earbuds/in-ear headphones

[RealmofOpeth]

Anyone know a good place to score some top-notch earbuds for really cheap? ones that are super comfy, noise cancelling, and of course great sound?
I'm not interested in the Shure's, since they're a bit overrated. i mean 500$ for their good ones...wtf. for that price i'd expect bluetooth, a mic and surround sound.
on a whim at best buy i picked up some sony MDR-EX85LP's...pretty decent. however while much more comfortable than the previous ones, they still make my ears achy after a while. also i spent $60 there when i could've spent $30 total on ebay from a guy in hong kong.
i figured if those are going for so cheap, i could maybe score the bose in-ear phones for cheap as well. sure enough, $50 as opposed to $100.
question is are they genuine or imitations, and i think based on feedback scores, they might as well be.
now i know ebay isn't the only place to get good deals some i'm curious where the 'underground' market is for these seeing usually on ebay, while you can definitely beat retail price, having them in such numbers makes me skeptical that it's the lowest price. maybe i'm wrong. i did see the shure $500 ones going for $275 though. still ridiculous regardless.

[Zero]

Audio equipment is the sort of thing where "top-notch" and "cheap" are extremely relative terms. The $500 Shure earbuds will sound stupendously better than anything you will ever dream of buying for $30. It also really depends on the person and what you are listening to. Every time I finally make the decision to get new audio gear and pay a bit more than I did for my last kit, it's like a new revelation all over again of just how good music can sound. Then again, I've known some people who just didn't have ears to tell the difference. My usual advice with audio gear, if you're serious about sound quality, is to get yourself down to a real shop where you can try them out. That's really the best way to get a feel for what you're buying. I'd stay well clear of Sony anything, though - you're almost guaranteed to get something substandard for the price bracket you're buying in. Sony are really overpriced for what you get, at least with headphones and speakers. For great advice, check out these guys :

http://www.headphone.com/


They're nuts about sound and give the absolute best reviews of headphones I've found anywhere. They've got a great section on earbuds that you'll probably find very helpful. I'd recommend absolutely that you go for an ear-canal model rather than a standard earbud. The difference is like night and day. Spend as much as you can on this page and you will be very pleased, I think.

http://www.headphone.com/guide/by-he...-monitor-type/

Also, be *very* wary of active noise-cancelling headphones. It's another one of these trumped-up tagline features that manufacturers use to make you think that their product is better because it does more stuff. More often than not it's a poorly-implemented and unnecessary "feature" to make up for poor construction. A good set of in-ear phones should properly block out external noise rather than have to cancel it actively.

http://www.headphone.com/guide/by-he...se-cancelling/

The first rule of buying audio equipment is to put aside the urge to buy based on features. You don't want a pair of earbuds to do your laundry, to simulate 3D space, to answer your phonecalls and take pictures. You want it to make sound and you want it to do that well. When you spend $500 on the Shures, it's not because you want it to do a ton of things, it's because you want five hundred bucks worth of godly and pristine audio to come out of them.

If you absolutely don't want to spend more than $50, I'd say the Denon AH-C351Ks are a dead winner. If you're willing to go up to about $100, the Etymotic ER-6i are a good choice. Have a look around, anyway.

I'm more a fan of full-size headphones. I've been too poor to splurge on much more than these badboys, but my god - they sound divine 8) They passively attenuate outside noise by over 30dB so you could nearly use them on an aircraft carrier as hearing protection from jet engines! Great for quiet places too - you can sit in a library with tunes pumping and they are almost dead silent to everyone else.

http://www.headphone.com/guide/by-he...hd-280-pro.php


Anyway - Happy shopping!

