Plug series, part 3: Cable is not like cable - round vs flat

Welcome to another article focused on in-ear headphones. In the previous news, you could find out what to look out for when buying new headphones for your phone, or how to choose jack with three or four rings and how to pay attention to compatibility. Today we will look at cables. Although it seems that the length and shape of the cable are negligible for small headphones, this is not entirely true. Even if the differences between them are almost negligible, there are still reasons to prefer one cable over another.

For almost every connection, whether it's an HDMI cable to your TV or a radio connection with speakers, in our case a mobile phone or an mp3 device with headphones, we know two types of cables. We are talking about the so-called round cable and also about the newer flat cable. What advantages does one form of cable have over another? The absolutely most basic and most significant positive of flat cable is that they get tangled less, or better untangled. In addition, they are also much more flexible.

A circular cable has insulated conductors in a bundle that are surrounded by several additional layers of a different material. If you've ever cut or torn a pair of headphones, you may have noticed small pieces of fiber sticking out. The cables are wrapped in polymer and a layer of textile material is added to reduce cable heating by friction. Then comes another layer of fabric wrap and above that is fair copper shading. All of this is packed in Polyvinyl Chloride packaging. The problem with this construction is when multiple layers of insulation are used to prevent heating caused by friction during repeated cable movement.

A thin cable is more efficient in terms of the use of insulating materials. It does not need any tapes to reduce friction and therefore can do with only two insulating layers. The four insulated cables are wrapped in a "jacket", which is usually made of a rubber material. Flat cables have a larger surface area for a given volume and therefore there is better heat dissipation. The conductors in flat cables also have a fixed geometry and therefore impendance, inductance, time delay and attenuation will remain constant. Likewise, the conductors in the cable have the same physical and electrical lengths. This, together with the fact that the dielectric dimensions will remain constant, means that the signal and time delay will still be minismall.

Even though the flat cable seems to be of better quality, it still depends on the specific manufacturer how they care for the cable. Most manufacturers stock headphones with both flat and round cables. Manufacturers also dealt with a large range of colors Vivanco for HSESSVV headphones, which have a flat cable and are intended primarily for mobile phones. They have chosen an elegant style for the Metalist Talk headphones, which attract you at first glance with the two-color design of the flat cable. A slightly higher category is the X-Treme Talk, which goes back to the circular cable.

In the case of a brand JBL we start in the lower price categories with circular headphones, but the higher we go with the price, the more often we come across a flat cable. Here, too, we can find types of headphones that directly ooze with different kinds of colors, in both cases. JBL's main advantage with their flat cable products is that the cables don't get tangled, otherwise they don't bother with it.

Other leading manufacturers include AKG, which, however, remains faithful to round cables. Everyone will have their own color with the K323XS, but if someone is after a truly exceptional sound that few in-ear headphones can achieve, they can drool over the AKG K3003. In this case, you can see a decoratively circular cable, which decoratively wrapped in fabric creates a truly beautiful impression. However, these headphones are certainly not among the cheapest and only a true gourmet who likes to enjoy music in the best quality can afford it.

We will stay with decorative cables. A truly beautiful cable, which is made of silver fabric, can be found at YurbudsSignature Series ITX-1000. In other cases, the cables are colored according to the shell. Rather than the cable, Yorbuds focuses on headphones for sports activities.

No need, then.chat be fooled by the elegant look and pay extra for the sound quality. The continuation of the earplug series will be a choice between plastic, metal and wooden headphones. Wood has always been used as decoration, but it may not have a positive effect on the sound quality.