The Radius Atomic Bass earphones for iPhone are sleek, stylish, affordable and comfortable. Combine that with Atomic Bass sound quality with a mic and these earphones are a very worthy upgrade from the standard set Apple provides with the iPhone.   Requirements: Any iPhone A love for bass ears

The Atomic Sound Test

After initially fumbling with these earphones, and finally getting to the point of hitting "Play" on the iPod feature of my iPhone 3G, it was immediately clear to me that these were no ordinary headsets. My initial testing consisted of radio friendly type songs and Pop artists of different types. Among them were Satellite Party, Juanes, Shakira, Laura Pausini and the like. After about 15 – 20 minutes of "I-Love-You's" I pulled the gun out of my mouth and decided to pull out the heavy artillery of music instead. My choices of weaponry were "A Farewell To Arms" by Machine Head, "Doomsday" by Atreyu, "The Banishment" by Prong, "The Crusade" Instrumental by Trivium, "Tarantula" by The Smashing Pumpkins, "More Than Meets The Eye" by Testament, "Indestructible" by Disturbed and finally "This Was Just Your life" by none other than Metallica.

To my utter delight the Radius Atomic Bass for iPhone earphones held on tight for the most part, never relenting or giving up clarity even after being bombarded with different kinds of "Heavy." I must admit, however, that Atreyu's "Doomsday" definitely pushed it to its limit when the drums kicked in shortly after the songs intro. It distorted for about one bar at the most, but then held out just fine for the rest of the song. At the number's conclusion I was compelled to recite the words of Mr. Han in Bruce Lee's Enter The Dragon "Your battle with the guards was magnificent. Your skill is extraordinary… And I was going to ask you to join us."

The contrast between highs and lows were immensely wide and crystal clear. The bass response had a bottom of which I'd never heard before. I've been a long time student of the school of thought "No bass, no good." And THIS was good. But what I was most impressed with was the full range of studio panning available with these headsets. That is, the sensation of three dimensional audio spacing; front-left, front-center, front-right; rear-left, rear-center and rear-right. The result was the grand sense of a large room being filled with a wall of sound. "Mucho Awesome!"

Atomic Sound Isolation

I commute every morning on an express Staten Island bus into New York City. My lovely fellow commuters have the uncanny habit of wanting to share their life stories indirectly by way of their cell phone conversations. This, in combination with the noisy air conditioning and the occasional stow away child wanting to go to work with mommy and making it clear to everyone else that long bus rides pretty much suck, I thought this would be the perfect setting to test these bad boys.

Well, I saw plenty of mouths moving but only heard the soothing sounds of "Awesome" by Satellite Party. The results were simply perfect.

Atomic Comfort

Getting the earphones to fit right at first was somewhat of a Braille experience. However, replacing the small silicon caps for the medium sized pair quickly dispelled my befuddlement. Radius so graciously provides three pairs of silicon caps; small, medium and large. There's a little bit of a learning curve, if you will, finding the right fit and positioning or "modes" of the earphones.

Because everyone's ears are shaped differently, Radius has included 3 sizes of soft silicone ear caps (small, medium, large) and they've designed the Atomic Bass earbuds so that they can be worn 3 different ways:

1. Standard Mode
2. Hook Mode
3. Deep Bass or Fitness Mode

I found that the sound quality was equally good and unaffected in all three modes. The only difference I found between the three was the level of how securely fit the earphones remained in my ears during normal movement and activity; Standard being the most loose fitting and Deep Bass mode the most secure respectively. Comfort was fine in all three.

1. Standard Mode - A traditional positioning with a straight-in fit.	2. Hook Mode - A variation of the traditional position but with the buds filling the nook of the outer ear cavity. Gentle pulling on the cables won't pull the earbuds out of position. The buds are basically "hooked" inside your ear.	3. Deep Bass or Fitness Mode - Put the left bud in the right ear and vise versa. Then loop the cable over the top of your ears. This position will increase bass performance and provide a more secure fit for fitness and outdoor activities.

Atomic Style

Is style just as important to you as sound? The Radius Atomic Bas for iPhone earphones come in a variety of styles including pink, black, violet, silver, red and green.

Y-Style Cable

The Y-Style cable is definitely the way to go. It's balanced and convenient to wear and allows you to carry your device on either side of your body, left or right. I've tried the U-Style cables in the past and was annoyed every time because I didn't have the option of wearing or carrying my iPod or any other digital player on the left side of my body. This was due to one side of the cable being longer in the right side. So, thumbs up on the Y-Style cable.

Atomic Mic

Besides sounding great, these Atomic Bass earphones include a built-in microphone that's designed to work seamlessly with the iPhone. The headphone plug is 3.5mm and is designed to fit the iPhone and iPhone 3G. The high performance mic is embedded in the left earphone cable and allows you to answer/end of phone calls and pause/play media.

Phone conversations were virtually seamless and call quality was unaffected. I was able to click and take calls; click again to hang up and the music would resume. No one on the other end knew I was using headsets. Sweet!

If you don't have an iPhone and want the same Atomic Bass sound quality without the microphone, then check out the Atomic Bass earphones for iPod.

Final Atomic Thoughts

Radius points out on the package that their 10mm neodymium magnet produces outstanding bass response and audio fidelity. Did I mention Bottom above? Well, it's got it and it's got it good. It withstood almost everything I threw at it.

The high performance microphone with multi task remote was the icing on this cake. I was able to enjoy my music and take calls on my iPhone without having to pull the earphones out and scramble for my phone, sometimes losing the call because I couldn't get to it on time. This was a huge plus for me! I was very happy. Call audio quality was excellent.

The Radius Atomic Bass for iPhone earphones w/ built-in mic averages for about $49.00 and worth every penny. It also stands up to several of the more expensive models like the Etymotic hf2 noise-isolating headset + earphones for example which run up to $179. Ouch!

Overall good quality and decent price.

This item is available for purchase from Amazon.com Radius, a relatively new audio company based out of Nashville, Tennessee (USA), prides itself on using premium parts in their products to deliver premium performance. For more information, check out: http://www.radiusproducts.com Rating: Requirements: iPhone, ears Manufacturer: Radius