Customer Reviews

V-MODA Vibe In-Ear Noise-Isolating Metal Headphone (Flashback Chrome)

5 star:		(92)
4 star:		(44)
3 star:		(19)
2 star:		(12)
1 star:		(11)

 

 

I own a pair of these, got them formyself for Christmas (brief story - Got the Shure E2c's for Christmas, wasn't terribly pleased with them, did lots of research, then went out and bought some Senn 300's and these Vibes to compare with the Shures).

At first, it was a pretty hard decision between the Sennheiser 300's and the Vibes. Both had their stronger points. The 300's had a bit stronger bass response, while still retaining nice mids and highs. Plus, it was cheaper ($70 vs $100 for the Vibes. But I understood that it would be necessary to 'burn in' the Vibes for several hours, so I left it rotating through the Vision:M's library overnight. And what you may have read is definitely true: the Vibes do need a period of time in order to 'smooth out', or maybe a better term would be to 'fill out'.

The long and short of it was, I bought the Sennheiser and the V-Moda on a Thursday evening. Friday morning, I see an ad in the paper from the retail store where I purchased the Vibes, putting them on sale for $79. As close as the Senns and the Vibes were, the Vibes were still clearly better, and now, with the sale price, they wound up only being $10 different in price.

My decision was made for me. Returned the Shures and the Senns, and have now been using the Vibes frequently for over a week.

I tell you this so that you will know that I did in fact compare some well-regarded iem's in this range, so maybe you won't have to. It is a pain to buy iem's because you cannot try them out before you purchase them.

In any case, the verdict on the Vibes is this: They are great, great headphones. Even within just a week of use I can tell a difference between their performance now and the performance out of the box. Brand new, they were a bit tinny, and seemed to struggle with bass as well. Now, however, they are rich, deep, have sparkling highs, lush mids, and offer the best soundstage of any of the others I tried.

The rundown: the #1 factor with headphones is the sound, which is as it ought to be. While it may be possible that some other iem's in the under-$100 category might techincally reproduce a more 'accurate' sound, I seriously doubt there are any out there which can produce one as enjoyable. It is simply so nice a sound, it actually makes you look forward to the next time you are able to use them. When is the last time you ever thought THAT with your stock earbuds?

Comfort: The Vibes are extremely small and light, I would say less than half the size of the Shures, and roughly equal in size to the Senns. It's difficult to judge the size of these things from merely looking at photos of them on the internet. But they are tiny little things. Let me put it this way: you should even be able to comfortably lie in bed, with your head on its side on a pillow, and listen to these phones without any discomfort. YMMV of course. The default tips installed on them out of the package are the small silicone tips, and I have been so pleased with the fit and comfort that I have not even bothered to sample any of the other sizes, or even the allegedly-softer black tips. I would rate the Vibes as the most comfortable of the 3, with the Senns #2 and the Shures far behind.

Isolation: Of the three, the Vibes give the least amount of 'sound isolation'. Don't interpret this as a bad thing, however. Unless you genuinely, seriously, honestly NEED to utterly silence the outside world when you listen to your headphones, it should not be a problem. Personally, I find that 'plugged up' feeling of the totally-isolating headphones to be extremely uncomfortable. Not painful as such, just not a comfortable feeling. The Vibes do not give you that plugged sensation at all (at least as far as I can tell), but they still isolate pretty well. Additionally, I have heard it said that the reduced isolation of the Vibes is what allows them to have such an open, airy quality to them, which in turn contributes to their having such an excellent soundstage. While I am not a propeller-head enough to know if this is completely true, I can tell you that the Vibes have a better soundstage, by far, than the Shures, and noticeably better than the Senns.

Accessories/Design: This is where V-Moda loses me a little bit. The marketing for these babies is calculated to appeal to those ultra-cool, ultra-hip California jet-setter stylistas. Fair enough. I am not one of them, but all I really care about is the sound and the comfort. So the marketing is not a negative for me, as long as the goods deliver, which they do.

The problem, if you can call it that, is that the cosmetic design has been influenced by this marketing strategy, and it has caused them to flub one thing, really very silly on their part.

