Hotice226They're not total crap. It's a more reputable OEM than the typical disposable garbage. The only issue is that this isn't really a deal worthy of being on Massdrop. You're basically paying ~0-20 dollars more than the regular price.
Taobao is China only, but I tried out the originals in Taiwan where they were selling for 1999NT (~60USD.) Very bright and not for everyone, but not terrible.
awidtsnwlrTaobao is $86 and you are hit with ? Customer service as it’s all in Chinese plus any import duties plus the cost of shipping. Saying this is a rip off because you can buy them as a knock off from a place that doesn’t even sell directly to the USA is just really unfair. There are lots of things much cheaper that way but it does us no good over here. You simply CANNOT find them for this price anywhere else.
JDOUBLEHThose aren't a knockoff. IN2UIT is a Japanese brand, it's also a rebrand of the Verisonix I500B that's being sold in the mainland as a higher end Japanese product (despite being produced in China by a Taiwanese company.) Calling IN2UIT a knockoff is like calling Mitchell and Johnson a knockoff. They're both legit products. They're both selling at a crazy MSRP and offering huge "price cuts." Verisonix partnered with both of them at the same time.
Headphones aren't usually at as much of a markup in the States as you'd think. Most third party sellers typically cheat the customs. My point is that if you're spending 90 dollars on headphones these aren't a great value. It's a discontinued model that was being sold by the ODM/OEM 2 years ago for ~60 and is currently being sold in China with the Japanese markup at 86. Mitchell&Johnson is just doing the same thing, albeit selling them as "British" and targeting the West instead of China.
Given the ~60 dollar pricing in Taiwan a couple years back, I'd say fair value would be ~40-50USD if they were still being sold by the OEM.
It's untrue that everything is much cheaper in China when it comes to products like these, unless you're picking them up from a small local audio shop in the States. But you'd be paying more for American products too at those places, so I don't think its a fair comparison. Magaosi K5s, for example sell at 179USD in the West and 175USD in China as a domestic product. The Xiaomi Pistons back when they were ultra-popular were being sold at the same price on Amazon/Gearbest as they were in China/Taiwan. And Massdrop has had a couple of drops on KZ products at cheaper than you'd be able to buy them from an audio shop in Taipei or China.
Music-headSorry, I don't own these and demo'd them too far back to clearly remember my impression of them. I just happen to had been living in Neihu and the local shop was pushing Verisonix products since their sales office was nearby. All of the headphones they had on demo were very bright though. If you're set on the Mitchell and Johnsons, the MJ2s are a rebrand of another Verisonix product that HEAD4 (Taiwanese audiophile site) was quite complimentary of.