[RealmofOpeth]

Audio equipment is the sort of thing where "top-notch" and "cheap" are extremely relative terms. The $500 Shure earbuds will sound stupendously better than anything you will ever dream of buying for $30. It also really depends on the person and what you are listening to. Every time I finally make the decision to get new audio gear and pay a bit more than I did for my last kit, it's like a new revelation all over again of just how good music can sound. Then again, I've known some people who just didn't have ears to tell the difference. My usual advice with audio gear, if you're serious about sound quality, is to get yourself down to a real shop where you can try them out. That's really the best way to get a feel for what you're buying. I'd stay well clear of Sony anything, though - you're almost guaranteed to get something substandard for the price bracket you're buying in. Sony are really overpriced for what you get, at least with headphones and speakers. For great advice, check out these guys :

http://www.headphone.com/


They're nuts about sound and give the absolute best reviews of headphones I've found anywhere. They've got a great section on earbuds that you'll probably find very helpful. I'd recommend absolutely that you go for an ear-canal model rather than a standard earbud. The difference is like night and day. Spend as much as you can on this page and you will be very pleased, I think.

http://www.headphone.com/guide/by-he...-monitor-type/

Also, be *very* wary of active noise-cancelling headphones. More often than not it's a poorly-implemented and unnecessary "feature" to make up for poor construction. A good set of in-ear phones should properly block out external noise rather than have to cancel it actively.

Thanks for the ideas man. however the sony ones i bought are the in-ear canal type...(with the little rubber gaskets that flange downward if held upright) but they're too wide for my ear canal even for the smallest gasket. i'm a pretty big guy and i find it surprising most earphones are too big for my ears. They're not too bad if inserted properly, they're much better than the typical dime-size round kind that don't get into the ear canal but just wedged between the cartilage.
I can tell the isolation of sound is much better...however, it's just very strange feeling, i feel like i simply have earplugs on and the sound is directly connected to my ear drums. obviously of course, but it sort of gives me a weird feeling. i put on my AR wireless headphones and it just feels so much better. perhaps there's a dampening effect with more space betweeen the source and the receiver.
I also can't tell if it's the speakers or my ears, but when i have some loud music on, i can tell there's some crackles and pops. i don't know if my eardrum is being battered too much or if it's the speakers.

Good point about the noise-cancelling being just a selling-feature. i guess when they're in your ear like that, hearing your throat can't be noise-cancelled.
oh and thanks for the webpage. it's nice to know there's others out there besides the typical joe-schmo brands and the much touted expensive brand.
however i think i'm just going to head for the bose ones. seeing as i can score them for about $35 (retail $100).

I really wish instead of reading reviews or otherwise shopping and trying them out, one could simply look at the specs and determine it from there. i mean they should standardize it. and i would like to know how to figure out the best combination of freq response, impedance, sensitivy, etc....and they could possibly give more details as well. however, as it stands it seems it doesn't matter much and it's all either just subjective opinions or first-hand trying out. which sucks because why bother adding that info if it's to be ignored?

[Zero]

Well, it's not really a thing you can standardise because the feel and character of each headset is always going to be unique and will present different characteristics in different environments, with different styles of music, and a hundred other things. There are too many parameters to try to condense into anything meaningful.

At any rate, I would be wary of the Bose set - it is an active noise-cancelling phone and it's *not* an in-ear model. Most things I've heard about them are that they are flat and uninspiring and easily outperformed in their price bracket by a number of other, better models.

http://www.trustedreviews.com/mp3/re...-Headphones/p1

This is a pretty typical review.

If you're fixed on an earbud/canal model and you don't like the feel of having drivers sealed into your ear-canal, though, then you don't have much choice but to buy the buds. The sound from them will never be anything worth writing home about, but they're small, I guess, and if that's what you want them for then they do that well. I guess it really depends on how passionate you are about music. It wasn't until I first heard a real, quality set of headphones that I realised the vast chasm between the quality of music I was used to thinking was "good" and what was actually possible to get out of a pair of the old ear goggles.

Again, I'd caution against buying sight-unseen (hearing-unheard?) - it only takes one day to sit in a headphone shop and have your ears opened to the options before you. It's very easy to spend a lot of money on crap but very possible, with a bit of work and diligence, to spend sensible money on something great.

[RealmofOpeth]

well i think i may settle for sennheiser cx 400 or 500's then. can't decide whether i want an extension cable or a volume control. but i'm not sure whether the 400 or the 500 is better for sound. i would assume the 500.

