Apple Investigating Issue With Monster Headphones

[MacRumors]

Apple is reportedly investigating an issue with a number of Monster-branded headphones designed to use Apple's Remote and Mic technology. According to photo screenshots of an internal Apple service bulletin, headphones included on the extensive list do not meet Apple's technical specifications and can cause iPods and iPhones to play and pause erratically.

Several Monster headphone models using Apple's Remote and Mic technology do not meet Apple's technical specifications. These headphones use conductive flanges, which can result in electrical shorts that cause an iPod or iPhone to pause and play erratically. Customers may not be aware that the issue is caused by the headphones and may believe that the iPod or iPhone is defective instead. There are no known safety concerns and no known risk of damage to the iPod/iPhone or headphones.

The list of nearly two dozen headphone models affected by the issue include representatives of Monster's Lil Jamz, Jamz, Turbine (Pro and Basic), and Heartbeats lines. The service bulletin does not appear to recommend a specific course of action for Apple representatives or the customers affected by the issue, but they should presumably contact Monster for support.

Article Link: Apple Investigating Issue With Monster Headphones

 

[flopticalcube]

Surprising. While exorbitantly overpriced and marketed more than the Second Coming of JC, Monster products are usually fairly reliable and well designed.

 

[Arcus]

Surprising. While exorbitantly overpriced and marketed more than the Second Coming of JC, Monster products are usually fairly reliable and well designed.

I agree with the overpriced without a doubt , but I have found them no better than the run of the mill generic brand stuff.

 

[malnar]

So, as usual, don't waste your time and money on Monster products.

 

[flopticalcube]

I agree with the overpriced without a doubt , but I have found them no better than the run of the mill generic brand stuff.

I must admit I haven't used the headphones. Maybe it varies.

 

[nunes013]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/532.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Mobile/8B117)

I get this issue with my klipsch s2m set. It doesn't work on my ip4 an causes my music to play erratically and also opens voice control randomly. I can only use them on my MacBook pro. It sucks because they are decent headphones too.

 

[Dooger]

Headphones for tossers

 

[Crayon Meld]

I'm not sure if this is related, but I've had erratic behavior from V-Moda headphones with the external mic. The music doesn't start/stop, instead the volume jumps up and down. Has happened on two pairs I own, and there are huge threads on support forums about it.

 

[Mr. McMac]

Not a fan of Monster products. Just like Bose, WAY overpriced, and WAY overreated

 

[uraniumwilly]

Anyone interested in anything that has to do with the 'Monster' brand, I recommend you google "monster lawsuit." They are the worse than microshaft at harassing the little guys, and I MEAN LITTLE GUYS. Stay the heck away from 'Monster' anything!

... Uh, unless it's the Monster Mash. That was, of course, a graveyard smash.

 

[tivoli2]

Monster is hyped up blah.

In my opinion, Monster is over-hyped, over-priced mediocrity for people who want better stuff without knowing any better.

 

[alent1234]

and i was just going to buy a set of Dr. Dre Beats for my wife as a gift. even saw someone on the street with them and he said they were very good.

otherwise monster is crap. my $5 HDMI cables are the exact same thing as the $100 Monster ones

 

[sniffies]

Just stick to Sennheisers.

 

[alent1234]

and for the ridiculous price they sell these for Monster could have added the right parts, unless they don't want to pay apple any royalties

 

[Xtremehkr]

Anything made by Monster is overpriced junk. Truly, nothing shows the power of advertising and branding like Monster when it comes to getting people to pay too much for so little.

 

[JeffDM]

I don't care for Monster either, but I don't understand what the deal is with conductive flanges, is it in the connector?

 

[sigma8]

http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2002/11/25/

 

[r2fa3l]

my beats dont do this.
but they sound really low.

 

[tharoc]

Add...

My Beats by Dre to that list...Sometimes when you click the mic to fast forward or reverse...all you get is a spike/decrease in volume...$299 and what recourse do I have?

 

[kinnetics]

I despise anything from Monster too. Their business practices are so horrible (ridiculous patent lawsuits and false advertising) that Engadget stopped posting any news related to the brand on their site.

 

[alent1234]

I don't care for Monster either, but I don't understand what the deal is with conductive flanges, is it in the connector?

few years ago during a tear down of an ipod they noticed some cheapo chip in there that no one knew what it did. and the price estimate was a penny or so for it.

a year or so later is when Apple came out with the feature of having the headphones control the device. there is also a requirement to have something in the headphones to be able to control the device. apparently it's this flange thing.

 

[mobi]

Just stick to Sennheisers.

I use a lower end Sennheiser headset and it rivals many $$$ Megabuck models!

 

[doctor-don]

few years ago during a tear down of an ipod they noticed some cheapo chip in there that no one knew what it did. and the price estimate was a penny or so for it.

a year or so later is when Apple came out with the feature of having the headphones control the device. there is also a requirement to have something in the headphones to be able to control the device. apparently it's this flange thing.

Say WHAT?

 

[doctor-don]

Does anyone have images of this flange to post - or a link to such images? I would like to see what the commotion involves.

 

[John.B]

Curious how well Apple has documented this.

Was thas a case of Monster reverse-engineering the inline connector protocol and guessing wrong in some instances? (For example, the logic for data on the 30-pin connectors is pretty convoluted based on what voltages do or don't exist on certain pinouts.) Or did Monster just fail to properly test a documented protocol?