Hacker News Reader

Comment by moheeb | Hacker News Reader

"Next time you roll into a Best Buy, compare the 'shinyness' and 'smoothness' of Beats to any other product"

Yeah...just don't compare the sound.

The sound on Beats is actually good; much better than what most people have with their headphones so most users will experience an improvement by switching to them.

The problem is that the cost:sound ratio is poor; you can find cheaper headphones with the same quality and you can find much better headphones for the same price.

Sound is a very objective measurement so I won't go ahead and say that beats sounds "better" or "worse". However (I can't seem to find the link now) on many audiophile forums Beats have been measured to skew to better frequency response in the low range. Therefore they will sound more thumpy but without warm mids and crisp highs. Beats has engineered their headphones this way for a specific marketing demographic, I just don't know if this is what the majority of Apple customers want and interpret as good performance.

That may be the case, but consider that most consumers are probably currently using the <$15 earbuds that came with their phone. When those users switch to Beats they will get a much better sound experience, even if the frequency response is skewed.

I'll continue to recommend sennheiser over Beats, but I think the primary objection to beats should be their cost, not their quality.

Those are $30 headphones and I _love_ them. I use headphones 10 hours a day and it's always the apple ones. So comfortable, just the right amount of noise-canceling so I don't have to remove them to talk to people, and they sound good to me.

Beats are also very comfortable. Not much is said on headphone comfort in reviews and comparisons but it's very important for me.

This is a very important thing to remember: people always talk about how 'audiophiles' hate Beats headphones and would recommend a better-sounding, worse-looking and sometimes more expensive option.

The people buying Beats are people upgrading from their free headphones that came bundled with their phone, or the $15 ones they picked up at the supermarket.

The skew is exactly what Dr. Dre's fans, and other pop fans, want. They are made by a former gangsta rapper turned pop rapper. Who can listen to Dre without a trio of 12" subs rumbling their car or house or the dancefloor?

I have had Beats for 2.5 years. I like a lot of rap, and rap sounds awesome. Nicer headphones may have a better sound for a more broad range of music - but they don't replicate the 808's and fat basslines on Novation.

This isn't even close to being on topic, but I upvoted you because 'fat basslines on Novation' reminded me of the Wu Tang Clan! Triumph is a great song...

You can find much better quality headphones for _much_ less.

90$ HD-280 pro's sound better than 300$ Beats..

> HD-280 pro

That's actually the exact pair of headphones I have on right now. ;)

Compare the HD-280 pro to Beats headphones, from an aesthetics point of view.

[photo showing my field of view wearing HD-280 headphones]

[photo showing my field of view wearing Beats headphones]

Photos have been omitted because they look exactly the same.

Beats Headphones are fashion items, which is really most of the innovation they provide: making a normally geeky or tacky piece of equipment into something stylish.

What it looks like to you is besides the point, it's how they look to the people around you.

I know that, and I know that's important for some people. But for me, my aesthetic experience is not changed by how headphones I wear look, but just by how they sound and how comfortable they are. I spend most of my time wearing headphones alone, and very little of that in front of a mirror.

And still: any headphones, even the prettiest ones, look kinda lame in comparison to not wearing headphones. This is my personal preference of course; if I was worried about looking good rather than hearing good sound, I'd stick to little in-ear ones.

I own two HD 280s: one at the office, one at home.

Audiophiles almost unanimously agree that Beats headphones are sub-par when it comes to overall quality of sound.

But that's not their target demographic so it's moot.

Does Apple care what audiophiles think? iPods and the default ear buds are low quality compared to most audiophile gear.

Apple's customers should probably care that they are going to be ripped off on headphones. The issue isn't "audiophiles don't like them". It's that you can pay a lot less money and get much better headphones.

let me correct that for you...

Apple's customers ██ █████ ███ ██ ██ are going to be ripped off █ ██████.

Apple's new earpods are a huge step up from their old earbuds, and given their price ($30) are well up there in their price range. Most reviews I've seen of them from more audiophile oriented sources have been very positive given their context. No they won't compete with $200 headphones or earphones, but they're supposed to either.

Audiophiles basically agree that ears are sub-par

Source: http://www.audiocheck.net/soundtests_headphones.php

But me, I use the cheapest Panasonic headphones because they look cool and they're durable, and that's good enough for me. Probably for a lot of people. These: http://www.cnet.com/products/panasonic-rp-htx7-white/

And audiophiles are, by definition, a tiny margin of the market. They're not the target audience of beats.

They're not terrible just poor bang per buck.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com