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Headphones suited for accidental walk away from pc (Yank-proof-audio plugs idea).

Hello,

If you own a headphone then you might recognize the following situation:

You're "computing" behind your PC or you are in a voice chat with somebody.

Something happens you need to stand up and you walk away.

But you completely forgot that you were wearing a headphone.

The end result is:

  1. You walk away.

  1. You yank the headphone of your head or get stuck.

  2. The cable attachment to the headphone plug gets loose/damaged over time, especially if this happens multiple times.

Another situation is:

  1. Stepping on the cable and janking the headphone with "cable-to-plug" damage.

I myself own a sennheiser HD 590 headphone which has plugs on both ends of the cord. One which goes into the headphone and one which goes into my PC soundblaster, TV or receiver/whatever.

Because I was a bit uncarefull as described above the cable-to-plug attachment points have become somewhat damaged. This damaged is not visible from the outside. I think the cables/connections inside the wire leading up to the plugs has become unstable/loose. Which leads to signal loss and crackling and me having to push a bit against the cable into the plug to try and get the sound back. This is ofcourse somewhat annoying and stupid and a real waste of money on an otherwise pretty much perfect headphone at least for my purposes.

So only because a tiny little fraction of cable gets loose the headphone sort of loses in value.

The way creative labs solved this for their gigaworks speaker set is interesting:

The cables/copper wires are simply stuck into holes. And if I trip over a cable then it easily pops out without damaging to much. So in a way that is a superior design which can withstand damage easy.

Conclusion:

The "plug" design for headphones is flawed.

Therefore my suggestion for the electronics/audio industry if it doesn't already exist:

"Invent a headphone with easy de-pluggable cables/plugless cables as to withstand damage/yanks easily".

This should be pretty easy to invent, simply replace the "plug" design, but

2 holes and a copper cable with two ends which can be stick into it... and some clips which push against it to keep the wire cables in place...

This will have to be done on both sides. On the receiver side and on the headphone side.

So this means the receiver design will also need to change.

However changing both might be expensive/impossible/to late to market.

So an alternative solution could be the following:

A special plug could be invented which follows the usual/common design, but it adds a new design on the other end of the plug where the copper wires can be easily plugged in and where they easily pop out if a yank happens.

These plugs should then exist/be manufactured in all kinds of shapes and sizes to match current audio plug designs/holes.

So conclusion:

Somebody should invent/design/produce special plugs which are "yank-proof".

So these could be called: "Yank-proof-audio plugs for headphones and perhaps other devices too".

(Perhaps this already exists ??? I would love to have some of these plugs to replace the plugs for my sennheiser HD 590)

Bye, Skybuck.

Reply to
Skybuck Flying
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y.

e,

Lose the cable. Infrared headphones.

Mark L. Fergerson

Reply to
alien8752

I have a pair of Sony IR phones that just recently died.

Does anyone still make IR phones? ...Jim Thompson

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Reply to
Jim Thompson

You mean to tell me that they don't have "Wi-fi" headphones yet? I am 76, and I never would have imagined that the teenage set would still be attached to their computers (or other sound producing devices) with an old fashioned wire!!

Reply to
Bill Graham

See Apple's MagSafe power connector design (US 7,311,526).

Pretty idiot-proof.

Best regards, Spehro Pefhany

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Reply to
Spehro Pefhany

Look at the Magsafe Power Adapter for the MacBookPro:

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I seem to remember a TV commercial about this. The same basic design = might=20 work for headphone connections. Basically a magnet and a few = spring-loaded=20 gold-plated mating connectors.

Paul=20

Reply to
P E Schoen

Have you ever seen the DC power connector for a MacBook? Pretty "yank-proof" if you ask me...

HTH Chris

Reply to
Chris

hed

ed

Well, they do make BlueTooth headphones....

But hey, they may be old-fashioned, but I'm kinda counting on those wires to help me reach my senior years !! Who needs tempermental wireless connections! (Cerainly my blood pressure doesn't) :) Give me wired headphones any day!

-mpm

Reply to
mpm

snip

It's not rocket science. Get yourself an extension cable and tie the cable, not the socket, to something stationary. Tie your headphone cable to your body. Now, when you walk away, the connection is pulled STRAIGHT, no matter which direction you go. That will go a long way toward accomplishing your goal.

Or, you could just unplug the damn cable before you walk away....

Reply to
mike

f".

Magnetically secured power connectors were prior art -- the feature Apple got a patent on was its ability to be plugged in either right side up or upside down.

Reply to
spamtrap1888

This is like Roseann saying, "I forgot to eat" !!!

Or Saying, "I forgot to go to the toilet".

Sounds like better training is in order.

"This is not a technical problem"

Reply to
hamilton

Tons of bluetooth headphones.

Reply to
GMAN

It "IS" Skybuck we are talking about here!!!!

Reply to
GMAN

Wow. I'm amazed that was considered "novel..."

Some of the first things I was taught once I was working in industry was to try to design connectors so that they could be plugged in backwards and everything would still work... or if that wasn't feasible (i.e., you'd just about had to double the number of pins), at least verify that

*nothing will blow up* if someone does plug one in backwards if, for some reason, you can't use mechanical polarization to avoid the problem.

(Similarly... try not to put identical connectors side-by-side on a PCB, particularly if swapping those two connectors will blow something up. We had this exact situation at a PPoE, but I never could convince a production manager to change or at least move one of the connectors -- he'd go on about how we "just shouldn't hire" people who'd ever make the mistake of plugging them in backwards. He changed his tune after one of his own guys did plug them in backwards, killing the boards, and his department was charged a couple thousand in repair costs...)

Reply to
Joel Koltner

f

He had never heard of Murphy's Law?

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Reply to
spamtrap1888

Yes, it's amazing how such trivial things can be patented. The quantity of pompous prose to describe it in the patent is flabbergasting. Granted, the usual power supply jacks are abominable by contrast.

Jeroen Belleman

Reply to
Jeroen Belleman

Well, you can't have your cake and eat it too. You've either got to put up with the wires that you trip over, pull the connectors off of and get intermittant operation out of, or you have to go wireless. To me, thay are all junky, poorly made toys. but what can you expect from these 3.5 mm mini connectors? And you are going to have to put up with them whether you go blue tooth or not. The source devices they use now-a-days are just too small to accomodate anything larger... You couldn't fit a decent sized connector into the edge of my iPad... So, as long as you have to put up with junk, you might as well buy convenient junk.......

Reply to
Bill Graham

Problem is, somethin's gotta give. If it isn't the plug, then either you will be snatched off your feet, or the device will be snatched onto the floor. It might as well be the cheap connector.....

Reply to
Bill Graham

p
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ni

If inline stereo jacks are available, splicing one and a plug into a line would be an appealing solution, if that was the weakest link. (Neither plug nor jack would break at the computer end.)

Reply to
spamtrap1888

You might look at the connectors on Plantronics headsets. They are a very funny-looking connector, but I suspect the major design goal was to make them so they pull apart without damage or ripping somebody's ear off. it is basically two flat pieces with hermaphoditic wiping ribbon contacts, IIRC.

Jon

Reply to
Jon Elson

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