Grado Labs iGrado Headphones Review - Conclusion
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By Mark Brezinski
Published on May 07, 2008
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Who's It For
Audiophile
Audiophiles could do a lot better than these headphones; they don't have the clean frequency response they crave, and the build quality doesn't appeal to those who like to show off their latest audio purchase.
Portable User
Portable users will get the most out of a pair of iGrado headphones, but even so, the iGrados are a pain when not in use. As we've said, they're light and small for on-ear headphones, but the non-collapsible band might make them too big to fit into your pocket. Also, the outside world will intrude on your music via the open backs.
Airplane Traveler
Airplanes are very loud places. If you want to hear your music over roaring engines, you'd have to amp your music player up to "permanent hearing loss" levels. Not only will this injure your ears, it will annoy everyone around you. We'd recommend leaving the iGrado headphones on the ground.
Home Theater Use
This would be great for home theater use if you could wear them for two hour stretches comfortably, or moved your amp to the top of your head. If you have a head that is both impervious to the iGrados and is strong and nimble enough to balance your amp, then you should be out fighting crime and not on the internet reading headphone reviews.
Conclusion
 Let's be honest; the iGrados are built to a budget. And the sound quality is great for the $50 price tag, although not good enough for serious listeners. The main issues we had with the iGrado headphones were comfort and range of use. They just aren't that comfortable. Perhaps we all have over-sized heads, but they just didn't fit that well on any of the heads we tried them on. Also, in terms of portability, these headphones have two knocks against it. One is its size: the iGrados are simply not as compact as an in-ear set. Also, open-backs don't isolate you from the outside world, which is probably where you'd want to go with your media player. Really, the iGrados, while a good deal on paper, are somewhat limited in use by their design.
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