The Vibes come with several different tips, both the clear silicon and the softer black rubber ones, of varying sizes. Good.

They come with something called the 'Cable Wrap', which is a notch and angled pice of silicone rubber designed to allow you to wrap excess cable around it, when you need a shorter length. Eh, whatever. Not a big deal to me.

They also come with a really silly, effite 'leather' storage bag/case, which looks like gold lame'. First of all, it's not leather, despite what they say. Second, ew. Come on V-Moda. Where else, outside of San Francisco, is anyone going to use this thing?

Lastly, the design of the headphones themselves. They are serious chrome metal buds. Nice. Slick design there. I really like the cable, with the clear exterior and some kind of interior mesh. Also cool. Plus, the cable is 'Y-shaped' and not 'J-shaped'. I know some people swear by 'J-shaped' cables, but I hate them. So, that's good too. The problem? The headphone jack. It seems nowdays that you either get to have a Y Cable or an angled jack, but not both. (For example, the Senn 300's have an angled plug, which is good, but they saddle you with that stupid J Cable, which is bad. The clone of the Senns, the Creative EP 630's, have a Y Cable, but a straight plug. Argh!) So anyway, the Vibes have a straight plug, which is bad enough because that kind of plug is not good for your audio device. The sideways torque can damage the internals of the thing. But even worse than that, V-Moda has designed the jack with a slick, TAPERED metal grip. This means that it is almost IMPOSSIBLE to unplug your headphones without having to pull on the cable itself, instead of the jack. And this is a surefire way to end up with a short in the cable. This is why I docked these phones a half-star. They let their exciting hip design strategy flub up their headphone design in a potentially serious way.

Hopefully, the inner workings of the jack are strong enough that they will not begin to short from having to pull on the cable, and all will be well.

In any case, other than that one flaw, these headphones are unquestionably the best bang for the buck under $100. I have not listened to any of the competitors in the next range, looking up at the $200 and $300 phones, but those would have to be some seriously great cans to be able to beat these little guys in the sound department.

I highly recommend these, just be careful unplugging them.

Enjoy!

I've used a pair of Shure E3s for a while now but a few things annoyed me about them - they were hard to put in and take out, they weren't always comfortable (whichever tips I used) and there wasn't a whole lot of bass coming out of them. I saw these recently and at the price had to try them - they're awesome. They go in like regular earbuds (no more looping the wire around your ears, although you can still do that if you want!), sound great, and are super comfortable. They even look good as a bonus. The gold case they come with sucks, but that's not the end of the world. If you're in the market for IEMs at any price (well, up to about $300 I guess) then check these out, they're surprisingly good.

They haven't even broken in yet and I can tell they are head and shoulders above the Bose Triports; lighter weight, better cords, better eartips, warmer and more balanced soundstage. Don't bother with the Bose. They are heavy and have overbearing bass. V-Moda has a different model that delivers huge bass if that's your style. These stay in with 2 out of the 3 sizes of eartips they give you whereas the Bose constantly fell out of my ears regardless of which size I tried. Noise canceling is much better as well so I can enjoy these in the subway. These cost less and sound much better. It's a no-brainer. Only thing missing is an in-line volume control on the cord.

I received the Vibes as a Christmas present and immediately let them play for a few hours to break them in somewhat before I reviewed them. As a background, I have used Sony's MDR-EX71SL, Sony's Studio Monitors, Etymotic ER-6i, Shure E3C, and few other crappy pack ins so I have had experienced using quality stuff. Also I tend to listen to mostly high bit rate MP3's (192kps or higher) and you'll understand why when you start using high quality headphones and earphones (your phones are as only as good as the source material). On to the review.

Appearance - 4.5/5

These things look great! They are look like they were machined from very high quality material and their looks defy their cost. In my opinion these are the best looking phones on the market. The cord length is perfect and the transparent casing around the wires are very cool. I would give it a 5 if not for the difficulty of pulling out the sleek metal plug from my iPod and the cord could have been a little bigger.

