Symphonized Wired Earbuds with Microphone – 90% Noise Cancelling Ear buds with Mic, in Ear Headphones Wire for Computer & Phone, Earphones 3.5 mm Jack

Outlined Review: These are much, much better than I expected. (Purchased with my own money. Genuine Review.) Who are these for: Anyone looking for a low budget set of wired headphones and still wanting a full, rich sound. The Plan: While looking for low-cost wired earbud headphones for my VR headset, I was fully prepared to purchase headphones that were more expensive than these as this is the lowest I would spend. I wanted quality full sound since I wanted them to use for media, and I wanted them to take up a small footprint to go into the case I also store my VR headset inside. First Look Impressions: A). The packaging was as simple as any retail store. It opened right up out of the box easily. To my surprise, I suddenly find the small pouch included as well as the color ear tips I chose (red) when buying these and black set all in small, medium, and large. The mediums fit me perfectly even though my ears are small. They also threw in a small wire clip to secure to your clothing, a very appreciated touch since it’s a better experience with all noise reduction wired headphones if the wires are limited in movement. ***Note: As mentioned, noise reduction wired headphones commonly make noise. This isn’t a defect, it’s a sideffect of isolating out exterior noise. Any movement of the wires will cause feedback bumps, if you will, like the sound of a cotton swab in your ear. It isn’t a distraction after a minute or two, and you’ll rarely notice it. Listening: Absolutely mind blowing. I have no idea how these sound so well honestly. They don’t look like they would produce such a quality experience. But they do. And that isn’t putting down the looks. They look great, but they sound more expensive than they look, easily. I tried these with all genres of music. The genres I believe it sounds best are R&B, Pop, Country, Dance, and Ambience. The genres I believe they sound worst are Classical, Accapella, Jazz, and Rap. All others were neither good or bad, but still sounded fantastic for this price. I also tested these on gaming and movies which didn’t disappoint either. Also, I paired a Bluetooth transmitter coming from my computer to a portable Bluetooth receiver I plugged these headphones into.There was no delay in sound and they sounded just as good as if they were plugged into my computer itself. Then, I took a battery-powered DAC and plugged these into it. These headphones handeled well at low and high volumes and there was a nice, clear, crisp sound. And while turned up to max volume, there was no distortion and very little sound leakage heard while wearing. In conclusion: I didn’t purchase these because they were the best or worst. I purchased them because the older version of them had an overwhelming positive amount of reviews. And while these didn’t have many reviews at the time I got them, I took the chance, and I couldn’t be happier that I did. Pros: - Sounds and looks more expensive than they cost. - Lightweight and easy to include with everyday items. - Thin slick cord makes it easy to untangle if they ever do. - In-line controls are compatible with many devices. Cons: - A nylon corded option would be nice. - I wouldn’t use the pouch while carrying in my pockets as I prefer a hard case. ... I honestly don’t think there are more cons than these. I would recommend these to anyone and I would purchase these again when needed. Thank you

Being a fan of the legendary Ink'd earbuds by Skullcandy, I was disappointed when they were discontinued. I had since been on a search for the best pair of cheap earbuds I could find. This is definitely the best comparison I have found. First off, I read the reviews before purchasing these. I read a lot of great reviews, and I also saw some questionable reviews. However, the terrible reviews that I saw left me impressed because they had been updated saying that the seller had dealt with the problem promptly and had been very considerate. That was a major selling point for me. If I had any problems, I knew from the history that the providers would take care of any problem without much hassle. Fortunately, I have not had any problems. If anyone sees any review about poor quality and breaking, they were not treating these correctly. After using these frequently for quite some time, I have definitely felt for durability. What I have found: - The microphone is very well built. Seams are small and hardly noticeable, making it difficult to separate and break. - The buttons are firm (but not too firm) and deliberate with movements, making it feel very sturdy and durable. - The connector is definitely interesting. It's a mix between the elbow and the straight connector. I will follow up on the review later to explain how this holds up after time. However, it is not a weak point in the build as it commonly is with headphones. Looks like it will last a while. - The black part under the earbuds themselves are very sturdy (yet somewhat flexible) pieces of plastic, creating an environment that is difficult to lose connection because of the lack of mobility, but just enough to not have too much resistance. - The cable itself is a little stiffer than the average