Stick these in your ears! And like it!
April 18, 2010 1 Comment Monday, April 19th, 2010, Netcast 1071
This is the complete kit minus of course, the iPod!Leo loves his Etymotic earphones. They do not provide “active noise reduction” the way, say Bose headphones do. However they still block outside noise because they’re designed to operate deep in your ears. It takes some getting used to, and some people don’t like the idea of pushing earbuds really deep into the ear. (It does make for far better bass reproduction in my experience.) Leo happens to like that design and I thought I had found a gadget he might not own or even know about. They’re the wireless ety8 in-the-ear Bluetooth earphones from Etymotic. I should have known better! Leo has them and likes them. But he does say you will look a little strange wearing them because they’re on the large side. It’s like wearing a domino on each ear. Since Bluetooth wireless devices compress the audio signal and then decode it, there is often a loss of sound quality. To overcome this the folks at Etymotic supply an iPhone/iPod Bluetooth dongle of their own design. (You don’t need to use it and the ety8 is available for about $100 less without it.) In addition to being wireless, the ety8 has built-in controls for volume up/down, play/pause and next/previous track, that work with both iPhone/iPod (via Etymotic’s dongle) and devices using the A2DP profile. You should check the company website to find out if the ety8 will work correctly with your device. This technology is not inexpensive. The price with the Bluetooth Adapter & travel pouch is $249 / earphones alone $159. (If you do a web search you can find the kit for about $30 less.)
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Reader Comments (1)
I think the Plantronics 903/R US BackBeat Headphones are way better because they are smaller and I can still hear the ambient sounds around me. They don't go far into the ear like noise cancelling headphones and of course I can take calls too.