Stylish headphones are good on the go
— -- Dr. Dre isn't the only music entrepreneur with a line of headphones that mix high performance with high style.
The new M-80 Crossfade headphones from V-Moda deliver superior sound built on a strong bass line that was crafted to enhance dance tunes and club mixes. But acoustic numbers are also treated well, and even low bit-rate MP3s come to life when heard through these on-ear phones.
The Crossfade headphones are light enough to make them a great companion for listening with portable devices. They come with two cables — one with controls for iPhones and iPads, and one for other portable gadgets.
The phones also score points for style. V-Moda was launched by Hollywood DJ Val Kolton and fashion designer Joseph Bucknall, who wanted to create what Kolton called "the perfect 'fashion cymbal' of a true dance and DJ culture."
The Crossfade has a solid, industrial look with quality touches like a microfiber headband cover and fabric cable wraps. The brushed-metal plates on the ear cups can be replaced with one of a dozen different colored shields that V-moda sells for $25.
For $50, the company will produce custom shields that feature your name or logo. Why wear Dr. Dre's "b" on your ears when you could be advertising your own personal brand?
The Crossfade M-80s cost about $230 at v-moda.com.
Traffic jam
The best way to feed high-definition video to your digital TV is with a High-Definition Multimedia Interface (HDMI) cable. But many TVs only have one HDMI input while you might have a traffic jam of devices that want to use that fast lane.
Cable and satellite boxes, home-theater receivers, Blu-ray DVD players, video game consoles, computers, tablets and even many mobile phones now have HDMI outputs. You can root around behind your TV every time you need to swap input sources, or try the much more elegant solution from the Accell Corp.
The UltraAV HDMI Audio/Video Switch can let up to five different high-def sources share that one HDMI input on your television.
The switch is a small black box with a row of HDMI plugs on the back and a button and corresponding buttons on the front. When you want to switch from DVD player to your PlayStation 3, you can press a button on the front panel or use the unit's remote control.
Even better, the switch has an auto setting that will detect an active source and automatically switch to that input. That's a fair amount of work for a gadget that only costs about $90 at amazon.com and other online sources.
—
E-mail Ric at ricman@courier-journal.com.
