Oct 25, 2020
Headphones types? Let’s juggle in the jungle
In this article I want to explain all headphones typologies, for every kind of uses: from registration to the common life in order to every one can choose the perfect one for his use. I do not find online whole information I need about the kind of headphones, generally the people write review of specific products. In this article I explain the all general kind of headphones are existing, only after select this you can select a particular model. So I want to fill the first gap: what kind of headphone I need?
Headphones shapes
Exist three principal kind of headphones shapes: in ear, on ear and over ear.
The in ear headphone are the calssical phone headphone. This kind of headphone are very small and lightweight so you can transport it everywhere but also the best model are not HiFi.
The second type of headphone is the on ear, this kind oh heaphone are at contact of your ear. This kind of headphone are more big and it has better sound generally.
The over ear headphone are at contact with your head and your ear are complitly covered. This kind of headphone are generally the biggest.
Headphone type
Before selcting our kind of headphone we need to know another headphone classification: open, semi-open and closed.
The closed headphone try to isolate from all external sound and all sound we ear are not propagated outside. They are common used to recocord something because no sound go into microphones or when you are in a train and you want to hear music without diffuse it to all people.
The open headphone are the headphone that you can use for several hours at time, but it will be used in a protected environment, also because the sound are propagate alaso outside your ear. They are used for mixing.
Exist also the semi-open type, they are a middle ground. They can be used to recordo or to mix, but is not common to use it every day in the street.
Active acustic isolation
The headphone with passive acustic isolation are the closed headphones. The active acustic isolation headphones instead are headphones that have also some extra microphone for each ear and activelly generate some vibration to our ear to clear the sound that came from the extern environment.
Headphone Ohm
An interesting thing of headphones specifications is the Ohm. The headphone to use with a phone or a computer or a tv normal output must have less than 32 ohm. Instead the best Hi-Fi headphone have more than 32 ohm, but they need a extern headphone amplifier otherwise the volume will seem excessively low or it even do not work .
Dynamic or Planar Magnetic Headphones
Generally all the headphone have Dynamic tecnology, this tecnology use only one magnet. This cause that the frequency response in the very high and ultra low freequence are not equal to other frequences.
This is not a problem, indeed for a My-Fi environment it can be very good. But for a very plain frequency response exist a more expensive type of headphone: the planar magnetic.
You can find here more informations.
Bone conduction headphones
Another interesting type of headphones are the bone conduction.
This type of headphones allow you to have your ears completely free to hear external noises because they transmit sound via vibration close to the ear (not inside). They are recommended in situations where it is necessary to listen to external noises (bikes, skis and other sports) or in situations of prolonged listening as an alternative to open headphones. But this type of headphones are not used for mix or mastering task.
Conclusions
In this article I include all my knowledge on the headphones, If you know something else write it in the comment and let’s expand our knowledge.
So I think that if you need every day headphones you can buy some in ear headphones, wired or bluethoot is better. They are too smart.
An alternative can be a on ear closed headphones, possibly with bluethoot, the can be less smart but not too big.
The over ear closed headphone are very good to use on home recording studio.
The planar magnetic headphone are for mixing or better audio listen, they cost a lot, so buy only if you really want it.
If you mix or work a lot with the headphone the better choice is open type.
If you want headphones for mixing, recording and use a lot of type, the best choice is the semi-open type.
In general if you want to have a very good quality headphones, you can get a good headphones amplifier with headphones that have more than 32 Ohm.
I hope to be usefull and I think that now you have a bit the knowledge for choosing your perfect headphone type by yourself in order to start the model search. Good luck.
