Ultrasone ZINO Portable Headphones

The artist formerly known as the iCANS, the Ultrasone ZINO headphones are sleek gunmetal black and fold for easy travel. Specially developed for portable music devices, the semi open headphones emit the natural surround sound synonymous with Ultrasone.

Although I’m skeptical of any headphone that refers to itself as “safe,” I have to admit that I may name my firstborn child after these headphones (and then use them to drown out the first few years of the child’s life). After hugging a tree, I figured I’d give the “safe” headphones a try; I have always held the opinion that headphones are for playing music, and if you’re really concerned with the music you don’t care about safety. I was grossly overconfident in my skepticism. The ZINOs are a beautiful piece of work. Although all headphones are technically portable, this lightweight and surprisingly attractive little device is far more comfortable and emits a sound quality that is absolutely heart stopping.

So how does the whole “safety” issue factor into the Ultrasone ZINOs? Every feature serves double duty. The design sleek enough to make any audio snob salivate? It’s to cover metal shielding that reduces the radiation by about 98%. The phrase “good things come in small packages” applies here – the ZINOs are teeny and portable, but they house gold plated drivers, which are often found in full-size studio headphones. These drivers are decentralized, meaning that they direct the sound to the user’s outer ear (most headphones shoot straight for your inner ear drum). This safety feature not only results in more natural surround sound by using the anatomy of the ear, but it also reduces eardrum pressure by 40%. The very obvious downside is that you can’t expect the sound to be flawless – if you’re a headphone aficionado it won’t sound like your bazillion dollar headphones. But for small and compact portable headphones, they’re pretty outstanding (and they’re safe!).

These are comfortable, portable headphones that have been designed to sound like the big, bulky cans. I’ll venture to say that even staunch audiophiles will agree that for portable headphones, these puppies sound delicious. The best part? They’ve downsized the price, too. Yee-haw.

Features

• Easy to wear, easy to store
• New level of sound quality
• Easy on your hearing
• ULE Technology
• S-Logic technology