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Well, my Skullcandies finally arrived yesterday, too.
The iPhone buds sound decent, not spectacular. On my "benchmark" recording of the St. Petersburg Philharmonic's 1812 overture (complete with choirs, church bells, and heavy ordnance), the upper and upper-mid ranges seem a bit muddled (the voices and church bells sort of much together), but, damn, the canonfire is pretty spectacular.
Kind of what I'd expect from something called "Skullcandy."
I haven't listened to the "bonus" pair of "regular" headphones, but I'm not expecting much. They're very green, though.
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I got the Skull Candy FMJs last year at a little Expo called MWSF.
They've got a larger driver than other SCs (11mm vs 9mm, though .40cal is my preference) and they are indeed bass heavy. It does muddle much of the rest of the freqs.
And it's no surprise given the whole Skull Candy atmosphere. I have visions of rouge skateboarders wearing wearing these, thrashing the streets and malls while listening to Satanic metal/trance/industrial/techno pounding rhythms.
The 'phones sound OK, but I don't *ever* listen to them after using my Shure 530s, or they's sound terrible by comparison.
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the directions state that they have a break in period which will help with the mid and high end.
>>The 'phones sound OK, but I don't *ever* listen to them after using my Shure 530s
It appears that the model number is also the price!
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The Shures are pricey, but they are phenomenal.
If you shop around you can save a few bucks. As great as they sound, I'd never pay retail/MSRP.
But that *is* an interesting catch on the model/price.
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I've been wearing and listening to them a lot today, and a few more obserations:
I'm beginning to think my complaints about the muddled bits might also have something to do with the quality of the compression of the file, as I bought it from the ITMS, and I really should shell out for the CD and do a better job with it. It could be the original recording gets a little overwhelmed by all the commotion in those ranges.
Walking around with them, I've gotten more impressed with how they deal with my usual snobby classical and operatic selections (Jussi again, and Russian fireworks from E. Svatlanov). They're not quite as good as my Shures, but they're plenty good enough for casual wearing around town. Perhaps it's the break-in, or perhaps I should pick another "reference" recording.
The big plus for me is the built-in microphone dangling at just the right height. With my Shures I have to use Shure's separate mic, with its long, long cord, and I'm constantly having to deal with tangled masses of wiring yearning to be free. It's pretty embarrassing spending most of a subway trip just getting the damn things untangled.
With the Skullcandies, I have one moderately-sized cord, and, man, it's so much easier. For casual around-down use, they're pretty darn good.
I dunno if the deal's still around, but it was money well spent, assuming they hold up for awhile.
Haven't tried the bonus ones, but they look cheap and crappy.
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I got some skull candy earbuds a few months ago. Now they're in the garbage.
Luckily they were free through my coke rewards points.
Muddy sound. earbuds kept falling out of my ears. bleh.
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Mine finally arrived today. No response to all four emails asking for a ship date, but meh. This was an impulse buy given the cheap price and the inability to keep the iPhone headphones from falling out of my ears.
I've used these earbuds so far to make two calls and listen to one song. I love them. You really have to push them down into your ear. When you do that, you're rewarded with very clean sound, even at low volume. Down side is that you really hear your voice inside your head on a normal phone call. That can get annoying if you're not used to it.
Part of my living is earned with my extremely sensitive hearing, so it will be interesting to see how these measure up for quality of sound reproduction in music.
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Down side is that you really hear your voice inside your head on a normal phone call.
For me, that's a plus.
Much clearer. If you already have both ears filled, the "mono" phone call thing should be a problem.
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