auxiliary cable, making it feel more protected from bending and connection problems. To sum it up, these are very well-built and do not feel like they will break any time soon. Next, I will address the quality of the sound. The first thing I do with any pair of headphones or earbuds is test the sound. I test the quality and the limits of the sound. Most headphones can reach fairly high sound levels, however you probably don't ever want to because it will hurt your ears or the quality is compromised significantly. I have played these with minimal sound, and I have played with maximum sound. I have played classical music to rock to dubstep. I can say that the sound quality is not compromised by playing too low or too loud. It is just as good loud as it is low. They have a great range of sound. I have had a lot of headphones that do not have any depth. Most can go pretty loud, but it feels like they are missing something. These earbuds do not feel like they are missing anything. I honestly feel just as immersed in the music wearing these as I do when I use my Studio Beats (which is why I honestly don't use my beats much anymore.) Sounds great on the highs and sounds amazing on the lows. They do have great bass, I'll give them that. I love the fact that they can produce so much bass, but it's honestly not a feature I will use often because they can tickle the inside of your ear because of the bass. In other words, you literally can feel the bass, which is great I think. Just be careful because it can be a weird sensation if you are not prepared to have your eardrum tickled (try it, its definitely worth trying) Well-made, beautiful design, sound great, no problems so far, therefore I give them 5 stars.

Pros: Fairly decent headphones for a very, very low price. Easy to get a good fit with the included silicone ear tips. Unique look to the earphones due to use of wood, metal, and silicone. Inline microphone and remote with 3 buttons that works on Android. Loads of bass. Cons: Frequency response on the low end leaves the large amounts of bass a little muddy Other: 45° bend in the strain relief near the plug splits the difference between the 90° (traditional) and the 0° (modern). The Short Answer: If you were going to buy Koss' "The Plug" spend the extra $5 on these and you'll be far happier. If you were going to buy almost anything else with a microphone and inline remote these most likely provide better sound than anything around 21 price-point. If you want them as your primary music listening pair you may be disappointed by the clarity of the bass. The Long Answer: So my replacement AKG headphones (which were replacements for my the pack-in AKG headphones that came with my mobile device) gave out after about 4 months. I was looking for something that was wired, in-ear, had reasonable sound, an inline microphone, and an inline remote that would work with Android (even better if it had both the universal button and the volume buttons). My first choice for headphones in the $20-50 (the "decent enough sound and won't break on you in 3 months" range), Sony, had reduced the number of wired headphones in this price range by quite a bit and the few left only had a singular, universal button. So I started poking around on Amazon. This was suggested and so I figured that at just over $21 (at the time of purchase) wasn't a horrible chance to take on something that had an inline microphone, 3 buttons on the wired remote, and would work properly with Android. I was mostly right. First Impressions: Out of the box the headphones felt pretty decent with its unusually heady coat of insulation on the main cable. The silicone ear tips fit snugly and were surprisingly firm (the barrel seems to be made to be a bit stiffer than most ear tips), yet comfortable. The jack end of the cable was a bit of an oddity to me—it had a 45° bend in it at the strain relief (the somewhat ugly, but very necessary collar of rubber near the jack housing; A.K.A. the part that tends to fail first on otherwise well-built Apple products). Normally I like the traditional 90° bends over the modern 0° bends (wire straight out of the jack) since the 90° bends sit more closely to the body of the device while 0° bends are better suited to devices that may require full extension of the cable or many cables of the type in close quarters such as amplifier cables, microphone cables, and RCA plugs). My problem with the modern 0° bends is that they were responsible for the death of the last two sets of earbuds that I owned as the straight out cable was just trouble waiting to happen as a cable sticking straight out will tend to be forced into a 90° bend whenever it's plugged into a device and put into a pocket. That said the people at Symphonized seem to understand that people are going to use this model on mobile devices and so a 90° bend is probably not great for when the phone is held at arm's length (selfie photos, video recording at concerts, etc), but will still get shoved into pockets and bags where a 0° bend would just get destroyed. Audio (both earbuds and microphone): My initial test for the headphones was on my mobile device (where they'd most often be used). They were a massive improvement over the less expensive AKGs! The high end was immediately clearer and the audio a good