I bought a pair of Jabra over-ear bluetooth headphones a month or two back, shipped to Taiwan by Amazon. I’ve been impressed by the bluetooth - I don’t believe it’s cut out on me at all, and the connection is quick. But they’re definitely hot in Taiwan’s heat, and they cut me off from the environment more than my previous in-ear headphones did. I could hear what people were saying with the in-ear headphones, and I can’t with the over-ear ones, and I realized that I wasn’t hearing cars as well - so now I’m not wearing headphones on the street as often as I used to.
Wirecutter reviews of the Jabra set that I bought said that the audio quality isn’t as good as for wired headphones, but my ears aren’t good enough to tell the difference.
After 5 years of daily use under the rain, my IEM died. They were ATH cks77. I went to try the newer model in a few stores and it sounded a bit meh. I then tried the 99 version and I really liked the sound, but not the price.
I just happened to notice the stand for headphones and there were many samples on display. I ended up buying the ATH 250AV. They cost next to nothing and while not as pocketable as IEMs they’re really tiny headphones. They sounded way, WAY better than I expected, and the most interesting part for me was that the higher end models from the same line, 350 Av and another one that I don’t remember, sounded like complete garbage.
Very limited sound stage, above average separation, slightly recessed mids, good lows and highs. Not for critical listening at home, but for walking around and wearing on a bus/train I’m 100% satisfied.
Only issue: why the f. do they produce small, portable headphones with cables that are like 2 meters?
Whilst they’re not the biggest mfkers out there, the 250AV really wasnt made with portability/on-the-go listening in mind, so I guess they went with the 2m length cable for home use.
Interesing observations on the 350 though, perhaps a better/more powerful source was required.
Power may be an issues, but I tried both with my smartphone and Sansa Clip and the 350Av sounded terribly muddy.
I also tried one of those trendy, super colorful models but only lasted 5 seconds before putting it back on the shelf, the stuff that comes for free with smartphones sounds better than that xP
The product page of AT website says ATH 250AV is for home use (and the cable length is 3.5m!)
The production of ATH-T300 has been suspended and ATH 250AV is the current production model which has a better design I guess.
By the way, AT has some good open backed headphones, though there are many people who do not like the way they design the sound. AT produces good cheap microphones too. A pro of AT headphones is many of them do not require headphone amp to drive.
Yeah, I happen to have been looking to add a new set of headphones for home use lately and was looking at AT gear (since I’ll be in Japan for a week next month). The beauty of the Japan stores is that they’ll let you try almost anything in store, but as good as that is, still would be different for my setup at home.
3.5m? It didn’t look that long, but holy cow, now you’re making me realize it’s much longer that what I thought…goddammit, ATH!
I tried some of their open cans, they sound great indeed. The problem is that when I’m outside I want closed cans, and when I’m at home I use the speakers, so open cans would see very little use.
When I got home yesterday I removed the clip that I was using the keep the cord at a reasonable length, and I can confirm it’s basically the length of an Olympic swimming pool. -____-
If these were designed for home use, why make them so small? I don’t really see size as an issue when at home. I guess it was just to cover the low price point, but geez…make it a 1m cable and I’ll buy 3 pairs just to have spares. In a perfect world they would have a detachable cable, but ATH only offers that on cans that cost 6 gorillion dollars +.
Two weeks of testing lead me to this conclusion. The 250 are fine on my tiny Sansa Clip, but they sound much better when powered by my smartphone, especially for some genres and at higher volume.I guess the 350 demand an even better power source.
Motorhead, Armin van Buuren and The Birthday Massacre sound prertty good, while In Flames, Insomnium and other artists with a “brickwall of sound” don’t sound very clean.
Does anyone know of a place in Taipei where I could get the cable cut and replaced with something shorter, or even better with a detachable one? I’m still enjoying them a lot as a portable pair of headphones, but that bloody 7893252km long cable needs some fixing.
During Christmas I purchased some stuff from B&H, and my self-gift was a pair of bluetooth headphones: Samson RTE 2.
Let me start by saying that the full price of 99$ is INSANE, no one should pay that much for this kind of headphone. I got them for 29$ and that’s a much more reasonable price.
They have 0 low end, but overall sound quality is good. BT works well, the battery lasts for days and they’re comfortable to wear. I wish they were a bit bigger and with a larger driver. I really wanted something that I can wear without having to worry about cables and without giving up too much in terms of sound quality, and the RTE 2 aren’t bad at all.
I lost my Sansa Clip+ ;_______; replaced with a Fiio X1 mkII. Everything on the Fiio is an improvement over the Clip…but I still feel bad about losing it on a rainy day…it’s probably in the ocean now. Rip in pepperoni.
I cannot explain how comfortable these are. Whoever designed the headphone and the pads should win the Nobel Prize for Medicine or something. Size is pretty compact, great for walking around. I prefer the sound from 50mm+ drivers, the Pro 82 “only” have 40mm drivers but they are extremely well made. They added a bass boost, probably to bypass the limitations of small-ish drivers. The +2 boost is atrocious, the +1 sounds good, though it depends on genre (Insomnium = NOPE, anything with some background TUNZ TUNZ can benefit from that +1).
Not super compact, but small enough to be carried around all day. And like the older Pro 80 they come with Takstar metal box:
My cheap and cheerful Mi sports earphones broke a few weeks while ago from being sat on by yours truly, so I picked up these for when I am on the bike:
Not going to change the game but the sound is pretty decent, bass heavy as you can probably guess from the brand, but not too overpowering and just right when getting the heartbeat up. Only complaint is that the buttons downright feel cheap and nasty with a hollow clicky sound, but eh not too bothersome.
I just picked up a used pair of Sennheiser Hd650s for $280 Can ( around 6500 NT). They are in perfect shape.
If you guys are Massdrop members, you can get the HD6xx for a bit more new, plus shipping. They are pretty much the same thing.
They sound phenomenal, but the only thing is that they pretty much need some sort of amplifier. I have the Schiit stack, which I also picked up a few months ago for around 7000 NT.
I’ve always been interested in Schiit’s stuff but their prices here in Taiwan are often so inflated x__x
I’m using as Asus Xonar to power my headphones, and it also transfers the sound to my receiver.
Today I’ve tried riding my bicycle while wearing the Takstar Pro 82: no way, too much sound insulation, I couldn’t hear approaching traffic.
Recently I’ve started to think that a cheap amp and two small speakers would fit nicely in the spare room we use for bikes (indoor exercise), storage etc. The problem is that we have a 5.1 in my computer room, a 5.1 in the living room, a 2.1 in the bedroom and two small speakers in the kitchen. My wife isn’t on my side regarding this purchase, and two new speakers are not something that would go unnoticed…
I need to develop a plan.
