Review: Far End Gear Short Cord Stereo to Mono earbuds

I try to ride my bike as much as possible for transportation. What that means is that sometimes someone tries to call me during the ride. While I could ignore all calls, sometimes I'm expecting a call or I need to make arrangements in flight. That's what having a bluetooth headset is supposed to be for, in particular, my MW600.

There's only one problem. The headphone wires are long and can easily get tangled with bike parts and are an invitation for my son to play with them while riding. I searched and searched but could not find cheaper short cord headphones than the Far End Gear Short Cord earbuds. These are extremely expensive at $16.95, and you can also buy the stereo version for the same price.

Out of the box, they're fabric-wrapped and look strong. The sound quality isn't the best, but you're not expecting Sennheiser quality for this price. Despite being so short, they do function as antennas for the MW600's radio, albeit with poor indoor reception. They're short enough that I can clip the MW600 to my collar and have just enough cord to reach either of my ears. They can also be looped around my neck and kept handy in case a call comes in (my phone rings) but not block my ears so I can have normal hearing.

You wouldn't want these if you want to listen to music in the gym, for instance, but having short cord headphones is so nice that I'd consider buying the stereo version just for gym use, where the long cords do occasionally tangle and get mixed up with machinery.

I was hesitant to pay the $16.95 price for these, but really shouldn't have. These are more than good enough and a huge improvement over any long cord earbuds. If someone made short cord headphones with great sound quality, I'd be all over them. As it is, for the specific application I have, they're recommended.