Wireless Headphones

[curly]

I understand that using the headphone socket on TV's and audio equipment cuts out the speakers. Is that correct?

My real question is - is it possible to use wireless headphones on a TV and still use the loudspeakers? My hearing is not good. I hope that headphones can help, but not interfere with other family viewers.

I am thinking about upgrading our family TV to include freeview and a LCD. what outputs should I be looking for?

Any comments on the headphones would also be welcome.

I hope this is in the right forum!

Robert

[Rik]

Hi Robert

Has your broadband been activated yet? It was due at the end of last week, iirc?

In every set I have ever owned, plugging in the headphones automatically cut out the loudspeakers, which is what most people want to happen. It would be a simple job for a TV engineer to change this, but would probably invalidate your warranty. In addition, unless the headphones had their own volume control, it might prove difficult to find a setting that was right for bother speakers and phones.

Instead, you could maybe consider taking the audio output from the TV to your hifi, and running the phones from there, that would give you separate controls, and wouldn't cause warranty issues.

Many TVs have a pair of phono sockets to provide audio output, on some it can be taken from one of the SCART sockets.

Personally, I would use wired headphones, the quality of wireless units that I have auditioned has not been as good as wired, though that may have changed by now. Bose do some very nice phones, but they are not cheap - £2-300.

[curly]

Hello Rik

Thanks for your reply.

Yes, BB was switched on Friday afternoon. It was marvellous, the difference after years of dial up was enormous.  It worked wonderfully for about an hour, then I lost it! I think the fault might have at my end. I was using a long ADSL cable for setting up, and broke the connection to plug in the wireless adaptor. The adaptor had plastered over it in large red letters don't plug it in until the CD has been run – so I didn't. By then I was feeling a bit groggy, so I left the wireless bit until I felt more like playing with it. Tried to to connect again with the adsl cable, but couldn't. Since then I haven't been feeling too well, so I put it all to one side till I felt a bit better. I'll probably have a go at it tomorrow. So I'm still on dial up!

TV/Audio – can't use your idea of TV phono to hifi. They are in different rooms. Would it be possible to run head phones from TV phono and still use the TVspeakers? I believe that some phones have their own volume control.

Bose phones at £2-300 are rather out of my price range. I was thinking more like £50-75. I see that Sennheiser do some well regarded phones at about that price – but then they are for PC gamers and probably wouldn't suit my needs. I would want them mainly for speech, so I can listen to the news and some drama. Not that theres much decent drama these days, and the news is just misery – perhaps it's not worth bothering!

Robert

[Rik]

Hi Robert

Sorry to hear you've not been feeling well, I hope things are on the up now.

Which connection have you broken, the one on a USB wireless adaptor or???

You can't drive most headphones from a phono socket, wrong impedance and load. However, some wireless base units may accept that level of input, in which case you'll be able to do what you want. Bose units are good, but way over-priced, imo. Sennheiser is a good make, I've been using their microphones for 40 years now. Also check out AKG if they have anything to suit you.

Good luck with getting your connection back up and running, shout if you need any advice.

[Simon]

Hi Robert,

If they are mainly just for speech, you may not need to spend all that much.  Although I haven't tried them, so not a personal recommendation, these Budget Sennheiser's from HMV look like a bargain at just £12.99 delivered. 

[Ann]

Rather than just using headphones you might want to look at the specialist listening aids.  A google search will find them or start here for ideas of what's out there...

http://www.enhancedlistening.co.uk/prodtype.asp?strParents=325&CAT_ID=445&numRecordPosition=1

[Rik]

Useful link, thanks Ann.

[merlin]

hi robert
suggest you consider Si6776,s budget phones at £12.99
as i,m getting on in years abit i too have hearing loss, and no matter how expensive or high on the reproductive quality the phones are, we are never going to benefit from them as our ears will not hear the quality, only the increase in volume.
by the way, many of the phones aimed at gamers and DJ's have alot of bass emphasis, which does not help in our situation

[john]

Hi Robert,

I've just seen these RSX 700 wireless headphones from Bayer Dynamic : http://www.beyerdynamic.co.uk/beyerpages/hifi_wireless.html

Although they are quoting a recommended price of £99.95 Amazon are advertising them for £70.56 delivered and would seem to be what you are looking for and within your price range.

However although they say they will plug into any HiFi or TV system  it doesn't say whether this is the headphone socket or the phono output. I would imagine it's probably the phono socket but it would be best to check if you were considering purchasing a pair.

They have a volume control, up to 20 metre range and although the sound quality may not be up to a pair of wired headphones of the same price, Bayer are a well respected headphone manufacturer and I would think they are more than good enough for TV broadcasts.