Comfort - 4/5

The package comes with 2 sets of small, medium, and large silicon tips and they are quite comfy. The tips are not unlike the ones that Sony employs. The phones themselves are metal and are a little bit cold when first inserted but you don't notice them after a minute or two. My only concern is that the housing is much more round than the ER-6i's that I was using and being as such they pushing against my ear more than the ER-6i's did so it could introduce slight ear fatigue after long sessions of use.

Sound - 4.5/5

Coming from the Etymotics, I was used a very flat sound field. Everything you heard is what was recorded by the sound engineer when the album was produced. The ER-6i's accuracy is unparalleled at its price range. However I couldn't escape the feeling that it left me cold when I listened to it. It was too perfectly accurate like that perfect nagging wife that won't let you spill a crumb on the couch. In contrast, the Vibes are well...vibrant. The sound levels are definitely altered. The highs are precise and roll off nicely but they're not as refined as the ER-6i. If you listen to a lot of Jazz I would recommend the ER-6i's because they are slightly more accurate with brass instruments. The lows are very substantial on the Vibe. I would not call it boomy because even though there is a lot of bass, it is still very accurate. Each bass note is well defined. You can pick up the differences between the cello's bow, the acoustic guitar's E string, versus the electric bass' walks. The mids are good but they are not as defined and warm as the ER-6i's. This especially true when you listen to the vocals on folk tracks. The Vibes do a better job of reproducing instruments than vocals even though vocals are still very good (we'll still talking about a $100 set of earphones). The best aspect of the Vibe is its sound stage. Most modern earphones produce a very "in your head" sound stage. You feel like someone is playing music in between your ears versus you listening to the music. The Vibe excels at letting you "listen" to the music. Stereo separation is great and there is a genuine depth of sound. You can tell what instrument is in the fore and background. If you listen a lot of live recordings than these are you best friends. The Vibes does the best job at letting you feel the audience in the recording. Overall the sound left me wanting to feel the music rather than trying analyze it as I often did with the ER-6i.

Conclusion

If I can could put down a 4.5 I would have. These phones are not perfect and for the price, I hope you don't expect them to be. However, for the price these are just as good as those costing twice their asking price and beyond. If you listen to a lot of music that require precise accuracy in the reproduction of the recording (jazz, classical) then I would skip these and buy some ER-6i but chances are you would have already spent more money for something else. However, if your listening tastes are a little more eclectic and you want the best sound phones in terms of accuracy, vibrancy, sound separation, and value then these are the best that money can buy under $200 (I'm even inclined to say $300)

OK, I am not any kind of audiophile. After 25 years of working around loud machinery and construction, I'm in no position to appreciate super high end audio. I just wanted a decent replacement for my Koss "the Plug" set, which was already a huge step up from the crap I was using.
Out of the box they had an overpowering, rather unpleasant tone. I had read several reviews commenting on this. Because of the driver type, a burn in period is apparently required. I let them run on the desk and checked them a couple of hours later and they had settled down quite a bit already. After about 8 hours of run time I was quite pleased with the sound. My old faithful Koss sound really muddy by comparison. They are not going to kick you in the head with bass if that is your thing, but I finally knew what reviewers were referring to when they spoke of "sound field". Bright (not tinny) and clean with a true reproduction.
They are very slickly marketed on their web site, which caused me some pause. But they are as well made as their marketing campaign is slick. A very sexy web site, speakin' of culture and whatnot, but as an overweight balding construction type, the old statement "lipstick on a pig" popped into my head. I do love the all metal construction and knurling, giving it a quality machined feel and look. cables seem stout, maybe not bulletproof, but more than adequate. They stay in my ears rock solid, which was important as I use them while working, mowing etc.
I am pleased, worth the money to me.

