Monster’s $250 Turbine Pro ear buds are a far cry from the $50 ‘buds we wrote about Thursday. The most noticeable difference: the iFrogz Timbre earbuds are encased in wood, while the Turbine Pro is wrapped in 24k gold.
Then there is Monster’s branding campaign, describing the Turbine Pro as “in-ear speakers” rather than your run-of-the-mill earbuds. Essentially, the company has stuffed in a full-fledged driver one would expect to find in Monster’s larger home speakers. Before the Turbine Pro began shipping, reviewers, such as Boing Boing, explained earbuds typically use armature drivers which sit “directly inside a magnet, producing a considerable amount of sound without a lot of power—the low impedance is perfect for portable music players which don’t have the luxury of power pouring limitlessly from the wall,” wrote Joel Johnson.
The promotional copy strips away the technical jargon, proclaiming the Turbine Pro is “like a subwoofer for your ears.” Unlike iFrogz’ product, which hopes to infer wood equals better-quality tones, the Turbine Pro employs a high-density metal casing to absorb unwanted vibration while providing an “inert,non-resonant acoustic chamber.” To get that perfect fit, the unit comes with five isolating ear tips.
As Griffin pointed out last month with its line of MyPhones headsets for children, the cable between your iPod and your ears is the weakest link. Monster said it is shipping the Turbine Pro with the company’s patented Magnetic FluxTube technology.
If reading technical data isn’t your cup of tea, Monster’s promotional campaign is using the latest tactic to sway consumer opinion: a YouTube video. The video includes testimonials from several recording engineers and producers.
[Via Monster and Amazon Orders]
