The Sleek SA6 cans are tiny and stylish, and their modular design affords plenty of customization. Do they sound any good?
Review summary of the Sleek SA6:
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 The Sleek SA6s are small and stylish, and they capably block-out noise. Alas, while their modular design is certainly nifty, it's not much more than a gimmick. The SA6s' sound signature is customizable, but it's nothing special compared to a good equalizer, and a single sneeze could blow all of its infinitesimal bits into parts unknown. Sound quality was comparable to midrange earphones, but unfortunately the SA6s aren't priced liked midrange phones. If you have this much coin to spend on cans, you can do better. Release: August 2008. Price: $250.
Pros: Cool style. Small carrying case. Intriguing modular design.
Cons: Losable parts, especially for a mobile device. Middling sound quality. Expensive.
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Full Sleek SA6 Review:
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Design - Very good
The Sleek SA6 are tiny earphones with a stylized aesthetic, to the point that we felt like we were putting miniature laser guns in our ears. The cord can be routed above or over your earlobes, which is nice, and the speaker wires are fully detachable, which is even nicer. The cable is a good length for portable listening, and the whole package is small enough to fit in your pocket. We would have liked a 1/4-inch adapter in the bundle, but given the SA6s' niche, it wasn't sorely missed.
Features - Mediocre
The SA6s are modularly designed, so you can switch between several earpieces and ‘tuning ports' that alter the phones' treble and bass characteristics. We didn't find the earpieces all that comfortable: they're made of an overly slick plastic that felt sticky in our ears and, excuse our grossness, tended to pick up ear gunk with an alarming alacrity.
There are four sets of tuning ports, one to increase or decrease treble and another to increase or decrease bass. They all plug into the back of the phones and alter their chambers' acoustics and sound signatures. For instance, the treble attenuator seems to have absorbent material inside to soak up high-frequency waves, whereas the bass booster just plugs up the chamber completely.
They had discernable effect, but nothing major. The bass booster sounded exactly like the bass booster on any nominal CD player, and the treble tips affected the sound just like any treble knob. Frankly, we can't imagine taking the time and trouble to physically tweak a pair of earphones for our current mood and music, especially when that's exactly why God invented the bass and treble controls available on practically every audio device on the planet. Realistically, we'd choose one tuning port and use it all the time, and we'd lose all the rest in four days flat.
It just didn't make sense to us. If you're going to spend $250 on a pair of earphones, you're probably going to be using them with a player that at least has a 3-band equalizer, if not something even more flexible. You'd definitely get better, easier results if you did use an equalizer, instead of plugging and protracting various orifices on your earphones. We're all for customizing playback to suit individual tastes, but again, that's what DSPs are for.
Sound - Mediocre
Out of the box, the SA6s are a tad bright. Accordingly, we plugged in the treble attenuators, but that just deadened the upper-midrange. Then we tried the bass boosters, but all those really do is turn the SA6s into closed earphones, so we weren't surprised when it made them boomy and claustrophobic. Eventually we came full circle and decided they sound best without any tuners.
We watched a few TV shows and simply found it too bright and flat. We had a similar experience when we played a few levels in S.T.A.L.K.E.R. During gameplay, we particularly noticed a constricted sound field – effects seemed only to come from extreme left, center and extreme right – making it difficult to place sounds. We also tried running the SA6s through a surround virtualizer, but unlike every other pair of headphones we've used (including other earphones), it had little effect.
Music was largely the same can of beans: playback was bright and lacked directionality. The SA6s did seem to render detail fairly well, as we could hear each twang and fret-squeak in the DVD-A version of Bela Fleck's "Bluegrass Sessions." Bass was controlled and the midrange was decently expressive. On the other hand, our $150 pair of open Sennhausers crushed them without mercy. Ultimately, the modular design just seems like a distraction from the fact that, for $250, you can get so much more bang for your earphone buck.
In terms of isolation, the SA6 worked very well. There was very little cable noise, and they killed most of the ambient noise on the subway and in the clamor of lower Manhattan. For tuning in and dropping out during a commute, the phones look and sound great, but they're still redoubtably expensive. Ultimately, Shure has little reason to worry.
Price and availability
The Sleek SA6 will start selling for $250 () in August 2008.
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