14 DAY TRIAL // With how companies and the media alike go on about high-end products and gadgets all the time, one might be tempted to think that those are the only ones worth fawning over, but that’s not the case. Attitude One may just prove that with the Almaz headphones.
The specifications don’t look like much at first glance, but they’re not supposed to. Not really. Attitude One focused more on versatility and device compatibility, as well as range and comfort. These aren’t wireless headphones, but they’ll still let you walk across town, or around a room, without having to take them off. But we’ll get to that soon enough.
Attitude One didn’t go out of its way to make the Almaz into some sort of exotic artefact. Instead, the company put the headphones together in a way meant to compensate for the normal drawbacks of supra-aural headphones.
The Box
Before we go over the headphones themselves, I feel I have to talk a bit about the box, because it’s actually pretty good-looking and practical compared to others I’ve seen. The Almaz come in a dual-section cardboard package, with the front section essentially installed on top of the rear one like a particularly wide and all-encompassing cap. I’d call them two boxes sandwiched together, but the front one actually swallows the other one completely in its snug embrace.
That’s not all though. The front, or top, box also has a lid, sealed magnetically if you can believe it. It opens up to reveal a transparent foil window, of sorts, that lets you gaze upon the headphones inside without actually taking them out and jeopardizing the seal.
Design
The headphones themselves have square ear cups, and white nets over the 40 mm drivers. Also, they can fold together, so that may be easily carried in that ever so convenient black canvas pouch included in the package.
The left and right cups have “L” and “R” written on the inner sides. Since the headphones have no permanently attached microphone or volume controls, this was a very wise move.
Don’t worry though. There are volume controls. They’re just part of the voice communication adapter you can see right in the middle of the box there. Said adapter also happens to possess a microphone. And the microphone is a patent pending flexible model, which you can turn mute by flicking the switch on the square section whose 3.5 mm jack plugs into the left headphone.
But that’s already touching on another topic, so we’ll move on to the next section.
Accessories
One might say that Attitude One paid more attention to accessories than the headphones themselves. The company didn’t really try to produce an audio output too out of this world (although it did pay special attention to the bass, for better or worse). But cables? It definitely went out of its way there. After all, it wanted the headphones to appeal to owners of Apple iPhones and Android smartphones.
To that end, it included in the box cables with track controls (next/previous track and pause buttons). The 0.9 meter / 3 foot and 1.2 meter / 4 foot cables aren’t alone though. Almaz also ship with a HiFi cable a full 7 meters / 23 feet in length. And not only does said cable have a 3.5 mm jack (gold-plated, like the rest), it also has an adapter that screws on top of it, turning it into a thicker jack if you have an audio system or DJ bench where such a thing would be useful.
Impressions
I was actually pleasantly surprised by these headphones. After I checked the specifications and saw the pretty standard numbers (40mm drivers, 20 - 20,000 Hz frequency range, 16 Ohm impedance, 20 mW maximum power output), it was clear that the Almaz weren’t meant to blow our minds with sound alone. They aren’t super-audiophile equipment, and they don’t pretend to be.
But they do have a stronger bass than many other on-ear headphones I’ve tried, and while they lack Wi-Fi or Bluetooth, they let you lounge on a couch just fine if you connect the 7-meter cable. Also, it’s pretty convenient that you can just swap the voice adapter for the long cable or the iDevice/Android cable at any given moment.
Speaking of the voice adapter, the microphone is as flexible as Almaz claims, but in no way elastic, not in a troublesome way anyhow. It won’t have trouble staying in place after you let go of it. And since the adapter plugs into a 3.5mm jack, it can be rotated around, so you can turn the microphone up if you so choose, and spin the adapter to the outside if you want it out of the way.
Also, and this is pretty relevant, wearing these headphones did not cause me pain. The lack of an elastic headband didn’t make my scalp feel sore. The black padding on the underside may not be all that soft, but it’s not too rigid either, and the headphones aren’t heavy enough to make your skull ache after extended use.
More importantly though, even after wearing the things for a full work day (8-9 hours), my ears didn’t start hurting. Supra-aural headphones, since they sit right on the ear lobes, often cause your ears to ache after as little as an hour or so, but these managed to sit comfortably on my ears for much longer. Indeed, not even the beginnings of an ache made themselves felt after a day of work, which, at the risk of sounding like Captain Obvious, is a very good thing.
Unfortunately, not all is rosy in paradise. I noticed that the bass tends to get a bit warbly if you turn the volume high when you listen to music that contains many high mid sound waves, like rock. I imagine this depends somewhat on the audio processor of the source. Phones might not suffer from this overmuch, since the tech used by Almaz seems to be specifically made to enhance the bass for mobile devices.
Anyway, the bass does not sound crystal-clear, although I suppose it really is “deep,” as Attitude one promised it would be. Then again, I assume that if you are well versed in the arts of adjusting equalizers, you can probably clear everything up. Most people probably won’t want to bother though.
Finally, the price of €100 / $100 – 137 is not exactly flattering. I’ve seen circumaural, Wi-Fi headphones selling for quite a bit less than €80 / $80, so Attitude One loses a few points here.
Conclusion
The Almaz deliver on pretty much all the promises Attitude One makes, but whether or not the price is worth it will depend on how much you like to listen to music on your smartphone. Wireless headphones might also be more appealing, but Almaz arguably compensates for that through not needing a battery.
The good
-cool package -foldable design -comfortable fit, even for extended periods -versatile and plentiful accessories -unique and easy to use voice adapter and microphone design -easy cable swapping -nice carrying pouch
The bad
-the bass, while deep and strong, might falter in some cases -there is no real noise cancellation (although, admittedly, that’s a good thing if you’re on the street and don’t want to suffer death by derailing car or anything) -the price is rather high
All in all, if you use your mobile devices extensively and travel a lot, these headphones will come in handy quite well. But if you’re the kind of person who sits in front of a PC for a long time no one will blame you if you get something else for a hundred bucks, especially if they have noise cancellation.
