitech’s impressive Ultimate Ear range a few times before on TechDigest and we’ve liked what we’ve seen.
If Logitech’s previous is anything to go by, the Ultimate Ears 4 Pro custom monitors should appeal to any aspiring rock stars or even some less aspiring audiophiles.
Let’s start with the price, which should give you some impression of what we’re dealing with here. £429.99, plus an extra £45 for an optional ambient noise feature.
So what do you get for nearly £500?
For starters, these aren’t your usual monitors. Each one is personally shaped to exactly fit the user’s ear. However, this requires an additional cost of visiting a qualified audiologist to create your ear impressions.
They come with “dual-armature, a patented dual-bore design with passive crossover which delivers reference-quality, evenly balanced frequency response for more detail, accuracy and versatility”. If you know what this means, you really should own these headphones.
The product is essentially aimed at performers. Logitech claim that 75% of the world’s top touring artists use Ultimate Ear products. They go onto state Leona Lewis is one of these artists, thus devaluing their statement somewhat. However, the fact remains that Ultimate Ear are the choice for the pros.
They also claim that the Ultimate Ears 4 Pro custom monitors will “fit better than even your favourite pair of jeans”. For nearly £500 I should hope so. My favourite jeans haven’t fitted me in months.
Grab yourself a pair direct from Ultimate Ears or via hand held audio.
HEADPHONE WEEK: Sennheiser MM 60s
Sennheiser’s new MM 60 may look suspiciously like it’s PX 100s, but they’re not, well they are, but they’ve been re-tweaked, honed, prodded and poked until they sound amazing – with the iPhone 3G that is. Because these on-ear marvels have been specifically designed for optimum performance with the iPhone.
Short Version
Name – MM 60s
Type – on-ear semi-closed headphones
How much – £75.99
How much should they cost – No more than £50
Should you buy them – They’re good – better if you have an iPhone
The Long Version
Sound Quality
The MM 60s, much like they’re identical cousin the PX 100s, bring the bass. They’re the bassiest on-ears I’ve ever had the pleasure to put on my head. That being said, you can lose some of the higher notes and all that bass can on-occaision muddy the vocal. But generally this isn’t an issue and the MM 60s sound pretty sweet, and oddly do sound a teency weency bit better on my iPhone 3G than my iPod classic.
Build Quality
Sennheiser have in the past been accused of making some pretty shoddy mid-price products, espcially some of their in-ear range. The MM 60s certainly aren’t flimsy, but they’re by no means as sturdy as other similarly priced headphones. They’re a bit like watching Peter Crouch play football, you know his legs aren’t just going to break, but you can’t help thinking its a mircale they don’t.
The headband is easy to adjust and feels pretty comfortable as do the phones. Sennheriser have also included an iPhone compatiable mic which is a bit low down on the line so unless your head is the size of a small asteroid you’re going to have to hold it up to your mouth, which pretty much makes it pointless. Because you’re holding your hands free mic with your hands, so…nevermind.
The MM 60s phones do fold though, rather brilliantly, into an ultra portable package.
Packaging
The MM 60s come in a box which leaves you in no doubt who they’re aimed at: “Giving the iPhone the sound it deserves.”
The MM 60s also come with a nifty little case which the folded Sennheisers slip nicely into.
Conclusion
The MM 60s do sound great in quiet environments, in the office or in bed or on the loo, they’re as good as a really high-end set of cans. But out and about even a moderate background noise can ruin the experience.
And they’re pretty expensive for what are essentially an only vaguely tweaked pair of £35 headphones. Personally I find the sound quality of Tuesday’s V-Jays superior and they’re £15 cheaper.
If you really like Sennheiser’s products these might suit you, but if you prefer substance then go for the V-Jays.
Gallery: 10 pairs of headphones you can actually afford
As part of Tech Digest's Headphones Week, here are ten pairs of headphones / earphones that you can actually afford. By "afford" I'm talking those that retail for under £200. Don't worry, there are some decent pairs for well under…
HEADPHONES WEEK: Jays' V-Jays
On-ear headphones are making a comeback. Okay maybe I just made that up. But the 80s are big again aren’t they? And no one had in-ear headphones in the 80s, they had on-ears, and they were right. On-ears are comfier and safer than in-ears, less obtrusive than cans and they can sound freaking awesome. As proved by Jay’s V-Jays.
The Short Version
Name – V-Jays
Type – On-ear open headphones
How much – £59.99
How much should they cost – £60.00
Should you buy them – If you’re self conscious I’d avoid them, if not, they’re well worth the money.
The Long Version
Sound Quality
On-ear headphones don’t look cool – but isn’t cool all about perceptions – prevailing social norms? Isn’t cool transient? For the sake of these super-wicked headphones I hope so. I’ll admit the first time I stepped out in the V-Jays I felt like a prize numpty. I might as well have had Mr Motivator on my head, that’s how ’93 I looked.
But as soon as I hit play, I forgot about my headgear, so ensconced was I in the precise and amazing sound they yielded: Deep and rangy bass with taut, precise treble and a hefty enough mid to handle anything I through at it.
Never has listening to Godspeed! stomping down Commercial Road felt quite so epic, though they weren’t amazing at drowning out the loftier decibels on the rickety District Line.
Build Quality
The V-Jays are light on design features, which suits me – they look serious, understated and stylish. The square phones are about as flash as it gets. The extendable headband can sometimes be a tad fiddly, adjusting each side to get a vaguely symmetrical shape, but it fits very comfortably.
The cable is about a girthy as you’d expect on a pair of high-end headphones with an interesting 15mm headphone jack-split in the middle, though what purpose it is supposed to serve has, as yet, alluded me.
They feel eminently sturdy, like a Sherpa. You trust them.
The phones fold under the headband to add a modicum of portability but it is one glaring concession of the on-ear genus of headphone: they aren’t easily stuffed in a pocket.
Phones
Swathed in familiar black sponge, it seems things haven’t moved on since about 1979 in-terms of ear-phone casing technology.
But the fact is they were comfy in 1979, and they’re still comfy now, and you get a pair of spares, once the others are too encrusted with your aural discharge for you to hear through.
Packaging
V-Jays come in a rather snazzy box wedged into some good thick foam, but they’re light on accessories. If Jays really wanted to give V-Jays the professional veneer a hard-case might have done the trick.
Conclusion
These headphones are so good I don’t mind looking a bit lame (okay pretty lame) in order to enjoy their full and glorious goodness. The first time I donned the V-Jays, it was 5.45pm, I was on a packed Northern Line train, and a large and unremmitingly odious man behind me was breathing in my ear, I put them on as much as to block his heinous violation of my ear-canal as to listen to some tunes. But hearing them was like a epiphany: “Oh remember this,” I thought, “Music! As it should be. Loud and bassy and ace.”
If you care more about your hair than your music then maybe V-Jays aren’t for you. But they’re certainly for me.
