headphone volume control

[superunknown98]

I have a pair of sennheiser earbuds with a volume control on the cord. How does this volume control work? Is it a filter of some sort, or does it compress the volume? Sometimes I notice music will sound better or worse depending on how the little volume slider is set. Am I crazy for thinking that it can affect sound quality?

 

[Killmenow]

Isn't it a variable resistor or something? Usually an additional inline resistor is considered detrimental to the sound, but I remember reading about this one particular set of sennheiser buds where the resistor actually helped with the bass

 

[superunknown98]

I wish companies would leave volume controls to the media player if it is going to have a detriment to sound quality. I can adjust the volume just fine from my mp3 player thank you very much.

 

[Killmenow]

=] Actually, I would prefer an analog volume control so long as the quality of the component is half decent (although having a shoddy inline one might not be the best idea). Wouldn't turning down the volume digitally risk altering or comprimising the data sent to the DAC?

 

[tm37]

Originally posted by: superunknown98
I have a pair of sennheiser earbuds with a volume control on the cord. How does this volume control work? Is it a filter of some sort, or does it compress the volume? Sometimes I notice music will sound better or worse depending on how the little volume slider is set. Am I crazy for thinking that it can affect sound quality?

Most earphones are going to have some electronic filtering or adjustment as most receivers (speakers) do not give the response that people want. Higher quality earphones tend to use hearing aid receivers which give a pretty flat response. All the volume control is going to do is have a potetiometer that will drop the voltage to the reciever. If it is well built it will not effect quality if it is shoddy you will see a huge drop in quality.

The main difference between the 20 dollar and 300 dollar phones are the recievers, and most of the high end phones do not have volume control in the phones.

I would avoid those with the adjustment my self because it is easy to do on my zune and it is an unneeded feature.

 

[tm37]

Originally posted by: Killmenow
Isn't it a variable resistor or something? Usually an additional inline resistor is considered detrimental to the sound, but I remember reading about this one particular set of sennheiser buds where the resistor actually helped with the bass

If the resistor dropped the response of the highs it would make the bass appear better (as you have cut off the highs) but I assure you they can not make the base better with a resistor.

If they use a reciever that has a better low response you can inprove the bass, but this is done at the reciever level and not at the "volume control"

Some phone will put resistors in to limit the output or to avaid impeadance mismatches. When using a cheap reciever they need to "protect it"

 

[superunknown98]

Thanks for the info. I didn't even really think about it when I bought the earbuds, but I will try and avoid this next time around.