Tag: samsung

• Dislike: Bass is muddled, muted, and sort of sloppy, which is unfortunate as this song has some seriously fun bass.
• Dislike: Snare/snaps are not crisp at all and feel like the higher end of the treble falls off.
• Like: Adequate separation to be able to discern timing differences in various snaps and overlapped vocal parts.

“Water Night” – Eric Whitacre, performed by the BYU Singers

• Like: Harmonies are still smooth in the beginning, despite the overlap of the many, many different parts.
• Dislike: Lower parts don’t hum and fill the space as nicely as they do when listening on other gear.
• Dislike: at 1:17, the Galaxy Buds+ do not perform well with the intricate and swelling treble harmonies. While other gear allows you to hear the ringing of each part without blowing out the earbuds, the Galaxy Buds+ got crackly during the swell and really ruined that part of the song. I do admit this is a tough part of a tough song for many headphones and earbuds, but I am still disappointed with the poor performance from the Buds+ here.
• Dislike: You can faintly hear a hissing during soft/quiet parts of the song. I have verified this is not room/recording noise from the song.

“Sir Duke” – Stevie Wonder

• Like: As with Bad Guy earlier, there is pretty good separation of the different parts here. Earbuds are notorious for having poor sound stage and spatial imaging, and that’s fine–they’re not exactly for critical listening. While you won’t get that level of detail and space with the Buds+, they do a decent enough job at letting you hear all the different parts of the music.
• Dislike: Again, I’m hearing not as punchy of bass as I would like, and not as crisp treble. It all feels very softened. And this is a punchy song.

“Formed by Glaciers” – Kubbi

• Like: The mutedness of the Buds+ kind of works here. The song starts out quiet, but rich and reflective. At 1:20, the type of muted bass the song incorporates works really well with the lack of punchy bass that the Buds+ provide. If you listen to a lot of music with bass like this, then my comments about the limited and muddled bass may be negligible to you.
• Like: Immersion was much better on this track, whereas previous tracks it really felt more like I was sitting with earbuds in, listening to the song, rather than experiencing the song.
• Dislike: Beginning around 1:45, the cello, bass, and other deep stringed instruments come in. The bow pulling across the strings of these instruments produces a lot of beautiful texture when recorded–however the Buds+ didn’t reflect that at all.

“La Luna – Binaural” – Ottmar Liebert + Luna Negra

• Like: The different claps at the beginning of the song do actually sound various and differentiated.
• Dislike: At 1:14 when the guitars come in, I felt like I was listening to the song live, but from behind a thin sheet of plexiglass. Again, overall very muted.

“Radioactive” – Our Last Night (Originally performed by Imagine Dragons)

• Like: These earbuds definitely perform quite a bit better for rock, punk, metal, and heavier/grittier music. Separation was pretty good and things felt more crisp. Part of that is inherently due to the type of music, but the performance really started to shine a little more instead of being dull.
• Like: The texture of screams and heavier vocals was present and defined, and surprisingly not muddled like I’d experienced otherwise prior.
• Dislike: There is a particular cymbal that is repeatedly hit in this song. The Buds+ do not like the frequency at which the sound is produced. You can hear a little bit of textured hiss as the drivers get fuzzy.

“Iscariot” – Fundamentally Sound

• Like: Finally, some a capella portion felt like it filled the space a bit better. This is partly due to the song, but something with the key and tonality of the vocalists combined with some really neat resonance really pops here.
• Like: Starting 0:35, the texture of the vocalists’ voices (particularly the /n/ sounds being held) are much better and are actually interesting.
• Dislike: There are definitely details being lost. This recording has some mouth and minor breathing noises that I can usually hear on other gear, but don’t hear here.
• Dislike: At 3:45, the bass and percussive voice that comes in sounded like I was listening to it from the room next door, while the rest of the sounds were present in a you’re-in-the-room sense.

“Xanny” – Billie Eilish

• Dislike: I know I sound like a broken record, but the bass performance is less-than-desirable. While this bass line is fairly muted, there is a lot of texture that the Buds+ simply didn’t deliver.
• Like: The sweeping/panning at 1:02 is pretty smooth and makes its way from ear to ear without any gaps or interruptions.
• Dislike: At the same spot, 1:02, there is an odd ring part-way through one of the sweeps that I’ve not heard on other gear before, including my critical listening gear. I wonder if this is issues with the drivers/build.

“Africa” – Toto

• Like: Harmonic separation is good enough and the different parts of the chorus (the most iconic part of the song) are easy to hear and blend smoothly.
• Like: At 3:03, the marimba/vibraphone/whatever-it-actually-is has some great little pings and pops as the mallets strike the bars.
• Dislike: As with the previous tracks, not clear enough bass.

“The Ground” – Ola Gjeilo, Tenebrae + The Chamber Orchestra of London

• Dislike: It is difficult to discern the different stringed instruments and their strings being played. There is a lot of texture here that is lost, despite it being a smooth harmony.
• Dislike: While there is quite a bit of bass here in this song, the texture and tone of the basses’ voices is completely lost.
• Dislike: There are quite a few places where the drivers peak, as they did in Eric Whitacre’s “Water Night,” ruining swells and treble parts.
• Like: Piano part and keyfalls come through roughly as expected and the quiet piano parts are well-heard.
• Like: You can discern some of the quiet noises of the conductor moving, which I like.

“You’re a Mean One, Mr. Grinch” – Small Town Titans

• Like: Here again we find that the Buds+ perform much better for harder styles of music. These earbuds do this song some justice compared to the prior tracks.
• Like: There is a lot of texture in the vocalist’s voice at the beginning of this song, and it shows through clear and cleanly when listening with the Buds+. This was shocking given the performance of the earbuds on other tracks.
• Like: When the vocalist plays around with his tone and different “characters” in the verse around 1:30, the tone is really quite good considering the previous performances and the fact that these are earbuds. You can really hear and enjoy the difference between his placed and proper intonation and when he pulls it forward to the front of his mouth or gets wider with it.

“Blank Space” – Taylor Swift

• Important Note: I decided to add this song after I had written the Call Quality section of this post. After having used the microphones on the Buds+ to do a recording test, the sound performance when listening completely changed. I checked my Windows audio settings, and everything was still the same as when I had previously done my analysis. This is wildly inconsistent, and alarming.
• Treble is now suddenly very crisp — too much so. Snares hurt your ears and most sounds above the mid range seem to be crackling. Actually, there’s lots of crackling in general, and it sounds hardware-related.
• Bass is still very lost and muddled.
• Sound is now overall very shrill.
• Harmonies are present, but less defined.

Call Quality

Just…no. During my test of call quality, the audio was constantly popping, and the people on the other end of the call were also hearing the popping. There was also an annoying buzzing sound the entire call. Volume on my side was okay, but the other people I was calling commented that beyond the cutting out and popping, I was very quiet as well. Below is a recording using the built-in microphone.