With the IDR650m earphones, Scosche is trying to tempt all you iPhone, iPod Touch and iPod Classic users into ditching your bundled buds. It’s never that hard to sound better than bundled earphones, but do these earphones sound like they’re worth £60 of your hard earned cash? Read our Scosche IDR650m review and we’ll tell all.
In their favour, the Scosche IDR650ms are more than just a plain old pair of earphones – they also function as a headset and remote control for your iDevices. All this extra magic happens in a little plastic housing that sits just a finger’s length down the right earphone cable.
It has three buttons hidden within it, for changing volume, changing tracks and playing/pausing your music. It’s a nifty little extra that worked perfectly on our iPod Touch, but resolutely refused to work with our 160GB iPod Classic. The Scosche IDR650m’s box may specify the 120GB variant, but when the box says ‘Made for iPod’ proudly on it, this is a bit disappointing.
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Equally, the crackling noise they make when you put the Scosche IDR650m buds in your ears is a definite turn off. It’s the sort of thing we expect from earphones that cost a tenner, not the best part of a ton.
It’s the sound that really matters of course, but sadly this area’s a mixed bag too. There’s a lot of bass to the Scosche IDR650ms, but it’s more boom than thud. In some songs this’ll sound warm and luxurious, but turn the heat up with some kick drum beats and a rip-roaring bassline and the low-end takes over, making for an uncomfortable, muddled listen. We love earphones with lots of bass, but it’s got to be fast and tight to get us smiling.
The rest of the sound is a bit more respectable. They’re fairly detailed, although – truth be told – we’ve heard a lot better from earphones that cost a fair bit less. Still, we get Scosche’s point in saying that the IDR650m earphones are worth sixty quid – after all you’re getting a pair of earphones, a handsfree kit and an iPhone remote in one.
However, we’d rather plump for a mid-range handfree earphone like the Ultimate Ears Metro.Fi 220vi and plug in a cheap third-party remote or, even simpler, opt for Apple’s own earphone, remote and mic bundle, which costs the same as the Scosche IDR650ms. The questionable build and boomy bass of these ‘phones means they can’t really compete with the big players.
