Hi!
Welcome to Lachlan Likes A Thing, a show where I take a thing and see whether or not I like
it.
Now the thing we're looking at in this video is the V-Moda Crossfade M-80 portable headphones.
Now a lot of you have been telling me on the Youtube comments and on the Facebook page
that I really ought to check these headphones out, so finally I got a pair off the Head-Fi
'For Trade' forums.
Now these retail for a recommended retail price of $230 but obviously you can get them
for less - and in this review we're just going to talk firstly about the design and build
quality of the headphones, and then we're going to go into the sound.
Now first off the M-80 has quite a reputation for build quality and that's because they've
apparently been built to a military standard.
So they have a headband that can take a lots of abuse in terms of bending and kind of,
force applied to it.
In terms of materials they have a really nice mix of high quality plastic and a metal headband,
metal faceplate, all up quite a durable, quite a well-built package.
Now maybe this is because my pair is a slightly used pair I found that there is a slight creakiness
that you can actually hear when the headband moves and actually found that sometimes when
I'm listening to music and moving around and I can hear these kind of creaks.
Now these have a two year warranty so what I'm going to do after this review is I'm going
to drop a line with V-Moda and see if this kind of thing is covered under the warranty
and if there's any updates I will update the description of this video to reflect how this
warranty process goes.
Now in terms of comfort I think these headphones are quite a comfortable pair of headphones.
One thing is that in terms of clamping force, they aren't very tight in terms of clamping
force, so on the one hand they're quite comfortable, on the other hand though, they actually don't
feel quite as stable on the head as something like the Sennheiser Amperior or the Audio
Technica ES10.
The other thing is that in terms of noise isolation, they are about average - they don't
actually block out a great deal of noise and that might also be because of these bass ports
which are just on the back of the headphone here which will let in some degree of sound.
Now as for the cable, what's really nice is about this cable, you get two cables in the
box, it's a detachable cable, you get one cable with iPhone remote, with a 3 button
iPhone remote, and there's another cable that comes with a one button remote for Android
smartphones.
And what's really clever about both of these cables is that they've put the microphone
module close to your mouth but they've actually put the controls further down the cable where
your hands are, so it's a little easier for you to use the cable.
And the cable is a braided cable it's quite nice, it doesn't tangle very much, and it
terminates in a slightly more than 90 degree angle jack.
So overall this is a well built cable, apparently it's Kevlar reinforced, it's very durable.
Another thing that's worth mentioning about the M80's is that they come with this really
awesome carrying case which fits the headphone perfectly and it stores your extra cables.
One thing I didn't like about this carrying case unfortunately is that you do need to
detach the cable to put it into the carrying case which is kind of a little annoying, and
the other thing is that the headband, just becauseI need to extend it a little further
for my head, I have to readjust the headband each time I put it back into the case, so
that's a little unfortunate.
Now in terms of sound quality the M-80 is a very rich, bassy sounding headphone.
So it's got a real kind of chunky sound to it, the highs are fairly rolled-off, and overall
compared to something like the in-ear pair of headphones, the Shure SE215, this is a
similar sort of equivalent in the portable headphone world.
The S - sorry the M80 definitely sounds bassier and kind of richer in sound than something
like the Sennheiser Amperior, so it's much less agreessive, and it's got a signature
that works especially well in noisy environments or when you're travelling because it won't
get too aggressive in sound even if you turn up the volume quite high.
So all in all, it's quite a nice signature.
Now if I were to nitpick about the sound, because overall it's quite a good, robust
sound, if I had to nitpick, one thing is that the bass is that the bass is slightly thumpy
and slightly slow in character.
So it doesn't have the laser kind of slam that the amperior has.
And in terms of clarity of sound, in terms of soundstaging, it's not quite as clean as
the Amperior and it's not quite as clean or as spacious as something like the Audio Technica
ES10.
Now obviously this is a cheaper headphone than the Audio Technica ES10 and it's about
the same price as the Sennheiser Amperior because that's going on clearance at the moment
so again if you can find the Sennheiser Amperior for a similar price that I paid for mine,
which is about $160, that's the portable headphone that I would recommend.
If you can't find it for that price I do think that the V-Moda is a very competitive headphone
especially if you are looking for a bassier sound, and I'm very happy to put it on my
recommended list of portable headphones just because it's a well thought out package, it's
a nicely built portable headphone with a really agreeable sound, especially good for kind
of modern studio recordings.
If you listen to classical or maybe more kind of jazz or that kind of thing you might find
that this headphone is a bit muffled, maybe not to your taste, so have a listen to it,
if you are a bit more of a all-rounder I would recommend something like the Audio Technica
ES700, or perhaps the Sennheiser Momentum.
Anyway thanks for watching this review, I hope it's helped you.
You can talk to me on Twitter @lachlikesathing or on Facebook at facebook.com/lachlanlikesathing.
Thanks to everyone who's liked my other videos and subscribed to my channel, and happy listening!