domdavis.com

OK, so the v-moda vibe duo headphones for the iPhone (at £65ish) look the business, sound great and die after about a month with serious use (I know, I’ve killed 3 pairs already). The mic also sucks a bit, but most inline mics do. Anyway, they can’t turn round the warranty requests fast enough for me to have a working pair at all times and I’ll be buggered if I’m giving them any more of my money.

Lets try Apples in ear offerings. Cheapish (£25), fit the iPhone but lack the mic and button to skip tracks, don’t fit my ears properly (although ironically enough when I replaced the sleeves with ones from the v-moda headphones they fitted a treat, and every time the naff white cable hits or rubs your clothes you hear it in the headphones.

So, next step, Shure do these lovely little adapters that convert bog standard headphones into headphones with a mic that fit the iPhone nicely.  Given I had a set of in ear headphones that could be removed from their lead and plugged into this one and given the adapter costs about £20odd I though I would give it a go. Works a treat, although the mic is a tad on the large side.  Problem was my headphones were £9.99 ones and they lacked the bass response of the v-moda headphones.

Sod it, throw another £70 at Shure and order the SE110’s. The sound is pretty much as good as the v-moda ones although they’re not quite as bassy.  Ordered through the Apple store they should be with me in a few days once they’ve done their grand tour.

Meanwhile I go for a wonder over to a shop that does ipody things near work to go look at an iPod shuffle (wanted to compare it side by side to the iPhone, it’s a bit thinner and wider, but otherwise pretty much the same) and discovered that they had Shure SE310’s priced as Shure SE210’s (they also had SE310’s priced as SE310’s).  Thats £99 instead of £165. I decided to chance it, took the mispriced ones to the till and, when I was told it was £165, turned the box over to show the £99 price tag. I also explained there was more than one set priced at this price. I think the guy must have thought they were 210’s as he said something about them needing the price changed while he changed the amount required to £99. I paid, grabbed my purchase and legged it just as the manager was explaining to the sales assistant that the 210’s weren’t on display so how could they be priced up as 310’s.

When my 110’s arrive I’ll send them straight back. I now have a storming set of headphones that sound better than anything I’ve ever heard before (with the exception of a £20,000 Linn stereo in an acoustically perfect room). Problem is I can now hear when a song has been ripped at lower (or even medium) bit rates. I wonder what the SE530’s sound like. They’ve got 3 speakers per ear and cost £350. Somehow I don’t think I’ll be finding out any time soon.