Waterproof Earphones

I’ve been a couch potato for a few months, playing my video games, and I thought about reviewing the games, but all three are very popular titles and have already been reviewed over and over to the point where I really don’t have anything fresh to add.

So today I want to review another product that I’m using now that I’m through my gaming binge and back in the gym (almost) every morning. I’m talking about H2O Audio’s waterproof earphones for the Ipod Shuffle.

It doesn’t take long to get bored when you’re swimming laps in a pool. I love to swim, but I hate being bored, and the gym pipes the worst of the Eighties pop rock into the pool area. I can only hear it when my head is above water, which I avoid as often as possible, because I can only listen to so much Cindy Lauper or Culture Club before I decide to sink to the bottom of the pool and just give up the ghost.

I was nearly ready to give up my swimming routine entirely when I found the H2O Audio earphones. This device encases an Ipod Shuffle (sold separately, of course) in a plastic case that is waterproof down to ten feet. It has bud earphones that come out of sealed apertures on either side of the case. You can clip the case and the buds onto the provided frame, which wraps around the back of your neck, or you can clip the case and ear buds onto the straps of your swim goggles. Either way, you can pause/play/skip music tracks and control the volume while the Shuffle is in the case, but you can’t access the manual power switch.

An Olympic swimmer and a tri-athlete endorse the rig on H2O Audio’s website, but that wasn’t enough to impress me. Since I had never seen the gear before, I drove two hours to the nearest Apple store to see the headset before I decided to buy it. It seemed to be of sturdy construction and looked like it would work as advertised, so I bought it.

The rig does work; you can listen to your music while you swim, shower, stand in the rain, or dip your head in a tank of piranhas, but it doesn’t work as well as advertised. My troubles might be attributed to my small ears or my huge head, but I had a difficult time getting the rig to fit.

I tried the wrap-around-the-neck frame days before I got into the water, and I quickly decided to clip the device to my goggle strap instead, because the earbuds didn’t reach my ears very well with the plastic frame in place.

Unfortunately, the earbuds didn’t remain clipped to the goggle strap very well either, and the buds didn’t fit in my ears. The buds are HUGE. I can’t get them into my ears at all. I’ve never seen earbuds as large as these. They’re fitted with rubber sleeves (not pictured) that resemble flanged earplugs, except they’re hollow. These sleeves are supposed to go into your ear to provide a water-free conduit for the music to travel through. Sound quality plummets if you get even a little bit of water in your ear, you’ll hear nothing at all if water gets into the sleeve. Since the earbuds are too large to fit inside my ear, I had to rely on the clip system to anchor the earbuds, but they didn’t work very well. Either the earbud fell free of the goggle strap, or they wiggled out of my ears as I swam, or the sleeve came off the earbud. (I don’t know how many times I’ve had to dive to the bottom to retrieve one those goddamned sleeves after it pulled free of the earbud.)

Even if the system worked exactly as intended, you’d have to be an idiot savant to get the goggles on your head without getting the earbud wires tangled or the goggle strap twisted, which leads to the buds falling off of the straps and or the sleeves pulling off the buds.

Despite the frustrating design issues, I was determined to make this gadget function. After weeks of trial and error, I finally devised a system that works for me. I put the case and earbuds back on the neck frame. The frame adds some rigidity and support to hold the earbuds in place, and it has an internal track that keeps the wires out of the way. However, due to my large cranium, the frame does not fit me correctly. I have to put the earphones on, bending my head upwards to use my neck to keep them in place. I have to put the sleeves in my ears before I get into the water. Then I put on my goggles, ensuring the strap goes over the Shuffle case and both ear buds. If I can balance everything right and get it all lined up just right, I can then get in the water and swim my laps. All in all, I probably add at least 15-20 minutes to my time in the gym, just fooling with these earphones.

In short: Yes, they work, but they can be a colossal pain in the ass. Even so, I believe they’re worth the hassle and the cost, because I really enjoy my swimming workouts much more when I can listen to Rob Zombie or Slipknot instead of Wang Chung or Devo.