These headphones cost 1.95 with free shipping from Amazon with a Prime account.
Link to Amazon (edit: I guess Amazon no longer sells them themselves) I got them to use the headband for a DIY fixup of a vintage phone. But I figured I should write a review since they're so darn cheap.
Packaging They come in a plastic bubble like thing. The plastic seems relatively sturdy and protected the phones well. It is also see through, which is nice so you can see all the glory of the product enclosed. There was also some cardboard inside. Regular cardboard, nothing special. The graphics printed on it were a little dated and lacked the color and creative vision that might have grabbed me and made me more excited about the purchase.
Build Quality They feature a metal headband strap, which seems strong enough to do the job. They're probably more durable than Beats and Bose from what I've read, I don't think they'd break even if you went Tyll Hertsens™ on them. The plastic is cheap and makes very unpleasant high pitched "tip, tip" noises when you hit them with your fingernails, instead of the deeper "tap, tap" you would expect to hear from a quality plastic. It was easy to break the plastic arm next to the metal headband to remove this metal strap for my project, so these aren't a good choice for your angry 5 year old kids. Only if they know their manners. The good thing is they cost less than 2 dollars.
Looks They look like super crappy headphones. Which is kind of charming in that "I don't give a dam" grunge kind of way. They'd go well with your sister's old beat up jeans and too small hoody. And
Comfort They're really light so that's nice, but the angle of the (fixed) earcup/baffle is straight vertical if not angled out the wrong way, so it only makes contact with my ears on the top of the baffle, and then the rest angles away from my ear, so that there is a gap of a finger's width at the bottom end (where the cable comes out). This causes some unnecessary pressure on this contact point up top because the weight isn't well distributed. It also negatively effects the sound.
Sound The most important thing when buying 2 dollar headphones is how they sound. They sound exactly like you would expect 2 dollar headphones to sound although they do have some pleasant surprises. They're not very harsh, there are a lot of very expensive audiophile headphones which exhibit much more harshness. These are fairly smooth except for a peak of some sort in the upper midrange, but it's not bad. The overall frequency response is a mountain shape (upside down V) which starts at 80hz or higher and climbs slowly upward until it peaks in the upper midrange and then starts it's decline, extending to 10khz or something probably. Coby does not publish FR range specs on their website for obvious reasons. I doubt they are flat in the upper midrange very long, most frequencies are quieter than the upper mids, they are not even flat throughout the whole vocal range. Lower mids are recessed as they begin
The Great Rolloff. They also suffer from overall SQ because of the way they fit hanging away from my ears, this gap contributes to the upper midrange peak, lack of any bass whatsoever and lack of richness and warmth.
They are also fairly resonant. They kind of sound like the drivers were installed backwards and everything is bouncing off the curved plastic enclosure before getting to you.
Treble The treble sounds like it is being filtered through a thick paper wall. It is extremely veiled, thick, really grainy, and for the most part nonexistent. There is a complete lack of air and precision. Cymbals sound like they are miniaturized and made of soft plastic or some kind of hard papery substance. There's no simmer or sizzle at all. I get the feeling that I may be missing entire instruments that exist in the treble regions. Like bells and things.
Midrange The midrange also sounds like it is coming from behind something. It is muffled and tends to get smeared into other instruments. Listening to Led Zeppelin, his voice sounds like he's singing right next to the electric guitar sometimes so that the two sounds blend together a bit. It has some characteristics of natural tone, it has some warmth and it's not terribly shrill with male vocals, though it tends to be a bit shrill with female vocals. Lhasa De Sala's voice sounds a lot smaller and less rich than it should. There is a sense that you're getting a little piece of the vocal range, with the top and bottom cut off, as if the vocalist is singing through a little slot in a wall that only lets the middle bit of vocal frequencies through. But vocals do have a degree of naturalness to them, and they do manage to portray some of the breathy qualities of vocals. I think the tone could be worse, it depends on the album. Daniel Lanois' voice is portrayed much better than Lhasa's voice and is acceptable. But overall it leaves a lot to be desired and after listening for an extended period of time, the amount of broad resonance in the midrange becomes quite fatiguing and I get a callaustraphobic feeling, like I want to get out of this tiny resonant chamber my head is trapped inside. The resonant notes in the upper midrange in this song are much more echoey and resonant than they should be, as the Coby's add their own resonance to the reverb in the recording.
Bass The bass isn't part of the picture with these phones. Bass guitar can hardly be heard. If you had a recording of a hundred elephants farting in unison in a big gymnasium, I think through these headphones it would come across like a squirrel fart high up in a tree. When I switch to my Yamaha orthos I realize that there are entire bass notes which do not exist on the Coby's. It is able to portray a kind of a "puff puff" type sound with bass drum hits and some bass guitar notes, but it's more of a generic impact, and not discernible as a particular note or instrument. It sounds like a baby banging on a small Fischer price version of the real thing. Listening to Daniel Lanois' album "Shine", whose first song has a very deep bass note, the Coby's do actually capture the upper end of this note, which is surprising. But it sounds strange, it has a different tone then it should, it again sounds like some kind of kids toy- a toy bass guitar that makes sounds when you push big plastic buttons. There are further bass notes in this song where the Coby's capture the upper parts of certain bass notes, but the lower notes in the melody are non existent or fade as they go deeper.
Separation and Imaging Separation and imaging are decent for the price. Some parts of
the frequency range have some issues where notes get blended together, namely the heart of the midrange and lower midrange to the "bass", which is effectively all this headphone produces. But there's a degree of separation and imaging in the upper midrange and treble. I can clearly hear cymbals here and a vocalist somewhere else. Imaging is better when there isn't too much going on at once. When 2 notes occupy similar frequency ranges on the same channel (left/right) they get blended together and tend to occupy the same position in the soundscape, which can be so bad that is damages the integrity of each instrument.
Soundstage Horrible. It's not just inside my head, it's inside of the inside of my head. Like I had headphones implanted an inch inside my head from each side, and these implanted headphones have tiny soundstage. Some of the treble manages to get outside my ears a bit, but the vocals dive deep inside my eardrums with all their resonant fury and I desperately want to get them out.
Sensitivity Good, not great. I have the volume on my ipod at 70% or so. for their size, they should be more sensitive I think.
Conclusion Save up for the KSC-75. Don't buy these unless you want some crap earphones to toss around. Not bad for 2 dollars to be honest. But they have horrible extension on both ends, cutting off entire instruments in the bass and treble, with a mildly peaky but fairly smooth, resonant midrange that isn't entirely natural sounding. A very narrow band of the midrange is the best, or shall I say, only functioning aspect of this headphone, which while resonant isn't terribly offensive. But if a voice doesn't occupy this narrow band it's not a super fun time. They have poor comfort and severe durability issues.
I think their saving grace is the lack of harshness which honestly makes them more listenable than many expensive headphones simply due to lack of pain, and which means I'd be comfortable with a kid using these, as I don't think they'd damage his/her ears. I would be a bit afraid of the unnatural, resonant midrange damaging his/her brain, however, and I wouldn't want my kid's brain to be developing under these circumstances for fear they may not develop proper perception, or they might just go crazy altogether.
My Macbook Pro laptop's built in speakers are better in every way including bass response, if that tells you anything. They have a more natural midrange and more extension on both ends. Well, not sure about the bass it's a toss up.
