Shure SE310-K Headphones

iPhones have a great feature... Actually, they have tons of great features... not the least of of which is, when listening to music through their included earbuds, you can answer a phone call by pressing a button on the earbuds' cable, and have your conversation using the buds' built-in microphone. Hang up by pressing the button again, and you're back to music again. The headphone's button can also be used to pause the phone's iPod.

It's a great feature... but if you want it, you are stuck using the earbuds that came with the iPhone. That is, until Shure came around with their SE series of earphones. With an optional cable available from Apple, Shure's headphones offer the same iPhone functionality as Apple's earbuds, but with better sound, fit and noise isolation.

MODULAR CABLE DESIGN

The feature that sets SE series headphones apart is their very short cable... Only 19" from the tip of the mini-plug to the end of the earbuds. When using the SE's with a regular iPod or other player, you use the included 3-foot extension cable. If you use a tiny player such as an iPod Shuffle or a Nano, you can skip the extension cable and put the player in your shirt pocket, or clip the player to your shirt.

iPhone owners face a special headphone challenge... Their headphone connector is a special four-conductor mini-plug with a very thin body. Most aftermarket headphones will not work with it. And very few aftermarket headphones offer the built-in microphone and mode/pause switch.

Shure has solved that problem by offering the "Shure Music Phone Adaptor for iPhone", a $39 accessory cable that contains a built-in clip-on microphone and a pushbutton. The adaptor cable terminates with the oddball 4-conductor mini-plug required by the iPhone. Use this instead of the regular Shure extension cable, and you've got high-quality headphones for your iPhone.

The adaptor is available for purchase at Apple stores and here:

http://store.apple.com/1-800-MY-APPLE/WebObjects/AppleStore.woa/wa/RSLID?mco=6C04E07A&nplm=TN544LL/A

ABOUT THE HEADPHONES

The SE-310's are in the middle of Shure's SE line, at $249. The lowest cost model is the SE-110 at $119, with the most expensive, the SE-530 listing at a whopping $499. (A hundred bucks more than the iPhone!)

The SE's are in-ear phones. They are made to fit snugly into your ear canal, just like earplugs. Three types of sleeves are included to provide an air-tight seal in a variety of ear-types... a soft foam rubber material, a plasticky material, and cone-shaped rubber "triple flange sleeves" that look a little like a Christmas tree. Each type of cover comes in three sizes.

For me, the soft foam rubber sleeves provide the best seal and the most comfort.

If you have not tried in-ear headphones, this will be a different experience. First, when you insert them, you are essentially deaf to the outside world. These things isolate you from outside noise far more effectively than the most expensive electronic noise-canceling headphones around.

YOU'LL BE SURPRISED AT WHAT YOU HEAR

The SE-310's strong noise isolation and wide frequency response unveil things you may have never heard from your music... and your player. Musical response is smooth, detailed and revealing. You'll likely hear subtleties in your music that have gone unnoticed for years.

But revealing sound reproduction can also be a curse. I was shocked at the level of background hiss my 5G iPod generated... None of my previous headphones had ever reproduced it. The limitations imposed by MP3 compression on music can also rear their ugly heads... Compression artifacts previously masked by lesser headphones are now out in the open.

The other surprise that you will hear are the noises generated by your own body. If you walk around wearing in-ear headphones, you'll hear your body transmitting those steps into your ears. Eating while listening reveals sounds you never thought you were making. Any movement of the headphones' cable will also transmit noise directly into your ears. It's something that takes some getting used to.

Once you get past that, the sound reproduced by these headphones is smooth and musical. Inserting the headphones and getting a good seal is imperative to getting proper bass reproduction from the SE-310's. I do wish that bass reproduction were a little deeper and stronger. For $250, I had higher expectations. I wish I could have compared them to both the more expensive and less expensive Shure models before purchasing.

The SE-310's come with a semi-rigid carrying case.

RECOMMENDATION

Choosing headphones may be one of the most personal decisions in the consumer electronics world. Headphones that sound wonderful in one person's ears may be lackluster in someone else's. Fit is critical. Some people can live with the strange auditory world that is part of in-ear headphones... others will despise it. The decision is made all the more difficult in that there is no store that will let you try out various models before buying.

That aside, The Shure SE-310s do exactly what they set out to do. Their noise isolation is nothing short of amazing. Music reproduction is excellent, except for somewhat tepid bass performance. Add the optional Music Phone Adaptor, and you've got a pair of headphones that give your iPhone full functionality, while maintaining capability to use them with conventional music players. Quality of overall construction and the cables is top-notch.