[Updated 20 February]They are dead
I lost the right bud, I had my Ipod in my jeans pocket, and the buds in my coat pocket. I placed the coat on the rack, and felt the tug as I walked away. When I tried them again, there was no sound from the right bud. Twenty three days from purchase to junk.

Inexpensive earphones. Cheap enough to lose, crappy sound quality, dubious build quality. The problems are numerous, but for the masses of us that do not wish to drop close to U$100 on a device that is easily misplaced or broken ... this is our lot.

I had a run of bad luck, my old sub U$20 Sony headphones and my iPod Nano headphones broke within a few weeks of each other. On the prowl for new hardware, I came across the JBL Reference 210 headphones on the clearance table, on sale for U$7. Given JBL's reputation, the included airplane attachments and the really low price, I bought them.


What you get
Unpacking my U$7 earphones, there was a pair of bud type headphones, the airplane adapter, two pairs of covers for the buds, a hard plastic carrying case and a user manual. I would like to say that you are unlikely to need the manual, the buds are not that complicated. The design of the ear buds is unimpressive, they remind me of a pair of freebies handed out by Jet Blue airlines - an airline that flies so low you can see the ground. Quite unimpressive, but a more positive person can claim they have an understated cool - to be honest they do not have any garish colours, which is a very good thing. The JBL Reference 210 has a volume control attached to the leads, it does its job, but I don't see it as a must have or even beneficial feature, if I had the choice, I would've chosen over the ear hooks. I like hooks because I can drape them over my chain, so I don't have to worry about them dragging on the ground. The 210's lead is short, it is listed at about 3'9" ... so maybe if I were taller that wouldn't be an issue. At the end is an L-shaped connector - always a good feature. Aside from the short cable, the other complaint is the shape of the buds, it does not make it easy to get the covers on, but it does allow them to come off easily. I have torn one, and lost another, and since I also lost the carrying case I am going without. This desolation occurred after less than one week of ownership.

What you hear
I expected my U$7 ear buds to sound like the U$40 that JBL listed them for, I expected them to sound better than my two prior headphones. But they don't. The sound is okay, it is clear, maybe somewhat anemic with respect to the bass.

This brings us to a bigger issue ... Selling out. Someone at JBL thought that it was a good idea to extend their market reach by competing in the U$20-40 price range. Unfortunately, they did not decide to make a good quality earphone and sell it at the lower price point, rather they decided to stick their name on rubbish. The result, is a tarnished reputation as this audio company is outperformed by the folks at Apple. I hope it was worth the money.

So where were we, anemic bass, the quality of reproduction is good, and the volume is high enough for you to continue damaging your ears...overall the sound is okay. And with headphones the most important thing is the quality of the sound, and JBL did not quite manage to mess this up. Do you think JBL actually engineered this headphone, that they gave it as much care as they would give the A30000GTI ? If this is a rebadged product then the quality is okay, if it is not then it is disappointing.

At U$7 this a good pair of headphones, at U$14 it is decent and at U$40 you were robbed. As a group, value headphones are not worthy of recommendations, when they elicit strong feelings they are usually negative. Even within this modest group the JBL 210 is not impressive, I think my Sony's were better and they listed for less than U$40.

Recommended: No