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Aftershokz headphones?
Has anyone tried Aftershokz headphones? If you've entered the Yorshire Marathon you can get £10 off a pair and just been looking at them, they're not cheap in the first place (£50 - £90!!!) but I'm actually quite interested.
'Unlike conventional headphones and earbuds that use the eardrums to transmit sound, Aftershokz headphones sit comfortably in front of the ear and utilize bone conduction technology to deliver stereophonic sound through the listener’s cheekbones to the inner ear. This enables anyone participating in an activity – jogging, biking, skateboarding, hiking, gaming – to stay connected to both what they are listening to and the outside world.'
Just wondering if anyone had any thoughts on them. I happily go running without music on my weekend long runs as I can run out to somewhere nice. But during the week I'm stuck doing my shorter runs around where I live (which is in the city centre) and sometimes it can feel like a slog with all the roads and busy traffic etc. I've tried running with headphones in but my spatial awareness is all off when I can't hear anything. Thinking these might be quite good but even with a slight discount it's a fair bit of money to part with!
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Comments
They have solid reviews, been thinking about picking some up for cycling. That said, I have no problem hearing people, traffic or anything else with regular earbuds. If you genuinely can't hear anything with regular earphones in and of course the volume isn't maxed out or anything, you should definitely consider a checkup for your hearing. There's just no way regular earphones are capable of blocking out sound to such an extent. You have to pay good money to find some that have a decent level of noise cancellation and are light enough to run with (and most I've tried don't live up to the hype).
Had a quick look at hearing loss statistics, seems they reckon 1 in 6 are affected by hearing loss, so it's not far fetched.
Not the most exhaustive test in the world, but I tried them at a marathon expo - I really wanted to like them, and they work better than you might think, but I found the sound quality to be really poor, especially at louder volumes. The sound just became an annoying vibration, and I really didn't like them at all.
I use the Monster i-sport headphones, the cheapest ones (Strive?), which aren't really isolating and you can hear a fair bit of what's going on around you, with really good sound quality. Cheaper, too.
I gave them a try at Brighton Marathon expo as I'm always on the lookout for something that will work with my hearing aids (I'm one of those 1 in 6 people with a hearing loss).
Unfortunately they weren't suitable as I still missed out on some of the frequencies. I'm back to my trusty, but not great quality, 'ear hooks'.
If anyone has any concerns about their hearing I'd definitely recommend going to your GP about it as hearing aids make such a difference in all aspects of life.
I have been using aftershokz for the last year and while I can say they are clever and produce a relatively good sound for the technology, the battery life is around 30% of the advertised 8 hours and this really grinds my gears!
I've never had more than 2.5 hours use from full battery.