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Making Earbuds That Fit (Video)
Decibullz creator Kyle Kirkpatrick talks as fast as an old-time carnival barker and is as enthusiastic about his product as Dr. Ironbeard was about his potions. A lot of people are probably satisfied with $10 earbuds, but it's kind of a cool (more accurately a warm) idea to have earbuds you can heat in your microwave, then shape and reshape as often as you like to fit perfectly in your ears.They're just one of many interesting items on display this year at CES (annoying sound if you click the "CES" link).
I know this is off-topic, but as someone who suffers from 24 hour shrieking in my ears, please be careful with these in-ear buds. If I can prevent just one person from my fate, my work is done.
I must have freak ears. Any ear buds I've tried either fell out after 5 seconds or hurt because they had to be jammed in so as to not fall out after 5 seconds.
You can roll your own custom fit ear buds for about $10 using moldable ear plugs: http://makeprojects.com/Project/Custom+Fit+Earbuds/199/1#.UPAvIKwyAtc. Not perfect, but a lot cheaper than the professional versions. Makes for a much more comfortable in-flight experience.
for example:
http://www.howtogeek.com/57481/how-to-make-custom-silicone-ear-molds-for-your-in-ear-monitors/
I never understood why people were content to drop ~$300 for a PMP every few years but then skimp on headphones which should, in theory, outlast any media player. Man up and get the real thing: http://www.jhaudio.com/ http://ultimateears.logitech.com/ http://www.westone.com/music/
You should always have flashblock or noscript installed, or even better, remove flash from your computer, if it isn't for this then at least that will leave less security holes.
Compared to existing ear-bud moulding services, that require you to visit an audiologist to have moulds of your ear canal made, then send them to the company that produce earplugs with the correct fittings from your headphones:
Pros:
- Cheaper
- No need to visit an Audiologist
Cons:
- Self-fitted, so there's a possibility of Doing It Wrong (if you do not use sufficient caution is putting something you have just heated into your ear)
- Press-fit into your pinnae, so they will not fit as deeply and securely as headphones moulded to your ear canals
- Fitted to your pinnae, not your ear canals, so inferior sound isolation
- Will only function with their proprietary headphones, rather than you supplying your own
You can do this with a 50/50 mix of corn starch and clear silicone. There are several refinements of this idea around the internet, here is one. What works even better IMHO is to use the moulded material to make the plugs stay in your ear, then a foam material (cutoff foam earplugs) on the tips to maintain a tight seal.
Very true. I can read a lot faster than any video can present 'information'. I just skip any video like this one (thank you Adblock/NoScript). I wonder weather the proliferation of video is to keep eyeballs on the site for longer or due to the regurgitated pap that passes for video journalism. But likely due to the horrible reading comprehension and laziness of some people (read key demographic that sells advertising).
It takes a couple of minutes to make ear plugs, or to custom-mould it around ear buds. It's really easy, you will get it right first time, and there's no need to dick around nuking it and trying again. This product fills a market that doesn't exist.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
My local library sells quite decent sounding earbuds for its computer users for a buck. Thats it, one buck. And you know what, they sound quite good to this 50+ neckbeard. I buy a couple at a time, have a drawer filled with backups. I treat them careful so as to not stress the connections, but when they eventually break or get lost, I'm not upset, I grab another pair. Life's too short to be worrying about expensive earbuds, just my 2 cents.
Do not insert head into microwave with earbuds already inserted.
On the advice of our legal staff who also consult on ladders.
Have gnu, will travel.
This looks nice for people who can stand earbuds, but I'd just go for old-school headphones.
Circumcision is child abuse.
It's the other end I have problems with. Why is the ear bud connection to my iPod strong enough to pull the iPod out of my pocket when it gets hung up on something but not strong enough to keep the iPod from popping off and landing in the toilet?
If you follow the directions in the video it will take a minimum of 11 minutes to heat up and mold each ear bud into your ears, plus you need a microwave, a cup, water, spoon, and paper towel. Quite a lengthy undertaking for something that normally takes me 10 seconds and doesn't require any special hardware.
I guess if you go for very long morning runs or bike rides every day this might make sense. Otherwise, it's cool, but very impractical.
I'm pretty sure the molding is done when they don't feel like they're fitting well. In other words, you don't need to mold them before each use, if they're still comfortable to wear.
And this is news, why?
A couple years ago I bought some brand of earbuds that came with multiple foam/rubber covers of different sizes. The smallest size fits best for me than the one-size-fits all buds I've tried because I have freakishly small ear canals.
Awesome. I really enjoy.
Man, I almost wish it would have really been Roblimo posting this.
