Icemat Audio Siberia In:Ear Headset
Review by: Steve
Edited by: Ji4m
Provided by: Icemat
Price: $58 Canadian

Introduction:
In-Ear styles of earphones are designed differently than the traditional ear buds. This style of earphone fits snuggly in your ear with a molded plastic ear piece that blocks out a large amount of background noise allowing for undistracted listening and work. Another advantage of this is being able to run them at lower volumes which in turn helps to protect your hearing! This is why you see most famous musicians wearing these on stage instead of using very loud stage monitors to hear themselves. Today we're looking at the Icemat Audio Siberia In:Ear Headset. Although not as fancy as the ones your favourite musician uses, this is a wired pair of earphones with an included mic for under $100! But does the low price really make them worth it? Read on to see!

  
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In The Box:
(1) Siberia In:Ear Headset
(1) Mic/Headphone extension cable
(3) Pairs of earphone tips
(1) Carrying pouch

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Specs:
Headphone
Frequency response: 30 - 24.000 Hz
Impedance: 16 Ohm
SPL@1kHz, 1V rms: 90 dB
Cable length: 1.0 m + 1.8 m = 2.8 m / 9 ft.
Jack: 3.5 mm

Microphone
Frequency response: 80 - 15.000 Hz
Impedance: 2K Ohm
Pick-up pattern: Uni-directional
Sensitivity (1V/P@1 kHz): -38 dB

Features:
The Icemat Audio Siberia In:Ear Headset is designed with a whole variety of uses in mind. Not only are the earphones themselves included, but a clip-on uni-directional mic is also in the package. The mic is basically identical to the one we saw with the Icemat Siberia Headset we reviewed last year, although a few very minor tweaks have been made. This includes a slightly different style of clip, lables on the on/off switch and the switch itself seems tighter so it can't get bumped on or off. The cable of the mic has a few clips on it which the wire from the earphones can be pressed into to eliminate a tangle of cables around you going to the computer. Keeping with the colour trend of the earphones themselves the mic is also all white and fairly small in size.

  
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The earphones themselves are fairly compact in design, as seen in the pictures. Like most in:ear style earphones the tips on the Sibera ones are interchangable. This helps you get the best fit for your ear as this style of earphone generally fits very snug to help with blocking out a lot of background noise. Included are two pairs of the regular style ends and one tripple-flange pair of ends.

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The area of the earphone where the wire enters surprised me when I was giving it a little push and noticed the flex. This canal is actually extremely flexible and is something I think will be a benefit during transportation. I've seen the occasional person's earphones with a broken or chipped canal when this part is solid plastic. The wire itself has has an all-white plastic covering. I'll admit I'm not too fond of the style of covering used as it isn't like a lot of other earphones out there. I noticed it to be fairly thin and dents extremely easily. When I first unpacked the earphones I noticed some small creases and dents in it. Not only does this not look very good on the cable, but I worry about the wires underneath. A thin covering could leave them more susceptible to being damaged, rendering the earphones useless. My last point on the wire design is the lengths going to each earphone. The wire going to the right one is significanly longer than the left one, designed to keep the cable to one side of you. I'm not a huge fan of headphones designed like this because I always find there to be too much cable going to the right earphone. This leaves a huge bulk of cable hanging in the middle. The V style of cable with equal wire lengths to each side doesn't have this excess wire that hangs.

  
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Lastly before the testing, I'd like to comment on how Icemat includes a nice material carring pouch for the headset. This pouch has a drawstring at the top as well, although without a way to keep it tightened I found it opened up very easily on me.