This JBud's For You (JBuds Noise-Reducing Earbuds)
Written: Aug 25 '08 (Updated Aug 25 '08)
Product Rating:
Pros: Good noise reduction and sound quality, great value.
Cons: Cord is too long, and I'd prefer asymmetric wires from earbuds.
The Bottom Line: For the price, these earbuds have done a good job of reducing bus noise and letting me enjoy my commute. The cord's not great, everything else is good.
lucidlemur's Full Review: JLab Audio Europe JBuds Consumer Headphones
For about two years I've been using a pair of Panasonic noise-reducing earbuds to cut down on ambient noise during my bus commute. They worked very well, but eventually the sound stopped coming through in one ear.
Rather than buy a new pair, I thought I could get by with one of the half-dozen pairs of free earbuds I've accumulated over the years. I went through all of them and there was only one pair that stayed in my ears, so I figured I'd give them a try. (Do free earbuds work for other people? I don't think I have weird ears, but I swear the other pairs were practically jumping out of my ears -- I barely had to move my head and they were gone.)
Anyway, I rode the bus downtown using my free earbuds . . . and as soon as I got off I ran to a computer to order another noise-cancelling pair. I hadn't realized how much noise I had been filtering out with the Panasonics, and how hard it was to listen to anything without them. Instead of pleasant music, I sat through 40 minutes of traffic noise and really unnecessary details about other peoples' personal lives. I kept turning up the music, but it couldn't drown everything out! I have pretty sensitive ears, and at the end of the ride they actually hurt. I think I'd like to keep my hearing, so I'll stick with noise reduction, thank you. Unfortunately, I couldn't find my old Panasonic model anywhere, and at $40 the newer models were a bit expensive for me. I settled on the JBuds when I saw they were $20.
My earbud use
I'm not a major audiophile, so don't count on me to notice the fine points of music quality. I usually use earbuds with my Olympus digital voice recorder, which also stores music. If I'm exercising or cleaning, I have my little Coby mp3 player loaded with motivating songs. I'd say about two-thirds of the time I'll be listening to lectures I've recorded or NPR downloads, and the rest is music. This makes audibility particularly important: it's more of a challenge to distinguish spoken words (especially technical terms) than to hear music, since it's easy to get the general idea of a song's tune and its beat, at least in my experience.
Product Specifications
The JBuds are available in white, black and pink. They come with three pairs of different-sized silicone covers so you can fit them to your ears. They also have a one-year limited warranty (two years in Europe and Asia [huh?]). I considered purchasing the $9 travel case to keep the cord from getting tangled, but decided not to. Just so you know, it is available.
Technical specs:
Audio Jack: Stereo 3.5 mm 18k gold plated
Magnet: 10mm Japanese cobalt magnet
Impedance: 16 ohm +/- 10%
Frequency Response: 20Hz-20kHz
Power Handling Capacity: 60mW
Sensitivity: 102 dB
Fit, Comfort and Design
The JBuds came with the medium covers on, so I tried those first. They seemed okay, but a slight tug on the cord made them fall out, so I went to the small size. Those stayed in better, but the small covers enabled them to push farther into my ears and I could feel the hard plastic earbuds sometimes. Right now I'm using the mediums again, and I think I've figured out a way to twist them while putting them in so they form a seal and fit more securely.
My one problem with the design of the JBuds is that the cords from the left and right earbud are the same length. My Panasonics have a longer cord on the right, so you can put the cord behind your neck and it hangs correctly. With the JBuds' short cords of equal length, you have to have everything in front. Not a huge deal, but I would have preferred it otherwise.
One major improvement over the Panasonics is that the JBuds have a long enough cord to reach an mp3 player attached to my waist. For some reason my old cord was way too short and I always had to use an armband. However, the JBuds cord is about five feet long: when I put the earbuds in it hangs down to my calves (I'm 5' 7"). This seems like a weird length to me, and the cord gets in the way so I had to bundle up part of it with a twist tie.
Noise Reduction: My Experience and Tests
My first impression was that these earbuds worked well, but not as well as my old Panasonics. While in a quiet environment, I have to turn the volume level on my Olympus recorder all the way down to level 1 in order for it to be comfortable (it can go up to level 30). On the bus, I usually need it at about level 3. Clearly, they transmit sound very well.
I was curious if I could quantify how well these earbuds work, so I came up with a test: I went to a website (http://www.phys.unsw.edu.au/jw/hearing.html) and took a hearing test that records how well you hear different frequencies. You're supposed to take the test using headphones plugged into your computer, but I took it using speakers instead. Then I took it again wearing the JBuds, and then for good measure again with my old Panasonic earbuds. (At the end of this all, my ears hurt and my dog was going crazy. Hopefully the information is worth it to someone!)
The website I used, from the University of New South Wales, states that most people hear best in the 1-4 kHz range. From my experience with this test I'd call this "normal-to-high-pitched." (If you want to compare, I tried to replicate the 1 kHz sound from the test on my Yamaha keyboard and found it to be about 2 octaves above middle C.) I know I've read that sensitivity to high-frequency noises decreases with age, and in fact this site says "Your children may be complaining about that 16 kHz tone that you cannot hear." Evidently, at age 25, I retain some of this childhood sensitivity, since my "hearing curve" shows that I hear high frequencies very well. This may explain why I'm so bothered by loud noise!
Other than that, my hearing curve looked pretty normal. After I took the test with the JBuds, though, the curve looked quite different. It turned out that the headphones had hardly any effect on the 1-2 kHz range, but drastically reduced my ability to hear very high and very low frequencies. The low frequencies especially were almost inaudible. This is great, and explains why these earbuds are so helpful at filtering that low bus rumble sound and some of that awful noise of squealing bus brakes. The fact that they admit sound in the middle range is probably so you can still hear people talking to you.
I should note that, alas, my old Panasonic headphones were even better. Although the hearing test goes all the way down to 30 Hz, I couldn't hear anything at all below 125 Hz with the Panasonics. They also cut out the very high-frequency noise much better.
Price, Availability and Recommendations
These currently sell for $19.95 on Amazon and elsewhere, and appear very popular and widely available. I like to buy from Amazon because of the free shipping and returns, and if their price goes down within 30 days you can contact them and they'll refund you the difference.
The other earbuds I considered purchasing were the aforementioned newer Panasonics for $40 and the Coby CVE92 earbuds for $6.61. I wasn't willing to shell out $40, and the JBuds got slightly better reviews on Amazon (including one person who bought both the JBuds and Coby and recommended paying extra for the JBuds). So I went with the JBuds, not wanting to bargain-hunt myself into buying something I wouldn't be satisfied with.
If noise-reduction isn't particularly important to you, you may want to look at the Coby models, since from what I read they were similar in sound quality but less effective at noise reduction. If, on the other hand, you really want to cut outside noise you may consider the Panasonics. My old pair was great, and the new models seem to be well-reviewed. For a middle-of-the road pair, the JBuds work well, as long as you're prepared to deal with the somewhat annoying cord. I can't deduct many points for that, though, since headphone cords are always difficult.
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