Skip to main content

V-Moda’s new Lightning to headphone cable has a premium DAC and amp, but it costs $101

By

V-Moda has come out with a new Lightning to 3.5mm cable that costs $101. This might seem like yet another expensive penalty for Apple’s decision to remove the audio jack from its iPhones, but the price is on par with other companies’ Lightning to 3.5mm cables, like Master & Dynamic’s for $69 and Shure’s for $100. Belkin offers one at the low end for $35, but it lacks some of the technical advantages that V-Moda says it’s offering.

Bundled within the 17.5-gram cable is a 24-bit digital-to-analog converter (DAC), a headphone amp with 31mW of power, and a three-button control with a microphone for using Siri voice, navigating through music, making calls, and more. V-Moda says it will work with “most brands” of headphones with detachable 3.5mm ports, including models from Beats, Philips, Hyper X, Audio Technica, and more. The cable is 53 inches long (nearly 4.5 feet), and it comes with a one-year warranty. Beyond that window, V-Moda also has an “Immortal Life Program” with no expiry date, entitling you to 50 percent off a replacement if your cable ever dies.

All of these cables are being ushered in because when Apple got rid the audio jack on the iPhone, it also got rid the digital-to-analog converter. DACs now have to be located in dongles, cables, or headphones. Apple’s $9 Lightning to 3.5mm dongle does contain a DAC and amp, according to iFixit, but V-Moda’s cable is a way to skip the dongle life and get components that, knowing V-Moda, are likely to produce great audio.

Is it worth the big price jump to upgrade from V-Moda’s regular cable (or any other) and Apple’s Lightning to 3.5mm dongle to V-Moda’s new all-in-one offering? Well, that’s up to you. Is the convenience of plugging straight in and not worrying about losing dongles a priority?

But no matter if you stick to cheaper options and live the dongle life or decide to bite the bullet on a $100 cable, one thing is certain: the future of headphone cables looks expensive.



from The Verge - Teches https://ift.tt/2rbIKMa
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Firefox is testing features that let you customize colors and view two tabs in one

By
Mozilla Firefox is testing out two new experimental extensions that let users further customize their browser and view tabs together more easily. The first one is called Firefox Color and it lets you change the colors of the background, text, icons, and the toolbar. Whatever you change can be saved and you can also choose to share your color schemes with others. Firefox also has a selection of pre-made color themes that you can choose from if you don’t want to customize every single color yourself. The second feature that Firefox is testing is called Side View and it does basically what it sounds like: you can view two browser tabs at once in the same tab and window. Without the feature, you can already line up two windows side by... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/2LZWa7h
Post a Comment
Read more

How to install Fortnite on Android

By
Epic Games launched its battle royale hit Fortnite on Android devices last week with a big catch: it was exclusive to Samsung-made phones for a few days as a way to help market the new Samsung Galaxy Note 9. Now, the exclusivity period appears to be over, and beta invite codes are going out to select users of non-Samsung phones like the Google Pixel 2 XL. If you’re itching to dive off the battle bus on mobile, you might have to hold on just a little while longer: there appears to be a waiting list, just like there was when the game launched on iOS. There’s also a bit of trickiness involving exactly how you get the app because Epic announced it would be distributing the Android version of Fortnite on its own terms . Last week, the app was distributed through Samsung’s app store, and Epic is using its own website and a Fortnite Installer program to distribute the game more widely on all compatible Android devices. (Epic CEO Tim Sweeney said this is basically to avoid paying Google...
Post a Comment
Read more