Skullcandy Ink'd 2 review: Eye-catching design, subpar sound quality

One look at the range of in-ear earphones available under Rs. 2,000 and it becomes evident that manufacturers are targeting the 'cool' crowd. A stray model in this price range might be available in a subtle black or white, but most of them are flashy and come in a variety of colours. We feel this barrage of options is great for users who want to stand out from the crowd, and for them, Skullcandy is definitely the best bet.

There are multiple manufacturers apart from Skullcandy like Sony, Philips, Soundmagic, Cowon, JBL, JVC, Creative and many more, that populate this price range. Quite a few have some swanky designs which are rather understated. Each one's sound definition varies and we are finding it increasingly difficult to recommend the appropriate one considering that listening styles also vary from person to person.

Fortunately, there is a selection for all types of listeners.

We have the Football Club (FC) Barcelona edition of the Skullcandy Ink'd 2 with us. Just like the Hesh 2 we reviewed some time ago, we want to reiterate that cosmetic embellishments notwithstanding, the performance of this model will not change across the multiple different colours and special editions. Let's find out how they perform and if the price is justified.

Features and design
Skullcandy actively advertises 11mm drivers for better bass output in the Ink'd 2, which are incidentally the same as the first-generation Ink'd. Now, we know that some headphones/earphones with larger drivers can sound horrible, and so we refrain from commenting on it until we get to the sound quality. They have a dynamic sound range of 20Hz to 20KHz which is almost the norm. We couldn't find any information about the impedance which is disappointing since we would rather know how well they will work with different devices. Fortunately, in our testing they worked with most of the devices we tried.

We are glad that the revised edition of the Ink'd has a flat cable. It is extremely thin but sturdy and we expect it not to snap in regular usage. But since it is thin, tangling cannot be avoided which is the USP of flat cables. Being the FC Barcelona edition, the Ink'd 2 is predominantly blue with a streak of yellow running around the edge of the flat cable. The earplugs have a circular strip with red accents. A logo of Barcelona decorates the back of the earplugs. We like the design and fans of the club are bound to love it.

The stems of the earphones is made of rubber and they flex a bit. Skullcandy provides two different sizes of soft tips, which were both too small for us. We would have liked a third option, because both the ones provided by Skullcandy failed to seal properly, which is vital for earphones that don't have active noise cancellation and for a good bass response.

The gold plated 3.5mm jack is a great addition. The inline microphone/remote control can be used to play/pause/forward/rewind music or answer calls. It would have been great if Skullcandy had added volume controls as well but we aren't really complaining. We also noted a small design flaw which was annoying - the Barcelona logo overlapped the microphone.

Sound Quality
Manufacturing processes for audio equipment are highly refined these days. This means that generally a burn-in period is not necessary, and many earphones/headphones perform to their potential and deliver the intended sound out of the box. This is not the case with the Skullcandy Ink'd 2.

The moment we plugged them in, they sounded extremely harsh and we were almost about to write them off after two hours of listening. We decided to burn them in and let the diaphragm expand a bit for them to sound fuller, which definitely helped. We noticed that bass response was much more punchy and pronounced. Thankfully, it wasn't too bass-heavy. Unfortunately, vocals took a hit and mids was muddled. The 100db max output gets realty loud and treble is very shrill.This made the Ink'd 2 uncomfortable to listen to for long periods. The soundstage is decent and left and right channels are isolated accurately.

Noise isolation is not that great either, but this could be because we couldn't get a proper seal with the soft tips. The inline microphone works well in phone calls and the receiver could hear our voice clearly.

Verdict
At Rs. 1,699, the Skullcandy Ink'd is priced slightly higher than we expected but it is highly possible that street prices will be lower. Design-wise, these in-ear earphones definitely get high marks from us but in the sound quality department, which matters the most, the Skullcandy Ink'd 2 falls short.

A great bass response cannot mask the inadequacies of the treble and mids. Generally, we expect at least two out of three frequency ranges to be decent, if not good. We'd suggest picking up the Soundmagic ES20 or Cowon EM1 which are priced much lower and provide a fuller sound with better sound definition than the Skullcandy Ink'd 2.

Price: Rs. 1,699

Pros

• Good bass
  
• Flat cable
  

Cons

• Treble is weak
  
• Mids are muddy
  

Ratings (Out of 5)

• Design: 4
• Performance: 2.5
  
• Value For money: 3
  
• Overall: 3