Beats -_-

[Guest]

Is there any proof of that claim?

 

Yes. http://seanolive.blogspot.com/2008/12/loudspeaker-preferences-of-trained.html

[linuxfan66]

I can tell you what we do know the average joes often prefer louder and more bass with less dynamic range over higher quality. Its why pop music is mixed like it is.

Also i do no believe most trained listeners who claim they can tell the difference under many circumstances because if you believe something is better you will be biased towards that and it wiil have an effect. case in point pono showing you a blue light when in top quality music file that blue light means you will be biased towards that tracked being better even if it isnt..

Third there is has been multiple scientific studies showing above certian quality marker(obviously good quality stuff) equipment is impossible to tell apart without actually telling the listeners what it is...

 

EDIT: as you can tell i dont like nonsense pono is selling people....

[mushies1337]

My cousin and I argue and argue over what's a good headset. He says Beats Studio at $380 are the best. He put some on at a Best Buy and when I tried telling him he was wasting his money on some overpriced headsets he yelled "sorry can't hear you over this quality" Can you find 5 headsets at $200 or cheaper with just as good or better quality? I did and he still don't believe me lol. He says everyone has them and they are expensive so they have to be good..

my new IE80s probably sound better than Beats lol

[Guest]

I can tell you what we do know the average joes often prefer louder and more bass with less dynamic range over higher quality. Its why pop music is mixed like it is.

Also i do no believe most trained listeners who claim they can tell the difference under many circumstances because if you believe something is better you will be biased towards that and it wiil have an effect. case in point pono showing you a blue light when in top quality music file that blue light means you will be biased towards that tracked being better even if it isnt..

Third there is has been multiple scientific studies showing above certian quality marker(obviously good quality stuff) equipment is impossible to tell apart without actually telling the listeners what it is...

 

EDIT: as you can tell i dont like nonsense pono is selling people....

 

I agree completely about the pono, but the study I linked was done blind; and what they found was that under those circumstances there wasn't that difference between untrained listeners preferring more bass, et cetera. I think the preference for more bass is just as much a product of marketing and sighted listening as "trained" audiophile reviews. Low quality headphones sound shit, so they need that boosted bass to sound acceptable; throw in some celebrity rapper branding and the rest is history.

[Eddprzz]

My cousin and I argue and argue over what's a good headset. He says Beats Studio at $380 are the best. He put some on at a Best Buy and when I tried telling him he was wasting his money on some overpriced headsets he yelled "sorry can't hear you over this quality" Can you find 5 headsets at $200 or cheaper with just as good or better quality? I did and he still don't believe me lol. He says everyone has them and they are expensive so they have to be good..

you shouldn't care u must b a kid if he wants to buy himself beats by all means let him

[Pomfinator]

Have him try the Urbanites, their sound is definitely geared towards the Beats crowd, and they're infinitely better build.

[Timmy-P]

Let him buy them, then take the pair and hold them at eye level. Tell him "If you're paying this much for headphones, they should be able to take a few hits." Then drop them from eye level and watch them shatter.

... I'm joking, I'm joking!

Have him listen to a pair of headphones you have, see if he changes his mind. Also tell him about the brand itself, as pointed out by many others in this thread. You should also debunk his "Price=Quality" argument by explaining said brand argument about where most of the cost comes from, and mentioning value.

[KaminKevCrew]

@SSL: I had a good laugh over some of your comments here, so thanks for that!  

@OP: here are a few that I think are better for the same money, or less:

Sennheiser Momentum

Sennheiser IE80

Sennheiser HD650

Shure SE535

Shure SE425

Shure SE215

Shure SE215 Blue

Westone W4R

 

Oh, and if you want MOAR BASS, then the Sony MDR XB1000. For huge amounts of bass, that's pretty much the be-all-end-all of sub $600 full-size dynamic headphones that I've heard as far as bass quantity goes. 

 

Those are what I can think of, that I've actually listened to, and can vouch for personally. Keep in mind that I have NOT heard the latest version of Beats, and the last ones I heard (and the only ones I was willing to try, briefly) were the original beats studio. You may want to point out that for roughly the same amount of money, he could get the Sennheiser Momentum 2.0, which look great, and are of a significantly higher build quality than beats, and they have a much more balanced, detailed sound.

 

The thing about beats is that if you've never heard anything better, how would you know that anything better exists? These aren't like cars, where you can quantify their abilities with easily understood numbers (e.g. 0-60 times, top speed, what materials make up the car). Headphone quality, to someone that has never heard something superior, is based on heresay, and rumor (at least, that's how it comes across). If you don't know what sounds you're missing in a song, you would never know that they are there. So if you get beats, and you hear a couple of new things, and get huge volume and very little bass, then why would you wish for anything more? You got more than you knew existed, and you paid more money for it. Why would you suspect that you can clearly hear a difference between two things of the same price, especially if it's (probably) the most purchased headphone ever? For most people, the more that people buy something, the better you think it will be.

 

The trouble with most headphones is that it's not easy to distinguish brands. If you see some beats, there is a reasonable assumption that you will be able to identify pretty much anything in their lineup from a distance, because they all look (more or less) the same. With a company like Sennheiser, the different lines look significantly different. The Momentums don't look anything like the Urbanites, I mean, the HD800 and 700 don't even look like any of the other products in the HD line alone!

 

Beats are all about brand recognition, just like apple products are. They are easy to spot, and people can easily make an opinion about you. If you wear gigantic headphones that are not easily recognizable, then people will assume that you are some yahoo wearing ridiculous headphones to stand out. And people generally don't like those that stand out; that's why kids get bullied. Trust me, I've been in that position before, and it's not fun. It makes conforming seem like the right thing to do. That's why people buy beats. They look expensive and they are. If you own beats, people assume that you at least have some modicum of money and that you're willing to pay for things of a higher quality. Whether or not that's true remains to be seen. 

 

...aaaaand this is where my sig. comes in... Sorry!!!

[Guest]

@SSL: I had a good laugh over some of your comments here, so thanks for that!

 

lol, good. I don't think I've ever had that many notifications at once.

[KaminKevCrew]

lol, good. I don't think I've ever had that many notifications at once.

<3 

[flowalex]

I have a pair of monster headphones that I got for really cheap on black Friday mainly for the inline microphone and controls, controls for my 6th gen ipod nano with a broken power button and the mic for when I have a phone call when I am working, I don't really use them much otherwise.