With Apple's iPhone 7 ditching the headphones jack, 3SIXT's digital lightning buds come to the rescue – but they make sacrifices along the way.
Tim Cook can put whatever spin on it he wants, but ditching the iPhone's 3.5mm headphone jack isn't courageous it's incredibly arrogant, even for Apple which has a long history of telling its customers what they want rather than asking them. There's also a massive conflict of interest in that it benefits Apple to ditch what is perhaps the world's most ubiquitous AV connector to further the sales of its own wireless headphones.
![3SIXT's digital lightning buds plug into an iPhone's Lightning port, but they don't sound too flash.](/web/20160913035504im_/http://www.theage.com.au/content/dam/images/g/r/c/m/n/u/image.related.articleLeadwide.620x349.grcmgk.png/1473389285860.jpg)
The fact that Apple is including Lightning-enabled earbuds with the iPhone 7 doesn't excuse its behaviour, considering that many people have invested good money in decent headphones with the not unreasonable expectation that they'll work with any audio device. Apple also throws in a Lightning to 3.5mm adaptor, but its audio quality remains to be seen.
The writing has been on the wall for a while, which is why accessory makers like 3SIXT jumped the gun with the release of "digital lightning buds" which plug directly into an iGadget's Lightning port.
Long story short, the sound quality from the $89.95 3SIXT earbuds is underwhelming – even compared to the analogue earbuds which came in the box with my iPhone 6. The explanation is a little technical but important to grasp if you want to get good sound out of the iPhone 7.
Ones and zeros
Any vendor who starts making Lighting-compatible audio gear is likely to boast about "perfect digital audio" but, one way or another, that data must be converted back into analogue sound waves before it reaches your ears. Here lies the rub.
Every digital music player with built-in speakers or a headphone jack contains a DAC (Digital to Analogue Converter), which turns all those ones and zeros into analogue pulses to drive the speaker cones. Unfortunately not all DACs are created equal and this has a huge impact on the quality of your sound.
When you use an iPhone's headphone jack you're relying on the phone's built-in DAC. When you use Lightning headphones, the sound is still digital when it leaves the phone. Now you're relying on the DAC built into the headphones cable; the cheaper the headphones, the cheaper the DAC, the poorer the sound.
Pitted against the iPhone 6's bundled analogue headphones (working with the iPhone 6's built-in DAC and headphone jack), the 3SIXT digital lightning buds sound flat and hollow. The sound is acceptable if you're not concerned about audio quality and you don't compare these earbuds to anything else, but if you're fussy about your sound quality then you should certainly shop around.
Listen closely
The earbuds' snug in-ear design helps boost the low end but if you love your bass you'll notice that fat bass lines don't sound as rich as they could. Meanwhile the treble can sound a little tinny, not horrendously brash but certainly not as sweet as it could.
Of course sound quality is subjective, plus it depends on what kind of music you're listening to.
Listen to "So What", the first track on Miles Davis' seminal album Kind of Blue and it mostly sounds pretty good – there's certainly a clarity which benefits nuanced music like Jazz.
Next cue up "Stacked Actors", the crashy first track on the Foo Fighters' There is Nothing Left To Lose. If you know the song well you'll cringe, this rock song sounds like it's had all the life sucked out of it. The difference switching to the iPhone 6's earbuds is striking, and remember they're only middle-of-the-road earbuds.
So what's the verdict?
If you just need any old earbuds which will work with a Lightning port then 3SIXT's digital lightning buds might do, but if you've invested in top-shelf analogue earbuds then don't expect the same sound quality from this Lightning alternative.
Apple throws a Lightning to 3.5mm adaptor in the box with the iPhone 7, but that fact that replacement adaptors only cost $12 doesn't fill me with confidence that its sound quality is any better than these mediocre 3SIXT earbuds – we'll have to wait and see.
Now Apple has banished the 3.5mm headphone jack, you can be sure we'll see a boom in standalone Lightning to 3.5mm adaptors with high-quality DACs for connecting your analogue earbuds and headphones. It will be worth taking a few of these DACs for a spin and see how they stack up against Apple's own adaptor.
Either way, I wouldn't spend money on these 3SIXT's digital lightning buds until you've heard from the competition.
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