All about Headphones
We begin today a brand new series of posts under the “Headphone Tips” umbrella, covering some questions and topics that may be the subject of confusion. Today’s subject is NFC. It is better known and popular for its use in contactless payments (eg Android Pay). So much so that its absence from some devices (such as the popular Moto G series) can derail the purchase of an otherwise great bang for the buck phone.
Continue reading “What is the point of NFC in Bluetooth headphones?”
LATEST UPDATE: March 29 in 2018: the new Oppo flagship loves the headphone jack :)… Samsung and LG lead the way… for now, I am only including smartphones announced in 2018 or later (excluding entry-level and lower mid-tier phones) and a few select pre-2018 models…
More and more manufacturers are making the mistake of abandoning the headphone jack, so I think the time is right now to start listing the headphones that come with a headphone jack.
Continue reading “List of Smartphones With a 3.5mm Headphone Jack”
A controversy has broken out on the headphones reddit, as the owner of Venture Electronics, the makers of the famous VE Monk earbuds (among others) said that anyone who leaves a review lower than five stars out of five on their website will be banned from buying again. He also shared a screenshot of people getting blacklisted from buying their products on their website.
Needless to say, this did not sit well in the sub-reddit, and there are already calls to ignore and boycott VE products in light of this development.
Continue reading “Opinion: the owner of Venture Electronics is wrong”
LATEST UPDATE on 4/8/18 – added the four new Monoprice products from their Spring 2018 Big Bang…
We are starting a new series here at this blog, the “Headphones to Avoid”. A lot of audio publications, websites, forums, and enthusiasts are quick to profusely praise, but it’s crickets when it comes to criticize. However, if it is fair to praise a product, it is also fair to criticize a product. In this series we spotlight headphones that have issues that would make them deal killers for potential buyers.
The first headphone to be “featured” is the Sony RF-995-RK Wireless RF. This is a headphone system of a transmitter/base and a headset, not unlike the Sennheiser RS-series. The RF-995 is well-made and all the good stuff, however, it fails at its #1 job: wireless audio. It has trouble keeping a connection running. Even minor movements of the body or head cause it to make “clicking” sounds. Whether you are listening to music or watching a movie or TV show, this is very annoying and distracting.
Continue reading “Headphones to Avoid: Sony RF-995-RK Wireless RF”
This is one of the “Chi-Fi” in-ears that are riding the hype train, so when I noticed it on a lightning deal at amazon.com, I gave in to the temptation and picked it up to see what all the fuss was about. I did this knowing that this is a bass-favoring earphone. This post is our customary text and pictures unboxing. The review will come later on 🙂
The box includes the following:
I needed to get a clear headphone stand to make pictures of headphones for blog-purchases more useful (you can see more of the headphone instead of the stand), so I picked up the Vivian Acrylic Headphone Stand in the Clear color scheme. It arrived a few hours ago, and this is the unboxing post. A review will come later on after I use it for a while…
They arrive in a sturdy unbranded cardbox box. The only thing on it is a white Amazon sticker that has the Amazon product code and bar code. On that sticker, it says “Made in China”
The box is easy to open with your fingers, and it looks solid enough you can easily reuse it for other purposes, or keep this stand in there.
Continue reading “Unboxing the Vivian Acrylic Headphone Stand”