Aigo H2 Earphones

Good bass Clear overall sound No distortion Sound leaks due to its design

Run a Google search for "H2 earphone" and the first three sites are in Japanese, so we were a bit hamstrung in our quest to learn more about the product. I did know that H2 is a fairly new Japanese manufacturer of PMPs, headphones, and a really cool solar charger that charges your gadgets on the go. You also have MP3 watches and other interesting stuff. All this lowdown we got from the aigo UK website.

Uniqueness is something that's given a serious thrust by this company. The H2 earphones we received proved to be a one-of-a-kind piece. Read on to find out why.

Design
This earphone has a unique two-in-one design, which incorporates both the regular design along with the newer canal phone design. Each channel has two drivers fixed back to back. One side culminates in the canal phone insertion, with the rubber padding, while the other side is a regular earphone. So you can choose your style of listening, and turn each earphone by a 180-degree planar horizontal axis. Extra pairs of rubber pads are shipped for the in-ear portion.

The build quality and appearance of the unit are impressive. The wires are a regular black, though they lead out to a nice gun metal finish for the transducer(s) casing. Everything seems multiplied by two! As I said, black predominates: the front of both ends are black, the canal phone comprises black rubber, and black plastic makes up the earphone end.

Performance
We plugged it into an iPod, a Creative Zen, a Philips GoGear and many other PMPs that we had lying around. The first impression was very good, and most of the humor induced in the beginning by the design actually turned into appreciation. The bass response was the highlight of the event, which was well-timed and pumping enough by earphone standards. The sound from the earphone side was better and, at equal volumes, the earphone side sounded a little more flat and clear.

The canal phone side fits in comfortably, and the sound is also pretty good. The only thing is that the mids and low mids are a little too heavy for my taste. The bass is good, and sound isolation is better than in some active designs I have reviewed in the past, but that again is a feature of the canal phone design itself.

One obvious drawback is that sound leaks when you're listening, as at any point in time one side sticks out facing away from your ears. This stream of sound is not too loud; imagine a earphone kept in the open and that’s the approximate volume. Of course, pesky neighbors may come too close and try to overhear what you are listening to.

Conclusion
This is one of those products that came to us by sheer chance, and it definitely surpassed our expectations with its nice sound quality and levels. It costs only Rs 600, so I think it’s a good buy, unless perhaps you commute by motorbike – it may be tough to wear a helmet because of the protrusions.