There is absolutely no precedent in EU Law regarding the common market that says if one country imposes a certain restriction or condition on a product, that this also applies to all units of that product sold in other member state countries and those operating with and/ or within the common market.
The major and most significant competence of the EU in this area is that a member state cannot impose a quantitive restriction or condition on a product if this would cause a contradiction on the free movement of products and free market principles. If France chooses to impose a volume limit, this would not be seen as an act of creating a barrier for the product.
There is no evidence whatsoever to support that the EU or EC has supranationalised the French law on volume limits, and neither is this automatic.
In early 2006 a law suit was filed against Apple Corporation on the grounds that the iPod is a dangerous and defective device (BBC News Brief, 2006). This was on the basis that the volumes produced could reach over 115 decibels, which could cause hearing damage in as little as 30 seconds use. It was noted also that each device does carry the warning that permanent hearing loss could occur if it is used at high volumes. Additionally this article reported that there is a mandatory decibel limit of 100dB in France and models for that market are restricted to this level.
http://www.acc.co.nz/PRD_EXT_CSMP/groups/external_ip/documents/reports_results/wpc120204.pdf
From the above article, we see that the EU warning is respected, but that the restriction appears only to apply to 'models for that market', read France.
In fact the original BBC article appears to suggest that the 100db limit existed in France before the iPod, and that the law suit in the US prompted/ highlighted in France the iPod's contravention of this, leading to Apple reworking the iPod for the French market:
Apple was forced to rework its iPod for France after it was shown to exceed that country's decibel limit of 100.
Each iPod does carry the warning that "permanent hearing loss may occur if earphones or headphones are used at high volume".
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/4673584.stm
Or if you prefer something less official and academic, this article in 2009 from the Telegraph also reinforces this:
There are no current European standards on volume controls for MP3 players, though under French law personal music players must be limited to an output of 100 decibels (db). The Apple iPod, which can reach 130db, was briefly withdrawn from sale in France in 2002 until Apple updated the software to reduce the maximum volume.
All iPods sold in Europe are now limited to an output of 100db.
The European Commission’s new proposals call for the default setting on all personal music players to be 80db. This would apply to MP3 players and mobile phones that are capable of playing music.
However, the proposals apply only to the default setting, not to the maximum setting for the device.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/news/6240432/EU-calls-for-volume-limit-on-MP3-players.html
So really, what this is saying is, France imposed this restriction on iPods in the French market only. However, Apple was the one who on their own initiative applied the restriction in a blanket sense for European sold iPods (who knows what their definition of the European market is, don't just assume EU). The EC proposals are proof to the fact that the French law does not obligate other member states, and that the blame for the blanket imposition of the restriction lies with Apple alone; most likely because they are lazy.
