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GOgroove begins campaign for inexpensive ultra durable earbuds
Warning: Do not try the above picture at home, unless you’re looking for an excuse to get a new pair of headphones. Most earbuds would definitely snap or at least get damaged by the strain, but not these. Audio company GOgroove realized that most in-ear headphones are not designed to last and plan to change this with an Indiegogo campaign for their newest durable in-ears called the AudiOHM RNF earbuds.
GOgroove has reconstructed the design of in-ear headphones from the bottom up with multiple patent-pending hardware choices. One of which is the new aluminum alloy housing used to protect the 9mm drivers. Another patent-pending technique is the use of solid injection molding wrapped in protective silicone for the Y-connector and the audio plug. This ensures that the two parts that are most likely to fall apart are firmly held together but remain pliable enough to be stuffed in your pocket. The star of the show has to be the 3mm reinforced cable that is a few times thicker than most audio cables out there. It uses an aramid fiber that is used in military applications in order to further protect the internal wires of the headphones. The use of the fiber is also (you guessed it) patent pending. GOgroove is so confident that the RNF’s won’t break on you that the headphones come with a lifetime guarantee that the company says “you won’t have to use.”
The spec sheet is pretty solid as well with a frequency range of 20Hz – 20 kHz and an impedance of 18 Ohms. They max out at around 98 dB and come with three sizes of silicone ear gels that, provided you take the time to pick the appropriately fitting pair, should do a decent job at blocking ambient noise from the outside.
What’s the best thing about the RNF’s? The price. The ultra durable in-ears will cost less than $40 and if you back the campaign you can get yours for $30. At the time of this post they still have a ways to go before the $20,000 goal is met, but the campaign is open until March 20th so if the RNF’s sound like something you’d be interested in make sure to grab your pre-order. These seem good enough that we might just have to check them out for ourselves, so keep one eye glued to Sound Guys for a review sometime in the future. Assuming the goal is met GOgroove will begin shipping this April.