Page 6 -- Audio
Audio
Firing up our Foobar2K player and listening to several hundred songs on the CineVibe, I feel like I got a handle on the 'Vibes. Using a wide range of music, from Classical to Metal, from Gospel to Tuvan throat singers, in a variety of formats (uncompressed WAV, FLAC, and MP3), the CineVibe performed surprisingly well. ASUS produce some excellent sound cards, now they put out these? Clearly somebody at ASUS are very into audio quality, and it shows.
In terms of ergonomics, we find the CineVibe merely adequate and could be much better. First is that the cable is microphonic, that is, anything that brushes against or hits the cable, you will hear it. I wish ASUS could manage to minimise this, since it can be very distracting. The second issue is that the headband is tight on the head, and can become uncomfortable after about an hour or so. Then again, I'm used to circum-aural headphones now, so consider this a reviewer slant. The earpads on the CineVibe are actually breathable and don't make the ears sweat like the AKG K701 or the Turtle Beach HPA2 do.
Volume is extremely sensitive, with anything above 9 or 10 in the Windows volume panel being extremely painful, although this seems to be limited to my Vista 64 install. My 64-bit Windows 7 install was just fine.
Lastly, the CineVibe are very isolating. Once they were on my head, I found I could not hear my wife asking me to do the dishes. It was amazing! Jokes aside, the CineVibe do isolate enough to make normal spoken conversation difficult to hear. My wife is great though, she resorted to hand signals and sign language. CineVibe can't isolate that!
James Brown, Mind Power, 320Kbps CBR MP3.
Being less than half as long as the Big Payback LP version, this drastically different song is all about having self discipline and courage not to fall in deep when you ain't got no job and no food. Resisting those temptations is the mind power.
Sound, hey, not bad. Bass heavy, surprisingly clean midrange, but pretty light on the treble. At least they dont sound harsh and nasty like most cheap earbuds and headsets do. The upper midrange (about 2 KHz or so) is a bit louder than neutral, but it brings out reverb, snare drums, and especially cowbell. I'm actually not joking on that: the CineVibe have more cowbell!
The CineVibe do suffer quite a bit higher up in the spectrum. Cymbals especially, around 7 KHz, are very down in level, and anything above 10 or 12 KHz is pretty much inaudible. I suppose it's better to omit than offend in the case of high frequencies. High-end and audiophile grade headphones will not just produce high frequencies, but do a fantastic job of it.
Stereophile Test Disc 2 -- Music Articulation, Bass Decade.
These two tests are geared towards the bass end, the first being a that can point out weak spots in the whole audio chain. It is a much more dramatic test for speakers than for headphones, but if there's something funky with the drivers or DAC's, the music articulation test will show it. The CineVibe is pretty good, not the cleanest I've heard (K701's and Grado SR125 come to mind as being pristine).
The second track is the bass decade. Listening to test tracks is not ideal, of course, since the ears don't behave in the same way that microphones do, ears (and the brain) are more sensitive in certain frequencies. This is the equal-loudness contour, which shows that human ears are adjusted to hear things around the 2 KHz region, things like sticks breaking (is that a tiger behind me?) and crying babies. Well, I'm not listening for loudness, I'm actually listening to how distorted the sound is. Since these are pure sine waves being played, the 'sound' of the headphones are revealed. This is where the CineVibe do better than a lot of closed back headphones: they don't resonate all that bad. This resonation is what colors the sound (among other factors) coming into your ears. It can make everything coming to your ears nasty and harsh, which is why you really want speakers or headphones as non-resonant as possible.
I'm sure you're wondering if there are a 'perfect' headset for music listening and gaming out there for less than $100? I don't think there is such a thing, sadly. There are too many great plain headphones without sans microphone from Grado, Sennheiser, Beyerdynamic, and good old Koss to really make you consider going completely headset over headphones. But, the CineVibe are pretty good for music and gaming. If you are fortunate enough to be able to afford high-end headphones, by all means, get the headphones. But if you don't want to bother switching headphones for your headset, then the CineVibe will probably be the best choice.
