Audiophiles and normal folk alike have bathed in disgust the past decade or so ever since the MP3 music format gained widespread popularity.

Recurring topics of interest: "What happened to our quality of music?!; MP3s are rubbish!; CDs are hard to find now!; I am NOT paying $1.00 PER MP3 on iTunes!; etc..."

However, since the introduction of the Beats by Dre line of headphones by Dr. Dre and Monster, this decline in our civilization has been somewhat reversed :)

Why? Because these headphones are great, and the masses are finally starting to realize that the same music you blast on your car's crappy stereo as you cruise the freeway at 65 with your windows down is a whole-heck-of-a-lot different than the same song played on a decent set of speakers/headphones in a proper and quiet environment.

Whole new sounds and nuances are discovered, background noise and ambiance are perceivable and endless possibilities present themselves when listening to any type of music on some nice headphones, such as the Beat by Dre (Studio).

It might not be of particular interest to you to be able to estimate the amount of phlem in Lil Wayne's sinus as he rips a raspy cough at the begining of one of his songs, but with headphones like these Dr. Dre beauties, you'll feel like you're in the studio with him and whole new things will pop out at you from songs that you would never even imagine.

These headphones are great, and if you're on this site asking about them, you should probably not even worry about what you read and just go out and buy one. You'll like them.

Sure there's better headphones out there (e.g., even the typical $75 Sony Studio Monitors will equal if not best these Dr. Dre headphones in sound quality when plugged into a proper source--not your laptop of ipad BTW, you need a mixing board or a $20-50 headphone pre-amp to give it enough juice to drive the thing--so don't think for a minute that these are anything special with regards to bass or clarity when you listen to them. Just know that overall, they're pretty darn good and that's enough for me, you, and probably most other people.

Why did I buy these besides the $75 sony headphones I already own? 3 reasons:

1)They're battery powered so you don't need a pre-amp and can plug it straight into your iPhone or Laptop and the batteries will supply the juice to drive the headphones. Batteries last for a long time.

2)They're noise cancelling. This is a lifesaver on a plane, and on my last SwissAir flight, I simply left them turned on but unplugged just to enjoy the noise-cancelling benefits while I slept.

3)They look cool. The Bose and Sony noise cancelling headphones will make you look like a square. These are bright white, shiny black (and a multitude of other colors) and they just look cool and have a similar effect as Apple products-- they're just cool to be around.


That's all I really have to say, and I don't have much negative about the Beats. I listen to Rock and Hip Hop, occasionally some Electronic, and so far they've been great for all! Buy a pair!

We may be stuck with MP3s nowadays, but at least we get to squeeze every last drop of quality out of them and try to enjoy the music as the artist intended. I guess Dr. Dre was right. We've come full circle. Good stuff.

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