It’s not easy to buy good headphones these days. There are so many companies that produce good stuff. Choosing is impossible. Especially when you are OCD and everything has to be perfect. Well, I’ve discovered the perfect headphones: The Beats By Dre ‘Studio’ Headphones, which cost $229. I previously owned a pair of plain old Apple earphones. But after listening to a friend’s Sennheisers one day, I couldn’t tolerate the crappy Apple earphones any more. I have been testing the Beats rigorously for the past three months, and now my friend’s Sennheisers sound like those Apple earphones. ;)
I had a great experience unboxing the Beats. It’s similar to unboxing an Apple product. The Beats come in a huge box with a lot of goodies. Firstly, there’s a nice little carrying case that is good quality. Then there are two audio cables, which are really high-quality. One has a built-in microphone called iSoniTalk, which works really well with my iPhone. Also included is a 1/8-to-1/4″ adapter that helps you connect the Beats to professional equipment and the usual suspects like cleaning cloths and batteries.
Aesthetically, the Beats “Studios” are really appealing. Once your eyes lock onto them, it’s hard to tear them off. This is the main reason I wanted them. They are available in two colors, black or white, but can be customized using Colorware.
The music experience is simply great! The crispness of the audio really gets me into the music. These are awesome, full-range heaphones that balance all the lows, mids and highs very well. For bass lovers, this is definitely a must-buy as there’s a lot of bass thumping in your ears to keep you immersed in the music.
Something I was really skeptical about was the noise-cancellation features, before actually using it of course. To my surprise, the noise-cancellation actually works better than all the Sennheisers I have tried, mind you, I tried many high-end ones before settling with the Beats. I’d say that the ear cups contribute a lot to this as well by completely sealing any ambient noise. It really does justify the need for external battery power too (The Beats are powered by two AAA batteries that go in the left ear cup). The battery life proved to be just good enough (I changed the batteries just twice in three months, even after mistakenly leaving the headphones switched on multiple times for good 10+ hours). Another thing I want to mention is that the extendible headband is great. Everyone I know says the Beats are comfortable, so they should do just fine for most head sizes. Also, the ear cups are really comfortable for long journeys, in case you are wondering. I had them on for seven hours on a road trip and it felt really comfortable. The build quality is simply great.
The only issue that needs to be addressed is sound leakage. The Beats leak a lot of sound, even at the medium volume levels. It is really annoying when people ask me to lower the volume in public places, multiple times. Other than this, these headphones are definitely excellent. In short, music to my ears. For anyone planning to buy some neat, high-end heaphones, definitely check out the Beats at your local Apple store or other outlet.
Sayam Aggarwal is a 18-year-old student living in India who has been an Apple fan for almost 5 years. He has worked with ModMyi, one of the leading iPhone communities, as an author for more than a year. He spends most of his free time on the Internet fetching the latest news regarding Apple and its entire product range. Follow him on Twitter!
41 responses to “Dr Dre’s “Studio” Headphones Are Music To My Ears [Review]”
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i found this review very useful, at first i didn’t know about the sound leakage but with a little bit of investigation i noticed it too
The price is our main concern, when it comes to buying products, even the most expensive and poor quality of the product. I know, I bought a cheap headset, only for a year or two my numerous. Both devices are expensive pieces. The beats by dre is about one hundred dollars
QC15 cheap, they are well worth the price.As the result the winner is Comfort beats by dre“!
The cult of Beats – these are everywhere these days in NYC! To see lots of pics and vids of celebrities and non-celebrities wearing their favorite headphones go to http://www.iloveheadphones.com
how the sito bikkembergsTrainers are offered at an extremely increased price.
Whats better for long distance plane journeys ? Studios or solo hds ?
Jesus. People seriously fall for this overprice gimmick? They are THE worst headphones you can find around the $300 price range.
Awful headphones for the price. Go get HD 25-1 II NOW.
studios are better in every way
Stereophile’s review for the beats was pretty complimentary. Though they said the bass was a tad muddy and the imaging was nice, but felt forceful. That they were very musical but had trouble deliniating instruments and rendering textures. The reviewer compared the beats favorably to the Grado SR-60i.
The problem here is that the Grado SR-60i are $70 and widely considered THE entry level audiophile headphone. It’s true, the Grado SR60i have astonishing sound quality, if you have no experience with audiophile headphones. Likewise, the Beats must sound pretty damn good for a market that has no audiophile headphone reference point. But they compare $70 cans, and Grado have 3 more models above the 60i yet priced below the Beats.
Did you even research high end headphones or did you just walk into best buy and throw your money away? I’m glad you like the beats. You should like the beats. You should LOVE them considering how much money you spent on them. But imo, you shouldn’t be here encouraging people to throw their money away on a set of headphones when you didn’t even take a moment to research the market.
And honestly, your comparison to sennheiser is ridiculous. Their cans at the same price point completely blow the beats out of the water. The HD-650 are some of the best headphones available at any price, period, and they cost $340. It’s blatantly obvious that you never auditioned these, or any of Sennheiser’s other high performance audiophile headphones, as you compared beats noise cancellation to Sennheiser’s. Sennheiser doesn’t have noise cancellation in any of their audiophile grade headphones because noise cancellation is inherently detrimental to sound quality (noise cancellation works by sampling external sounds with a microphone then reverses the soundwave and plays it, effectively canceling out the noise to our acoustic perception, however it also covers up detail in the sound and constricts the soundstage, which is why beats and bose are the only headphones with noise cancellation marketed as “audiophile quality”).
If anyone reading this is considering the beats, do yourself a huge favor and audition the Sennheiser HD-650, AKG K702 or Grado SR325i first. Each are cheaper than the Beats and light years beyond in sound quality.