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>The mobility, flexibility and convenience of no tangles and accidental wire pulling and causing phone to drop - all worth it. You can thread the wired headpho

>The mobility, flexibility and convenience of no tangles and accidental wire pulling and causing phone to drop - all worth it. You can thread the wired headphone/IEM cord under your shirt, or even over your ear and down your back [0] to prevent tangles and wire pulling that causes a phone to drop. It's less convenient than wireless earphones, but it solves the problem, and comes with advantages (better noise isolation and sound quality with certain models, plus you don't need to worry about the batteries degrading and having to buy a new pair after possibly 2-3 years, so you save money). I'm considering switching back to wired after my current AirPods pair dies for these advantages. >Wired is dead Not at all. You can get high-quality, professional earphones (in-ear monitors or IEMs) that fit in a pouch in your pocket, which are great for people in loud environments (better than noise cancelling due to their noise isolation); who appreciate music (sound quality is noticeably better for any genre); or who do professional audio work. [0] https://imgur.com/QOSNA9T https://imgur.com/QOSNA9T

DangerousPie 5y ago
Sure, you can work around the limitations of wired head phones. But at the end it's just not worth the trouble for many of us. I ditched my wired head phones years ago and haven't regretted it.
- munk-a 5y ago
  Or you can work around the limitations of wireless headphones. At the end of the day both choices have advantages and consumers can freely chose one or the other (or both for different situations!) just so long as no manufacturer is stupid enough to remove headphone jacks from their mobile music devices we'll all be good.
  - The_Colonel 5y ago
    It's a dying breed, but there are still many phones with audio jack. I don't think it will disappear completely.
strogonoff 5y ago
Having cycled through WH1000XM3, XM4, AirPods Pro, I am back to my trusty Shure SE215 that I use wired. — They never deafen me with connected/disconnected sounds (which can never be configured quiet enough) or music briefly playing at insane volume after switching or connecting. — I know I get the source quality. — I would never lose one randomly (always a chance with “true wireless” models). — I don’t get weird phased low-frequency rumble from active noise compensation gone wonky. — Most of all, their passive noise suppression with Shure’s black sleeves, depending on exact noise profile either beats or is on par with top-of-the-line active isolation (both according to rtings’ test benches and my subjective experience), and does not end when battery runs out inevitably at the most inconvenient time. Addendum: 1) I connect them via a tiny Ikko Zerda DAC, which I started using way back when I still had a phone with a headphone jack (this is subjective, but with lossless sources I hear more detail—as in literally small instrument parts I didn’t hear before in complex arrangements—compared to built-in DAC). 2) I generally pass the wire under the top layer of clothing, and personally taking an earbud out and letting it dangle is about as difficult as switching on the transparent mode on AirPods (and without audio degradation inherent to such modes).
- grp000 5y ago
  As far as their SE215 model goes, the sound, isolation, and ergonomics are great, but I've always had issues with the cable breaking at the ear curve next to the connection point to the earbuds.
  - strogonoff 5y ago
    Now that you say it, I’m not using the original cable, and I don’t recall what happened to it because it’s been so long ago (could’ve been a similar issue to the one you described). I couldn’t find a Shure original cable to replace mine with right away, so I got a compatible one and been rolling with it ever since. It’s slightly thinner, more flexible and without the thicker malleable parts near earbud connections. I was cautious about those differences at first, but in the end grown to prefer it more than the original, these thin wires wrap around my ears just fine. As a side note, one of the things I treasure about the design of these IEMs is the replaceability of the cable. The IEMs themselves can probably survive for ages, which gives a nice feeling among the increasingly disposable electronics—I just hope the model would still exist on the market when something eventually happens to my unit.

DangerousPie 5y ago

Sure, you can work around the limitations of wired head phones. But at the end it's just not worth the trouble for many of us. I ditched my wired head phones years ago and haven't regretted it.

munk-a 5y ago
Or you can work around the limitations of wireless headphones. At the end of the day both choices have advantages and consumers can freely chose one or the other (or both for different situations!) just so long as no manufacturer is stupid enough to remove headphone jacks from their mobile music devices we'll all be good.
- The_Colonel 5y ago
  It's a dying breed, but there are still many phones with audio jack. I don't think it will disappear completely.

strogonoff 5y ago

Having cycled through WH1000XM3, XM4, AirPods Pro, I am back to my trusty Shure SE215 that I use wired. — They never deafen me with connected/disconnected sounds (which can never be configured quiet enough) or music briefly playing at insane volume after switching or connecting. — I know I get the source quality. — I would never lose one randomly (always a chance with “true wireless” models). — I don’t get weird phased low-frequency rumble from active noise compensation gone wonky. — Most of all, their passive noise suppression with Shure’s black sleeves, depending on exact noise profile either beats or is on par with top-of-the-line active isolation (both according to rtings’ test benches and my subjective experience), and does not end when battery runs out inevitably at the most inconvenient time. Addendum: 1) I connect them via a tiny Ikko Zerda DAC, which I started using way back when I still had a phone with a headphone jack (this is subjective, but with lossless sources I hear more detail—as in literally small instrument parts I didn’t hear before in complex arrangements—compared to built-in DAC). 2) I generally pass the wire under the top layer of clothing, and personally taking an earbud out and letting it dangle is about as difficult as switching on the transparent mode on AirPods (and without audio degradation inherent to such modes).

grp000 5y ago
As far as their SE215 model goes, the sound, isolation, and ergonomics are great, but I've always had issues with the cable breaking at the ear curve next to the connection point to the earbuds.
- strogonoff 5y ago
  Now that you say it, I’m not using the original cable, and I don’t recall what happened to it because it’s been so long ago (could’ve been a similar issue to the one you described). I couldn’t find a Shure original cable to replace mine with right away, so I got a compatible one and been rolling with it ever since. It’s slightly thinner, more flexible and without the thicker malleable parts near earbud connections. I was cautious about those differences at first, but in the end grown to prefer it more than the original, these thin wires wrap around my ears just fine. As a side note, one of the things I treasure about the design of these IEMs is the replaceability of the cable. The IEMs themselves can probably survive for ages, which gives a nice feeling among the increasingly disposable electronics—I just hope the model would still exist on the market when something eventually happens to my unit.