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CES 2013: Sounding Off on Lifestyle Headphones

24.05.13

Headphones are a funny thing. To certain factions of society, they're tools needed for optimal listening pleasure. These folks still want the product to be comfortable, fashionable, and easy to manage. But if the sound quality isn't superb, those elements no longer matter.

Beyond this brand of audio aficionado sits everyone else: the person that wants good sound but doesn't carry the same expectations as an audiophile; the youth that wants something stylish and will accept passable sound quality; and the fanboy who gets off on the license and celebrity tie-ins that are in abundance.

At this year's CES, the audiophile customer still had many vendors vying for his attention. And elsewhere in this issue, Gordon Brockhouse looks at some innovations on that end of the market. But for the "everyone else" demographic, there was a dizzying array of lifestyle headphones to wrap around their heads, and wrap their heads around.

This isn't implying that lifestyle headphones must sacrifice on audio quality in order to be fashionable. In many cases, what we call lifestyle headphones also sound great, too. (And, it's also worth noting, that many audiophile headphones are also quite fashionable.)

Source: Marketnews.ca