amount louder. Several mobile games that I play make extensive use of solid sound design and the one with a fully orchestrated soundtrack really showed off the mids and highs of these headphones. Also, there seemed to be a solid amount of bass that made instruments in the lower range stand out a bit more. However, the lower-mids to bass range felt a tad fuzzy, but I wasn't sure if it was just my device or the headphones. My second test was to make a call with them. One of the first things that the person receiving the call mentioned to me was that the call audio did seem a lot clearer (I hadn't mentioned that I was using a new set of headphones). I've yet to test out the audio in a recording scenario, but I'll update with those results once I do. The third test was to plug these headphones into my computer. Instantly I could tell the difference between these headphones and the more expensive Bluetooth set that I normally use—the Symphonized NRG 3.0 was just better in most ways. I tested both on a few different songs—several orchestral pieces (which tend to have the highest dynamic range)—a few pieces from the '60s (one being The Beatles' "Penny Lane" since it has both rock and traditional instruments as well as '60s style left-right separation), a few modern electronic pieces, and Free's "All Right Now" (which has a plucked bass that will sound like more like a tuba when the bass isn't as clear). Most of the orchestral pieces sounded amazing, "Penny Lane" sounded excellent (it's very mids and highs heavy), and the electronic pieces sounded sufficiently thumping. However, on Free's "All Right Now" the headphones sadly delivered what I had feared; a more tuba-like sound when faced with the bass. In fact the tuning and clarity of the low-end of these headphones reminded me a lot of Koss' "The Plug" (which after looking it up have a similar frequency response of 16Hz-23kHz—the NRG 3.0 has a response of 18Hz-23kHz). Sadly these didn't offer the low-end performance of my favourite Sony MDR-EX71SL (which had a frequency response of 6Hz-22kHz)—but the Sonys were also $9-15 more expensive and didn't offer an inline microphone and an inline remote with volume controls. Conclusion: I came to these wanting something that could work as a wired headset for my Android device and competently play music and game audio. These deliver on that and at a very good price. However, if I had wanted these as my sole pair of headphones for music listening I might be disappointed with the lack of clarity on the low end—which may or may not be a concern to someone listening to music with more synthesized bass-lines (modern pop, modern dance-pop, and club-standard E.D.M.). If you were going to buy cheaper headphones buy these instead!

These are truly impressive headphones! Opinions on these things are unavoidably subjective and depend heavily on personal tastes and listening habits, so it's probably relevant to state those of mine upfront: My enthusiasm for classical music veers dangerously close to the nutty edge, as my collection of 2,100+ CDs (about 95% classical) would attest. For decades, I have also attended (and sometimes participated in) performances of symphony orchestras, choral groups big and small, as well as chamber ensembles and individual recitals. So, even though I am not "audiophile" enough to be equipped with headphone amps, I sure know what my music should sound like. I also have a bunch of headphones for comparison listening, including -Sony XBAH1 -Sony XBA-C10IP -Marshall Mode -Brainwavz Delta -Panasonic RP-TCM125 Ergo Fit All of these were among Wirecutter.com's top picks one time or another recently, and all of them I have found pleasing in one way or another. After a few months of living with my Symphonized NRG 3.0 headphones, I come to the conclusion that, over all, I would prefer these headphones to all the others. The very first thing I noticed right away with my Symphonized NRG 3.0 pair was the exceptional efficiency of volume production. At the usual volume setting I listen with other pairs, these are considerably louder. I like to listen to music loud enough so that the full sound quality of the instruments/voices can be clearly discerned, but not so loud as to bust ear-drums. It is known that people tend to favor louder speakers/headphones during listening comparisons, so in forming my opinions I have tried my best to reduce the player's volume setting to offset its higher efficiency when I listened with the Symphonized pair. The first few recordings I listened to using the Symphonized pair happened to be string quartets. I was awe-struck by how good they sounded. It took a while before I figured out what gave the additional listening pleasure: The four instruments are presented vividly at four individual locales in the sound stage. And thankfully, this was not accomplished with edgy or shrill sound. The tones are pliant and alive and the instruments are clearly and palpably THERE! The quality of the Sony pairs listed above that I appreciate the most is their ability to render individual instruments with air around them (so to speak). But the Symponized pair presents the instruments with a steady vividness unlike anything I heard before. This effect may be a little less noticeable with other instruments or orchestral sections