VR Ears

[zildac]

Hi,

Has anyone had any experience with these headphones?

https://rebuffreality.com/products/vr-ears

Looking at a set for the Varjo Aero, but they don't appear to have an inbuilt mic, nor do they mention explicit Aero compatibility,. Before I reach out to them, just curious if anyone has an informed opinion on how they sound.

Z

[Convexrook]

pretty interesting! never heard of them until now

[eaglecash867]

Off-ear audio was the main reason for my removing the off-ear speakers from my G2 and just using my Bose QC35s and a Avantree Bluetooth audio dongle.  Don't know if its the same for the system in the link, but I couldn't deal with off-ear audio...I couldn't hear anything with it.

[zildac]

Off-ear audio was the main reason for my removing the off-ear speakers from my G2 and just using my Bose QC35s and a Avantree Bluetooth audio dongle.  Don't know if its the same for the system in the link, but I couldn't deal with off-ear audio...I couldn't hear anything with it.

I had a G2 previously and really liked the off ears tbh.

[edmuss]

The G2 audio is really nice, far more immersive than any headphones for me. The physical lack of contact with the ears makes a big difference.

[eaglecash867]

Heh...I guess it all depends on how much ambient noise you have in the room and how much hearing loss you have.  When I had the volume turned all the way up for the G2, I could barely hear it, and there was definitely no depth or dynamic range for me.  Anyway, just putting that out there as a possible drawback to off-ear audio for people in similar circumstances.

[Convexrook]

if you are in a loud environment this makes sense but off ear is the way to go.

[eaglecash867]

11 hours ago, Convexrook said:

if you are in a loud environment this makes sense but off ear is the way to go.

We'll just have to agree to disagree on that one.  

[unlikely_spider]

On 8/12/2022 at 3:58 PM, eaglecash867 said:

Off-ear audio was the main reason for my removing the off-ear speakers from my G2 and just using my Bose QC35s and a Avantree Bluetooth audio dongle.  Don't know if its the same for the system in the link, but I couldn't deal with off-ear audio...I couldn't hear anything with it.

That is strange. I am able to get mine incredibly loud if I want to.

Edit - I like the off-ear due to the comfort, and so that I am not completely isolating myself from my family (this may or may not be a plus depending on your particular family)

Edited August 18, 2022 by unlikely_spider

[dburne]

I like total isolation myself hence why I use earbuds. When gaming the game is all I hear.

[Eldur]

I was excited when I first heard about those and wanted to improve my Quest experience with them. The sound is decent and naturally has a wider range than the Quest speakers which are basically tablet speakers. Being off ear it's great for immersion, but I also noticed they're not perfect and come with a few things that might turn out to be deteriorating your experience. First off, they're quite heavy for their size and the way they're mounted at an angle to be positioned just off of the ears, most of the weight typically is in front of the ears which basically makes the HMD front heavy, even with a battery pack sitting at the back. Next thing is when I set down my Quest, it usually sits on the headset itself and the back of the strap with the battery pack. With the earphones attacked, the latter is no longer the case and the battery pack is left hanging in the air, putting constant gravitational strain on the whole headstrap which might get problematic over time. You can't just flip the earphones up sadly since they went with a design, probably to make them stay in place better, that requires you to loose a screw with a small hex key by one revolution in order to set it to one out of five possible angles and tighten it up after the change. For being able to access that you need to take the earphones out of the holding brackets so I basically ended up with taking them out everytime I put the HMD down which kinda kills the "just put the thing on the thing and get going" of the Quest. Also, I kept smacking my right controller into the earphone when doing any archery stuff in VR which I love to do.

Oh, almost forgot, there's no mic on it, but you can order a boom mic for it as it has the attachment port for it. But don't expect anything stunning from it, it's a very tiny and thin antenna like thing. It's probably better to just use the one built into the headset or get an Antlion ModMic Wireless which is preferred by a lot of VR YouTubers.

Can't say if it somehow fits the Aero. It came with some sets of bracket inserts for various consumer grade headsets like Q1, Q2, Reverb G2, VIVE and I think even the Index.

For people interested in getting off ear audio for the Quest 2, check out Logitech Chorus as well which apparently just dropped this week (first heard of them like yesterday and it was an announcement mentioned on Thrill's tuesday newsday). Seems to be an interesting solution at least for that HMD.

 

EDIT: Here's a review video of the VR Ears:

One comment saying:

Quote

I got these for my Varjo Aero. I also have a Reverb G2, and I think the off ear solution is the best for VR. These get the job done. I can count on one hand how many index inspired headsets there are, so obviously the only decent solution is going to cost a small fortune.

 

Edited August 19, 2022 by Eldur