Apple iPod In-ear Headphones

Who's It For

Audiophiles

First of all, an audiophile probably wouldn’t wear these even if they offered virtually pristine audio quality. As it stands, however, they aren’t able to offer pristine audio quality, allowing the audiophile crowd to snub them with a clean conscience.

Portable User

Portable users probably already have a pair of these, and are looking for something else. These really are made for portable users, but they are a bit annoying when they need adjustment or fall out of place every few steps.

Airplane Traveler

While fairly portable, airplane travelers might want to look at in-ear headphones that actually fit into the ear canal. Since these just sit on the outside, they don’t block out much low frequency noise. As you may already be aware, there is an abundance of this kind of noise on airplanes.

Home / Office Use

We can just picture someone crouched beside their big screen TV, tethered to their amp by a few feet of cord, trying to watch Lord of the Rings from a 20-degree angle. No, the iPod in-ear headphones aren’t for home theater setups.

Conclusion

Chances are, if you’ve read this review, you’re in one of two camps: you’re looking for replacement headphones and don’t necessarily care about audio quality, or you were an audiophile curious to see how much these headphones sucked. If you were in the latter camp, you were probably a bit surprised they did as well as they did (well, maybe not in terms of distortion), but wouldn’t consider buying these regardless.

To those in the former camp, free of prejudice, you really have to ask yourselves what you’re looking for. In terms of a short-term investment to just get you by, the Apple iPod headphones aren’t the best investment to make, but they’re not a horrible one either. In an interesting twist of fate, the best thing these headphones have going for them at their price is their audio quality.

If audio quality this doesn’t matter to you, then we’d recommend trying out other pairs of cheap in-ear headphones. As we said earlier, the iPod headphones tend to pull out of position very easily, and aren’t the best at blocking out low-frequency noise. This is downright annoying, since iPod headphones were made for commuters who either walk or take public transportation, and therefore can’t depend on their car’s speakers. For the same price or cheaper, you can get a much better wear experience, and those headphones will probably block out the train/bus noises better.

If audio quality does matter to you, then you’ll have to resign yourself to paying more than $30 for a pair of headphones.