[Zero]

I've generally had very good experience with Sennheiser - they're a solid brand. That said, I guess it depends on how serious you are or how much you actually care about sound quality. For years I just bought whatever - something cheap or on sale at Radio Shack and really neglected the business-end of my music-playing equipment, but at the same time was really into music so when I finally broke through into the world of quality audio there was really no going back. I get the impression that you're the sort of guy who really digs his tunes and I think it's a worthwhile thing to invest a bit of time in selecting a set of headphones because once you get that first experience of "omg, I had no idea my recordings had so much detail!", you'll really be glad that you did. I found, as well, that spending a bit more money on a quality set of kit was cheaper in the long run because I wasn't perpetually breaking the cheap crap I used to have to replace regularly. My HD-280s I've had for over five years now and they're still the only headphones I use. That's like 4¢ a day. Bargain.

[RealmofOpeth]

Well since I'm into metal, it's hard to find those kind that properly play metal I think. to get the right crunch on the guitars. it's either too muffled or it's too tinny. I love bass, and i love clarity and it seems i can never properly flesh out the midrange. maybe it's simply because i'm kind of clueless on equalizers or something. I mainly play mp3's and of course i've got various bit rates going on and whatever other settings they were recorded at as well. i've noticed some of my mp3's that have some supposedly super clear recording sound like shit on most speakers unless you have the utmost high quality ones to handle the frequency trying to be played.
also sometimes there's some type of weird syncing up of bass and the rest of the spectrum where it sounds like the entire volume is being adjusted up and down really fast which is so annoying.

as far as headset at the PC, I'm using Acoustic Research AW721's. kind of cheesy on the outside, don't seem very solid, but i've had them for a couple years and they sound really good. the most comfortable i've had too, seems most other headsets clamp my head like a vice or otherwise fatigue my ears. they're wireless 900mhz of course, so i get the fuzzy and the blips every now and then depending on where i am. and i have to pop in batteries about every couple days but beats the wire bullshit.
they really have nice mellow bass to them and really feel spatial to where if there's a clear sound on it's own of some type being played, you almost feel like it's in person. i'm very often looking around me if something else is going on next to me or in the room if i'm not expecting a certain sound. it's not the artificial amped up sounding bass, it just sounds very thoroughly transmitted.

I'm beginning to wonder if the regular headsets with the over-head-band are naturally better sounding than anything on the small-in-ear-type. i understand the super expensive ones are certainly on par. but i read around some reviews about the ones i just bought (the sonys) and a lot of people say they're good. which makes me wonder about the others that others have said are good. i was expecting crap reviews, but if people say the sony's are good, then maybe the whole spectrum of the in-ear types simply don't stack up to the big headsets. maybe those reviews don't know what they're talking about, i just found it to be weird, because those sony ech's are jack squat compared to these wireless AR. they sound good on their own, but i don't know if they are decent as far as ech's go.

[Zero]

Well, the problem is really choosing who to believe when you read a review. If it's just some bog-standard review site like pricegrabber or kelkoo or whatever then you've got reviews from a ton of people, most of whom don't know the first thing about audio. That's why I really like headphone.com - generally if it's a substandard product they simply won't carry it. What they stock is stuff they like and they're proper geeks. I agree about the in-ear headphones, though. I've heard some good ones, but I'd never give up my big earmuff model for them. Like you, the in-ear thing, while it does bring the buds into the genuine audiophile-class of headphone, still annoys me enough that I don't really care for them. Give me big phat drivers anyday, man 8)

My old man's got the AW721s, so I've heard them. They're not too bad considering that they're wireless. Are you after the buds for something portable, I guess?

also sometimes there's some type of weird syncing up of bass and the rest of the spectrum where it sounds like the entire volume is being adjusted up and down really fast which is so annoying.

Is this listening on the AW721s? I've noticed this on other wireless headsets when they use some sort of dynamic compression when the signal strength drops out.

[RealmofOpeth]

well if i could have the comfort and sound of my aw721's in earbud/small format, i'd be happy. but they're just too big to be wearing around and of course i can't carry the tx with me on the player. of course the comfort factor is something to get used to as it's totally different feel. frankly i'm expecting as good or better sound than my aw721's for the good/great brands of the earplugs. perhaps i shouldn't be expecting that as it's totally different size, as well.


the bass problem happens on a lot of different speakers. if it's very heavy and fast, everything goes up and down with the bass. it might simply be just the encoding of the mp3's, regardless of bitrate.

[Zero]

:lol: yeah, I guess it's really a tough gig trying to buy audio kit. I still think a floor demo is the best way to figure out what works best for you. Get the cans on your ears and all questions are answered