Sony MDREX85LP/BLK Soft Earbud w/ Soft Clip & Case
See it at Amazon.com for $41.00Average Customer Rating
(4.0 out of 5)
Amazon Customer Reviews
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(5 out of 5)MDR EX 85lp
Unfortunately, the only real way to test different brand earbuds is to buy them and hope you like them. If you don't, then return them. Fortunately, larger companies let you return open packaged items such as earbuds for a full refund (without a reason), so this is what I did.
I tried similarly priced ($100) Shure earbuds, and also the popular Bose ($100) earbuds. Both are quality products, but not as quality as the Sony MDR EX 85lp (which you have to find at an actual Sony store, if not Amazon, which is about half price.)
The Shure brand has a sound disparate towards Treble. Way too much treble. And the Bose have much too much bass for my taste. So much that it overpowers the music itself. If this is what you're looking for then your good to go, but this is not what the music was recorded to sound like. That is a matter of fact.
And then there is the MDR EX90 lp, the slightly older brother of the MDR EX85. The slight difference is that the MDR EX 85 case is made of plastic and the MDR EX90 of metal. The metal housing is supposed to cut vibration, but it is so negligible as to stump a hummingbird. Ok, exaggeration, but I actually tried both and went with the EX85 (with plastic housing) because I thought the sound was a touch touch nicer, but I'm sure it was imagination or the fact that I'd compared them so many times side by side as to not know the difference anymore.
The EX85 and EX90 are nearly identical earbuds, much better than anything else I've heard in the way of earbuds. The sound is so great!
(5 out of 5)An impulse buy that worked out
I was wandering around the Apple store (which has a funny way of making money feel like it is burning a hole in your pocket) and rationalized ::cough:: realized I needed a headset upgrade (as well as one that worked with the iPhone without an adapter). I went to the audio section and looked at a number of headphones. This headphone looked reasonably priced and was the last one in stock (wisdom of crowds at work?) so I went with it. I didn't think the extra expense of noise cancellation on other headsets was worth it as I already preferred in-ear headphones (which do a pretty good attenuation job already).
Well I have to say it was a great purchase. Excellent response across the entire frequency spectrum. Fits comfortably in the ear for a long time. Treble is not too trebley and bass is FULL but not overpowering nor muddled/cheap-sounding (perhaps due to the bottom frequency response spec of 5hz!). Nifty carry case. Can't go wrong with these, as long as they fit comfortably in your non-mutant ears...
(3 out of 5)Fit dependent
I had these phones for about a week before returning them and was lucky the Sony Store took them back.
Sony describes these earphones as a hybrid between the typical earbud (similar to the standard iPod buds) and in-ear phones (or canalphones, similar to the MDR-EX51/71). I am not a fan of bud style phones as I find the fit very fatiguing after a short while and was extremely happy with the fit of my EX51's. I can wear them (the MDR-EX51) forever, which made them a wonderful discovery a couple of years ago.
And while I loved the fit of the 51's, I felt it was time for a sound upgrade - hence the EX85's. Sony describes them as having studio monitor quality, which means equivalent to the sound that engineers hear when creating CD's - or very very good.
So enter the Sony MDR-EX85's. These phones, while comfortable in my ear canal, are sufficiently large that the hard part of earpiece rested against my ear. This after a few minutes was uncomfortable, though not to the extent that normal *buds* are for me. In addition, I did not hear a revelation in sound quality, though I must say I did little a/b comparing of the 85's and the 51's.
Still, considering the apparent lack of a significant sound improvement and questionable (for me anyway) fit the MDR-EX85's were returned. The hunt continues...
(4 out of 5)Great Sound for the Money.
First off I listen to a wide variety of music and have a high end home system that I tend to compare everything to. I have always stayed away from MP3 players as the quality of sound always seemed sub par to the original cd's played on my high end equipment. That is until recently when I purchased an Ipod touch and set of Shure E3cn headphones for my son. Ripping the CD's at 320kbps the sound quality was much better than I had expected. So I picked up a used Ipod 30 gig and ripped my entire cd collection and loaded it up. While the Shur E3Cn's are super nice I wasn't "sure" I wanted to spend the money to get a set for myself and decided to try the Sony EX85LP's. I was extremely surprised at the great sound quality from these mid priced earphones, major improvement over the stock apple headphones. The highs for voice reproduction are very smooth and controlled, the mid range is nice and the bass response is controlled and accurate which is very important. There are no tinty fatiguing highs or boomy uncontrolled cheap sounding bass, just clean smooth accurate music. Wether listening to the latest 3 Days Grace CD or The Eagles Greatest Hits you can listen for hours using these earphones without getting tired or fatigued from them.
Spent some time compairing them to my son's Shure EC3n's I will have to say the Shure's are better, I like the thicker cables and small footprint of the earbuds themselves and they do isolate outside sound better than the Sony's. The Shure seems to be a bit better on the highs the bass is not as prounced as the Sony's but I think the Shure's bass is tighter and more accurate. Overall listening to both sets on different music selections for several hours I found it very hard to justify spending double the money to get the Shure EC3n's over the Sony MDR-EX85LP. Another note is that the Shure EC3n's appear to be more efficient, didn't check the specs but at the same volume the Shure's are lounder than the Sony EX85's. Overall I would say the EC3n's are better but not that much better to justify spending double the money. However if I break the Sony's I may spend the bucks and get a set of Shure's next time.
Overall for the money I would say you would be hard pressed to beat the Sony EX85LP's!
(3 out of 5)Good depending on use
I just received my headphones and after one day of use I'm undecided if I'll keep them or not. Luckily, I bought them from a local retailer and they are returnable. I wore them for several hours at work and found them quite comfortable. I have small ear canals and to my surprise the middle size ear coverings worked well. The problem came at night for their primary intended purpose. I've been listening to relaxation CD's to go to sleep. I put these headphones in thinking this is going to be so much better than my over the head earphones. Unfortunately they hurt as much or worse. The problem is that attached to the part which fits in your ear is a metal part and the wire is attached to that. I'm sure everyone reading this knows what it's called. Sorry, I'm not very technical about this stuff. I don't know if it's functionality is for the headphone sound or for you to put in and pull out of your ear. I found is so uncomfortable laying on my side (and unfortunately that's the only way I can sleep) with that part protruding from my ear. The only way I found some relief was to put my hand under my head so there was some elevation. So, if you don't use them while sleeping, or your a back or stomach sleeper, you can disregard this review as this aspect of discomfort won't affect you.