but still quite noticeable. I have no idea whether this has anything to do with the fact that wood rather than plastic is used for the ear-pieces, and honestly I really don't care. Sound quality is what matters to me. Like most people, I often wish headphone could produce a bit more bass than they are usually capable of. Here the Symphonized 3.0 pair also does a lot better than most other headphones. Better yet, the bass sound is musical, sounding like real low strings or timpani should, not at all boomy or boxy. It's probably not for people who prefer to hear heavy drumbeats over everything else, but it's plenty satisfying for me. I want the bass to provide firm support for the music, not be the prima donna of it all unless during a timpani or double-bass solo. On good stereo recordings, the Symphonized 3.0 pair produces the sense of an unusually wide sound stage and a fairy nice sense of depth too. It fills the whole sound stage with a warm, unforced, and very musical sound. Though occasionally I hear some hollow piano tones, I suspect that's more the faults of the recordings. All in all, I have found the Symphonized NRG 3.0 headphones a very happy purchase that makes extremely pleasurable listening, especially if your musical tastes and listening habit resemble mine. You will find their sounds warm and full. More than any other headphones I have listened to, these give a lot of vivid presence to the music. Very very impressive indeed! I could wish for clearer indications on the ear-pieces to distinguish the left from the right, but that probably amounts to ungrateful nit-picking.

I'm debating about whether to give these 3 or 4 stars. I'm going with 3, because the pros are offset by a couple of cons that substantially reduce usability for me. First pro: audio quality is quite good for earbuds, and very good considering the price. That said, I find the sound to be a little harsh. The Symphonized website says the NRGs have "Crisp acoustics, deep bass". Well, I agree with the crisp acoustics part. In fact they are TOO crisp for me. I just listened to XTC's "King For a Day" on them, for example, and found that the upper mids on high-hat, cymbals, and snare were prominent to the point of being uncomfortable. I threw on my Grado SR-60s over-ear headphones to compare, and didn't experience that at all. Now, comparing $25 earbuds to Grados is utterly unfair, and the truth is that going to the Grados didn't reveal that the NRGs sound was horribly unbalanced or deficient. That is actually EXTREMELY impressive. Stereophiles rave about the Grados. I think part of the problem with the NRG sound is that I increased the volume more than I otherwise would to try to get more bass and lower mid frequencies out of them. I suspect that this is not so much a problem with the driver, but rather with the earbud-to-ear interface. I think that the silicone tips are, for my ears, just too flimsy. That makes them comfortable, but it reduces the seal necessary for good bass response and sound isolation from outside. This is even true of the large size tips, although my body parts all tend to be freakishly medium/average. (Reviewers who say that these have excellent outside sound isolation must have really different ears than mine.) So, although I agree with the "crisp acoustics" part of Symphonized's description, I can't agree with the "deep bass". Not in my ears anyway, although the bass isn't terrible for earbuds, and it is more balanced and less artificially hyped than many cheap headphones these days. One other pro I'll mention: so far, the mic seems pretty good. I had a long conversation with my father, who doesn't hear very well, and rarely had to repeat myself. That is a huge improvement from the EarPods that came with my iPhone. The cons are mainly about getting the NRGs to stay in my ears. The cables don't have any noticeable noise transmitted by handling them, but they are stiff and heavy (at least compared to most iPhone-style headphones I've had). As a result, they pull down on the earbuds, even when using the included cable clip. Since the tips don't stay in my ears particularly well anyway (see above), the combination of tips and cables means I am constantly shoving the NRGs back into my ears. They don't necessarily fall out of my ears unless I knock into the cable, but they quickly pull out enough to seriously diminish bass response and sound isolation, so I'm constantly fiddling with them to have them sound good for music. I learned a trick to keeping my Apple EarPods in my ears better, which was to loop the cables over the top of my ears. I tried this with the NRGs, and it doesn't work well at all, for 2 reasons. First, the stiff cables don't lie down over my ears very well. Second, the cables come out of the earbuds stiffly and at an angle away from the ear, which makes it even harder to loop them over my ears. I actually kind of like the stiff cable, because it doesn't get tangled as easily and I suspect it is more durable than wimpier cables. But I can't give high marks to earbuds that don't stay in my ears. BTW, at first I had some weird problems with the volume on the remote, with the volume dropping way down or going way up when I pressed the button. But that seems to have calmed down after the first couple of times I used them.