I read the reviews here and various other sites, including some that cater to audiophiles, and after seeing all the praise directed at these earphones, I figured they were a must-have.
The packaging it came in was compact and attractive, as are the phones themselves, but upon giving them an initial listen, I was rather disappointed. Out of the box, they sounded overly bright and somewhat lacking in bass. The clarity was great, but my overall impression was that the highs were overemphasized and the bass, while definitely there, was somewhat flat. It sounded "artificial".
I then let them burn in for 10 hours and had another go. This time, the sound was slightly warmer, the bass was a little better, but the harsh, abrasive highs were still there. The strange thing is that it only does this on certain tracks while others sound absolutely splendid. Bitrate and source do not seem to make any difference as some of the times this happened, I was listening straight from CD's and DVD's.
I'm not sure whether mine are defective or what, but I'm really not impressed. Even my Shure e2's sound better than these on many tracks, even when you consider that these Vibes have better clarity.
Don't get me wrong, these are definitely better than stock earbuds, but they don't sound to me like ~$100 earphones.

**EDIT**

It's been about a month now since I wrote the preceding, and I must say that my opinion on these earphones has changed. It seems that not only did I not let the vibes burn in long enough (the sound continued to change for about a week after opening the package, probably around 40 hours of actual play time) the addition of 3rd party plugs (I wasn't able to get a proper seal with any of the supplied plugs) seems to have changed the sound for the better. The harsh brightness is now gone altogether, and has been replaced with a pleasantly warm sound.
The bass is plentiful, even a little heavy, though not boomy... the mids are clear and vibrant, and the highs, while a little short on extension, are fairly crisp. Overall, the sound is warm and "fun".
If I were to rate these purely on sound quality for the price, I wouldn't hesitate to rate them 5/5. However, there are a couple of problems that need to be mentioned.
First, these do not offer much in terms of noise cancelation. They offer slightly better isolation than stock iPod earbuds, but not by much. If I pause the music while leaving the plugs in, I can hold a conversation easily.
The other major drawback to these vibes is their design. While the "chrome" plug looks nice, it is not very functional. I had to pull on the wire to unplug the phones because my fingers would slide right off of the "chrome". I have solved this by wrapping mine in electrical tape, but now it looks rather tacky. Still, I would rather have them look tacky than to eventually pull the wiring loose, although I'm fairly sure that v-moda would replace them within the warranty period without hassle. Which reminds me... after posting my initial review, I recieved an email from Val Kolton. For those of you who don't know, Val Kolton is the founder and CEO of v-moda. Now that's customer service!
In conclusion, I am generally pleased with the v-moda vibes, and wouldn't hesitate to recommend them, as they really are a good value. They aren't perfect, but for less than $100, they're pretty darn good.

I would rate them now as 4/5.

The great looks of these earbuds is what caught my attention, but it's sound that counts. I already own Apple's In-Ear buds, Shure's E2C, and some Grado SR 60s. I was looking for new earbuds that would provide a bit more bass than the Shures do. (They have an almost pathologically flat response which I guess I'm supposed to crave, but the E2Cs just end up sounding a little thin.) The Vibes I just received from an Amazon partner are making a great first impression. They do indeed have a more "rounded" sound than my previous buds. The bass is not overly emphasized but it certainly is present to a pleasant degree. The rest of the sound spectrum has nice balance leaving voices and cello notes "forward" and clear. These buds do NOT block noise like my Shure's do; the bud itself must let more environmental sound through since the seal in my ear canal seems just as secure as the E2Cs. I'm actually enjoying the not-quite isolated feel of the Vibes. The soft rubber ear inserts are a bit too soft to my liking. I have the Shure firmer ear tips on the Vibes as I write this because they feel more secure in my ears. Beyond my own peculiar ear anatomy, I really like these Vibes!

Edit (one week later): I'm discovering that these sound best NOT jammed way in my ears like the Shure line-up. I've switched back to the ear inserts that came with the Vibes and am finding them very comfortable. These wouldn't stay in during exercise, but hanging out as I use them, they're good.

I'll concur with most of the positive reviews already posted about these earbuds. They sound great, look nice, have a good cord length, and seem solidly built. There are a few things to point out about them.

1: They do require some break-in. I let mine play for about 8 hours (overnight) before I started using them for myself. That seemed to improve bass response, and overall smoothness. They improved even more over the following week.

2: If you've not worn "in-ear monitors" before, you have to make sure you're wearing them properly. A good fit with the sleeves, and making sure they're at the correct depth in your ear canal is essential to good sound. I can only assume that those complaining of poor bass response have not had a good fit. You can even experiment with using different sized sleeves on each side. I've found that my left and right ear canals have a significantly different shape to them.

