Entries from October 2008 ↓

Last month, I received a pair of Bose In-Ear headphones from my USA-return cousin bro.

As you can see here, it’s obscenely expensive, at almost 5k INR, and not something lesser mortals such as I would consider buying otherwise. Perhaps what Russel Peters says about Indians here is true, after all

(Poor) jokes apart, unboxing the package reveals a manual, a warranty-card, two extra sets of plugs (for abnormally small and abnormally large ears) and a leather carrying case, apart from the headphones. The medium sized plugs come mounted on the headphones. People seem to have complaints that these plugs keep falling off, but that hasn’t happened with me.

The earphones by themselves are the ‘in-ear’ type, meaning that they go quite a bit inside your ear-canal. At this point, I should probably mention that I’m no hardcore audiophile. Though this is my first set of in-ear headphones, I find that they fit in quite nicely, albeit a tad loose perhaps.

I plugged these babies into my PC, and set the mode to “headphone” on the Realtek HD Sound Manager (an app bundled with my motherboard). On my PC, I personally find that the best sound is produced by VLC media player (in “Rock” equalizer mode) for mp3 files.

The first thing I noticed about the sound was the humongous bass reproduction. I’ve never experienced such bass from such small earphones, for sure. The highs were also very crisp, but not tinny. After about a month of testing, this is what I would have to say, in summary:

Pros:

• Awesome bass reproduction, very good mids and highs
• Comfortable even after long hours of use
• Good looks, good build quality

Cons:

• Extremely expensive
• No noise cancellation, ineffective noise isolation

Overall, a very good pair of headphones. However, the price is way too much. And for that very reason, you tend to be very cautious – being extremely careful not to tug it by mistake, for example. So the bottomline is, if you have tons of money, go for it! If that’s the case, you may also want to take a look at the Bose Quiet Comfort range of headphones, which are said to offer the best noise-cancellation in the market today.

~Raj

Officially, I’ve been proclaimed a Master of Software Systems.

A few extra letters after your name never hurts !

For the uninitiated, Birla Institute of Technology and Science offers distance learning courses in various streams.  The M.S. in Software Systems is a two year “work integrated” learning program, which essentially means that this is designed for people who wish to pursue the course while working full time at an organization. You need to have some work-ex to apply. It’s a regular 4-semester 2-year programme with a mix of open-book and closed-book exams. And, you should have a “mentor” – preferably your manager in your organization who guides you through it.

For more information, point your browser to the BITS DLPD website.

~Raj