I have to use earbuds while I work on my computer and listen to meetings. My 92-year-old father watches tv at a very high volume in the same room. It makes it difficult for me to hear the audio on my computer. The last set of earbuds worked ok but the wire was beginning to come apart. I purchased these based on the noise cancellation and price. I am very surprised how well they work. They fit great in my small ears and block out most of the tv sound. I am very happy with my purchase and would buy them again.

So things I do like: the sound it great. They are great at noise canceling too it that's what you're into. They look amazing. I love the wood. Both earphones still work great and I've owned these for four months. Buuuuttttt--they will become my back up and that's because despite being only 4 months old, the controls on it whacked out. If I even bump the little Sound/skip remote on the headphone wire it zooms up the sound or turns it completely off when plugged into my computer. They are completely unusable with my iPhone. It will constantly bring up Siri or start skipping around in the songs/podcasts, speeding them up, jumping back. I thought it might be a phone problem but when I switched to an older pair non of this was happening. It's made it so I can't work out with them and even worse, I'm a professional Illustrator so I move enough when I draw that I can't use them while I'm with them. So the earphones themselves are great quality. But the attachments are what screwed this product over. I was really hoping for a pair of earphones that could last over 6 months with the price point these are at, but honestly I won't be buying these again and will try a different route this time. UPDATE 7.20.17: So the company did reach out to me and are sending me a replacement pair. If the new set lasts longer, i will be so happy. I really do like these--just so long as they don't break so quickly. I do wanna make very clear though, the sound on these headphones is really awesome. The pair of headphones I have been using since these were broken has much quieter and poorer sound quality (a $15 pair btw), which was immediately noticeable after using these. I just wish these ones didn't have the remote at all or possibly had one of those nylon/almost shoelace kind of cords, those seem more durable, lightweight and less noticeable or at least what I use headphones for. UPDATE 8.23.17 I never received any replacement headphones from the company.

I’ve been buying Symphonized earbuds for years and love them - superior sound and comfort. I decided to try this model (although I prefer the all white version) because of the updated design of the jack - it’s angled and looked to be a sturdier design (the jack has been a point of failure on the previous model (NRG X) that I’ve purchased many times). Now that I’ve been using these for a bit, I definitely like the new jack design better. However, I didn’t realize I’d be giving up the angled earbud housing that I dramatically preferred. So, if the folks at Symphonized read this - please keep both the angled earbud housing and the sturdier, angled jack in future versions. I love your headphones and will continue to buy them for years to come! I have sensitive ears, so comfort is a big deal (I can’t tolerate Apple’s AirPods or many other earbuds) and the tips you provide are so comfortable. I was a bit overwhelmed with the plethora of options included in the package for these headphones - and ended up sticking with the style & size I’ve always used, so now I know. I think I’m pretty hard on headphones - I use them for hours each day, so I tend to go through a pair every 3-4 months. Anything you can do to improve the durability and strength of the common points of failure (the jack and the wired connection point at the earbud housing) would be greatly appreciated. The low price point makes it so it’s not a nuisance to buy a new pair, as needed, though. Thanks for a great product!