MaximumPC 2007 02

U

ltrasone’s iCans feature the same S-Logic technology that prompted us to

name the company’s Proline 750 headphones to our 2006 Best of the Best

list. However, as wonderful as they sound with an iPod, they can’t displace the

Shure E4g earbuds in their respective Best of the Best category.

Yes, we’re comparing apples to oranges, but both sets of phones are

designed to be paired with personal music players. And if you find in-the-ear

phones like the E4gs uncomfortable, we would strongly encourage you to

check out the iCans: They’re light, they’re comfortable, and they’re considerably

cheaper than Shure’s pricey earbuds. They also sound great; they just don’t

sound as great—or as loud—as the E4gs.

Instead of piping music directly down your ear canal, Ultrasone’s S-Logic

technology uses an array of transducers inside the ear cup to bounce sound off

the folds in your outer ear. The result isn’t exactly surround sound, at least not

in the sense that you’ll perceive audio events to be originating from specific

locations in three-dimensional space, but the effect is much more natural than

what you get from conventional headphones.

Typical headphones—and this goes for earbuds, too—tend to overem-

phasize stereo separation. Musical instruments and voices come from the

extreme left or extreme right; if they’re perfectly centered in the mix, they

sound as though they’re originating from smack in the middle of your head.

With Ultrasone’s S-Logic, sound waves bounce off your pinnae before travel-

ing down your ear canal, just as they would in a normal listening environment.

They arrive at your eardrums microseconds apart, enhancing your perception of

depth and separation. Instead of hearing the band on either side of your head,

you hear it all around your head.

In light of the valid concerns about headphone-induced hearing loss, it’s

probably unwise for us to wish for louder headphones. But we will anyway:

The iCans just didn’t rock our casbah—or should we say our cabeza? Hmm...

maybe it’s time to invest in a

headphone amp.

—Michael Brown

Ultrasone iCans

Tommy, can you hear me?

T

hanks to Apple’s ubiquitous advertising, you can walk around town with

wires hanging out of your ears without getting strange looks from passers-

by. Etymotic Research’s ety8 Bluetooth earphones shorten the wires, but these

anything-but-discreet earbuds are guaranteed to draw a few sets of eyeballs

your way.

If you don’t mind the attention, you’ll get to enjoy a great set of noise-

isolating earphones that don’t need to be tethered to your iPod. The ety8s aren’t

entirely wireless—a shoelace-like cord links the left and right modules—but

they use Bluetooth technology for wireless two-way communication via a

small transceiver plugged into the iPod’s docking port. The lanyard is just long

enough to allow you to turn your head without tugging either module, and when

you’re not listening to music, you can drape the ety8s over your neck.

Five tiny buttons on the right module control the iPod’s volume up/down,

track selection, play/pause, and previous/next track functions. As small as the

buttons are, it took us just moments to blindly locate them and memorize the

function of each one—the all-important pause button was the easiest to mas-

ter. And each button press updates the iPod’s display. The more we used the

ety8s, the more we appreciated the convenience of going wireless, whether we

were bundling up for a cold-weather outdoor excursion, working out indoors on

an exercise bike, or just sitting at our desks.

Only one aspect of the system gave us pause: The transceiver you plug

into the iPod is small (1 inch high by 1.5 inches wide) and sturdy, but friction is

the only force that keeps it mated to your iPod. We’re just unsure of how well

it and the iPod’s docking port will stand up to repeated jostling and knocking

around inside a jacket pocket.

The ety8s come with a wide selection of ear tips and do a fabulous job of

blocking out background noise; more importantly, they sounded marvelous with

everything from Mozart symphonies to Paul Thorn’s wry, whiskey-soaked blues.

Yeah, they’re a little geeky, but they’re definitely worth suffering a

few stares for.

—Michael Brown

Etymotic Research ety8

Bluetooth Earbuds

Get your geek on

7 MAXIMUMPC february 2007

reviews Tes Ted. Reviewed. veRdic Tized

we found the icans comfortable for long listening sessions,

but the fact that they fit on top of your ears might render them

uncomfortable for folks wearing earrings.

etymotic also offers a version of the ety8 without the iPod adapt-

er for $200, if you’d like to pair the earbuds with a cell phone or

other Bluetooth-enabled device.

8

etymotic earbuds

$300, http://www.etymotic.com

8

ultrasone icans

$129, http://www.ultrasoneusa.com