3: I've not had any trouble with the plug being hard to grasp, but I do have a mild concern about the way the cord exits the plug. There is no strain relief on the cord at this point, so with rough treatment, the cord could become damaged.

4: I wish that there were clearer markings for left and right. The laser etching on the side of the unit is almost impossible to see. I used a red Sharpie to make a mark on the right bud, underneath the silicone sleeve. This is subtly visible through the sleeve, and is all I need to be able to tell which side is which.

5: The gold bag is not exactly "manly". I'm using a Griffin bag that came with a set of EarJams. This bag is smaller, and not so obnoxious.

I'm no audiophile, so I'll stick to the basics.

I live in New York and deal with a lot of street noise. The Vibes don't isolate noise as much as other phones. I have a set of Koss "The Plug" headphones, and a set of Sony MDR-EX81LP over-the-ear phones, and both are better at isolating than the Vibe. Both of those are also annoying to have in my ear for very long (apparently, I have small ear canals), and The Plug phones would *never* stay in my ears, even after I reversed the foam tips.

The Vibe is very small. It fits well in my ear with the smallest tips, and doesn't put unnecessary pressure on my canals. They don't feel like they're going to fall out and they can take a good tug, unlike the Koss or Sonys (the Sonys have an over-the-ear hook, so they wouldn't fall off, but they'd still pop out of my ear canal when the cord got pulled).

The Vibes are very light. Their low mass makes them more comfortable and less likely to fall out. I wouldn't say you can forget they're in, but you only know it because of the pressure on your ear canals, not the extra weight.

The Vibe also has low impedance (13 ohms, I think). That means low-power devices like my 5.5 Generation iPod or even my girlfriend's iPod shuffle have no problem driving them. The low impedance coupled with the moderate isolation means I get enough volume out of these things without having my iPod cranked up to "blast", like I would have to do with the Sonys or the Apple phones. More specifically, I can listen to them at 30-40% volume and it's loud/isolated enough to drown out the train noise on the subway platform or the crazies yapping on the train.

The moderate isolation is also good for walking in the city. I can still hear a bit when cars are coming, and when I turn the iPod off, I can hear "through" them, so I don't need to pull them out to talk to people or walk around.

Speaking of taking them out, they're much easier to get in and out than the Koss or Sonys. They're not as easy as, say the factory Apple iPod In-Ear Headphones, but they also stay in my ears, which the Apples don't even stand a chance at. There's no ear-pulling routine necessary, as I had to do with the Sonys, and the silicone tips don't require compression like the foam tips on the Koss.

At work, they're good for listening to music at my desk and isolating general office noise without leaving me deaf to what's going on. Again, I can shut them off to listen if I need to, or to answer the phone. They're small enough that I can put the phone to my ear without taking them out. And when I need to take them out for whatever reason, it's not a chore.

If you're thinking about which color to get, remember they're TINY, so it doesn't really matter that much. I was worried the chrome would be blindingly bright and flashy, but they're so small that there's not enough chrome there to make them look tacky.

And my non-expert opinion on the sound: they're great for what I listen to. The bass is plenty for most purposes. The only place I miss it is in electronic music, but I find that setting my iPod EQ to "Hip-Hop" is a good compromise to get the bass out of them without killing the rest of the frequency range. Very happy with them - will update if anything changes.

I really like these headphones, they are comfortable and the sound range is very impressive. I owned, and returned, the Bose in ear phones. I found them much to heavy on the bass and the little covers kept falling off and getting lost. The quality of these is far superior, probably the Bose are over rated and should be selling for $40-50. Putting them up against the Shure Ec2, again the sound quality and comfort was much better on the Vibe. I personally did not like the comfort of the shure ones, an acquired taste I guess. When I put these up against the Shure Ec3 then the battle royal began, however comfort and the fact that these are $80 cheaper won out. Match for match the 3's were on par with the Vibes but who wants to spend $180 when you can pay $99 for the same thing.

Very impressed, and feel that I got what I was looking and listening for.