a-JAYS Four Review

I can’t confess to being an expert in headphones, mainly due to the fact that I can’t afford all the sets I want, but the pair that I’ve used the most would be the Sennheiser PX-100 and it’s newer, more widely available sister the MM60¹ (which is the one I would recommend). However, a few months ago I left my pair of headphones with my parents about 300 miles away, and I decided buying new headphones was cheaper than spending the gas on a trip to collect them.

Given that I would eventually collect my headphones again, my goal was to get the best headphones for $40 that I could find that were different in some significant way from the MM60’s. I cheated, though, because I had $30 of credit on Amazon to add to that, so I found the a-JAYS Four for $70. Unlike the over-the-head, open-backed MM60’s, these are ear-canal earbuds.

I’ll quickly start with the bad news: the audio quality is good, but isn’t stellar - indeed, the treble is rather weak, though you adjust to it after a short while. Also, the cord transmits the sounds of bumps and rustles a bit too much due to the nature of the cord.

Now for the huge pile of good news.

The build quality of these earbuds is fantastic, especially when paired with an iPhone 4. The most obvious design characteristic is the fettucini-like cord. It does the job of preventing tangling quite well, enough that I can pocket the earbuds separately from the phone without fear of three minutes of torture awaiting me later. The plug is designed so that there’s no good way to break it through bending. The little things are important, too: the right earbud has a dot on it (like the home-row keys of a keyboard) so that you can pick the right earbud by touch alone. Yup, no more looking at the icon on the cord!

The volume control is the one that Apple should have designed, with the same functionality but with big, easy-to-click buttons. The plastic is well-chosen for usability, though Apple would have put steel buttons in its place. In the design department, it’s blatantly obvious that these were designed for the iPhone 4 specifically, but there is nothing at all wrong with that.

As far as audio quality, where it lacks in treble it more than makes up for in bass, mid-range and warmth of the sound. You can tell these are made in Sweden: if you play a heavy metal track (like, oh, this one - it’s on sale, save a dime!) the sound just comes alive. My MM60’s seem more accurate, but I have much more fun listening to music on these.

I also notice a strange effect: when I put them on at first after having them off for a while, the treble’s weakness throws me off and I question how the audio can be so weak. After 20 minutes they are the best headphones ever made and I don’t notice any deficiency at all. I know ears adjust for a while so I’m not sure if that’s just my ears adjusting or I’m not a good judge of sound, but they sound amazing to me after a while so they have to have got it right.

Really, the only downside I notice in wearing them is that like any pair of earbuds my ears start to get irritated after a while. Also, I don’t wear them at work unless except during “I’m-busy-coding-don’t-disturb-me” sessions, because I may need to hear people coming up to ask me questions or give me requests. That’s where a pair like the MM60’s comes in handy.

The short version is that while you can find better sounding headphones at higher prices or in larger sizes, the a-JAYS are probably the best iPhone-headphones out there in every other category. At $10 cheaper than Apple’s premium headphones (which I have used as well), definitely opt for these instead - they’ve outdone Apple at its own game.