Sounds like it could be.
I cannot wear earbuds for the same reason someone else has stated. No matter what the brand, they hurt in less than a minute. The same for my blue tooth. Also, I cannot imagine what anyone would want earbuds anyway. The audio quality is deplorable. The drivers are so small and their frequency response is limited. I prefer the over the ear, with the behind the head band. Deeper basses and better audio all together. Don't listen to tinny music that sounds like it's resonating in a soda can.
The time it would take for me to type out your post, at an above average typing speed, would be about the time it takes for me to skip over at least 100 slashdot videos, as it takes only a fraction of a second to go on to the next story, or to scroll past it to the start of the comments. Is it really that big of a deal to you?*
*I apologize if you have some sort of disability that makes you compulsively watch any video, in its entirety, when presented to you.
It looks like they're using "Shapelock" plastic -- this is marvelous stuff. I got 2 kilos of the generic (polycaprolactone plastic beads) a while back, and it's great for all kinds of projects. I haven't used it for earbuds, though.
Don't leave it in your car on a hot day, though... it will melt. (I found that out with the "windshield washer jet cleaner" I made using it.)
It would help your argument profusely to actually state what you find wrong with videos on slashdot, till then it sounds like you're whining / can't deal with change / have a very low bandwidth connection.
Sure. They're poorly produced. They reek of being advertisements. The content is terrible. They're a waste of time and money slashdot could be investing in fixing the performance problems of the site as well as the bugs that have been dragging the site down for years. Videos are strongly disliked by a lot of readers (you can go back to the comments from previous video debacles to see evidence of that claim). They refuse to give us a way to filter them from our feeds.
...have earbuds you can heat in your microwave, then shape and reshape as often as you like to fit perfectly in your ears.
I'm having trouble fitting my head inside my microwave oven...
It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
Let's approach that from the other angle... most slashdot users aren't competent enough to figure out how to block the video: here's one of a thousand methods: NoScript. I do agree though, most of the videos aren't worth watching, so another option is rather than stop publishing videos, stop publishing shitty videos, I can sympathize with that.
How about those of us who don't want to cram shit into our ear canals to listen to music? What happened to good old-fashioned ear buds that just sit in your ears?
Seems like this would make it feasible to mold your own earpieces for mass-produced hearing aid cores. Cheaper (but maybe not as well fitted) hearing aids could be possible.
I disagree with your assessment that "most slashdot users aren't competent enough to figure out how to block the video", if anything they're more likely to know how.
KOSS Sparkplugs just had a memory foam earbud cone. Much like moldable foam earplugs. You just roll/squeeze them between your fingers and it takes several seconds for them to plump back to regular size. Put them in the ear before they plump up and they hold themselves perfectly snug with only VERY slight pressure on the inside of the earhole. Great noise isolation and very comfortable and they were KOSS so they actually had decent sound as well. Nearly all other earbud-type apparati make my ears hurt. Unfortunately they seem to be discontinued, and i've not seen any similar products out there; though mine are still good so i've not spent much time looking.
Anyway: i feel like the memory foam solution is actually better than the semi-permanent moldables from TFA.
jz (Je-Tze)
containing the sub woofer, which could be inserted into an orifice near the solar plexus.
My job requires me to spend a lot of time with stuff in my ears: Headsets, earbuds for music, bluetooth for phone calls... They would always fall out or not isolate well. Then I found out about custom ear molds. You go to an audiologist (same guy who makes hearing aids) and they put this putty like stuff in your ear which hardens after a couple minutes and takes an impression of the ear canal and area just outside your ear. Then you send that impression off to a place that makes custom ear molds and you tell them what device you are going to be attaching it to.
I highly recommend Avery Sound: http://www.averysound.com/.
I have no financial interest in them, I'm just a very sastisfied customer. I have their custom ear molds on my Etymotic ear buds for music, on my Clarity Aloft aviation headset, and on my Jawbone Prime bluetooth headset. Perfect fit, great isolation, and have never once fallen out of my ear due to the way they lock-in by following every curve of the ear.
My only complaints about them might be that I have accidentally pulled the earmolds off my Etymotic earbuds a few times while listening to music because the low surface area of the part of the earbud that sticks into the earmold doesn't leave much to grab onto. But my Jawbone and Aloft are stuck on there very solidly. The Etymotic earmold is also probably the least well fitting of the three although it still fits very good. It's just that if I swallow hard or chew it breaks the airtight seal with the outside (which is what gives the awesome noise isolation coming in and music isolation going out) which causes a popping noise. A very minor thing, really. But that's how good these things are.
I'll never use standard non-molded earbuds again.