[UPDATE]Audio Roundup: The best gaming headsets in comparison test

Introduction and scope of delivery

Inexpensive, foldable, but not rickety? With the price of just under 19 euros, of course, you always shrug your shoulders, because you certainly won't trust the whole thing. This is all too understandable, because the shelves of the relevant ear warmer discounters are full of potential sound and money destroyers.

The Creative Flex may not even stand out at first glance, but perhaps the second one. With an almost inconspicuous 136 grams, these unspectacular travel companions are of course not a powerful sound-pusher column, but you can do something with them.

Healthy scepticism has always been a useful way to save money in advance and so we were also very curious about what is actually hidden in the box and what awaits us in the test.

The unboxing is done quickly, because the clear box contains only the transducers, a few colorful plastic applications, a handbooklet and a lot of Asian air.

The 1.2 m long plastic cable (approx. 30 cm of this must be estimated solely for the Y-piece from ear cups to the cable bridge), at least for the wiring under the coat with hood up to the back pocket, without causing an extreme bondage feeling. Unless you are 2.10 m tall, bouncer and wide like an Andalusian bull. Then the rather short cable quickly becomes the ignition cord for explosive thoughts. The angled jack plug is now rather nonsense, but is firmly attached.

Optics and haptics

It is a real plastic bomber, or rather, a plastic ultralight aircraft. Everything about this bouncy is made of plastic, which swings in colour from black-glossy-ribbed, over matt-anthracite to a discouraged metallic grey for the ironing bracket. There are usable colour applications for individualizing the headphones as colour spots in the surf of inconspicuousness. Then you can buy at least the right handbag later – or vice versa. Pink is missing, orange and postbox yellow unfortunately too.

It's nice, however, that it's so conspicuously inconspicuous. You certainly don't arouse any desires of certain target groups in the night, public transport, and as a bass bomber junkie you don't get out of it. You're kind of present and good. Fits.

Comfort

It wears itself as well as it weighs almost nothing. So such a Creative Flex can really score points. Folding matism does what it is supposed to do, and also the jointness when adapting to one's own physiognomy and anatomy is not an insoluble task, but flux is done. After a long period of wearing, one should just not forget that one still has the part on, otherwise a jerky head movement quickly becomes a slingshot trauma for the winch set.

The adjustment of the ear cups by several axes pleases, because here there is not only an up and down but also the rotational movement from the articulated hip. Also the undressing has its charms, at least when it is about the handle. Until hat size 62 one can hope not to be disappointed with its length, which is already a lot of wood for Asian life designs.

The PU imitation upholstery of the classic on-ear is removable and also reasonably comfortable. A hermetic conclusion is not carried out, which is very good for the microclimate in the pressure chamber between the transducer and the ear canal. In any case, you will not sweat with it. One must not decay jerky excesses, otherwise the part quickly flies into a geostationary orbit. Stop yes, but please don't get too firm. So it's good and it's not going to work.

Functionality and connection

The volume control does not cause any problems, because there are none. At the same time, the Mute button also serves as a multifunction button, e.g. for the acceptance of telephone calls. Works on many smartphones except Windows Phones. The Mute button is reasonably grippy and can still be easily felt even in the twisted state of the cable.

Drivers and Sounding

Once the ear pad has been removed, the view of the glued-in 32 mm driver is free. Unfortunately, we cannot open the shell, because here everything is glued as tightly as if it had to withstand the next tsunami in the front row. And we didn't want to completely destroy it. You still know exactly what's in it (and what's not).

For 20-Euro you don't get any noble drivers and at the targeted weight there are no mega-magnets. But we will see that the practiced sounding (note the two openings glued with fleece) is almost too far-bared. At least below.

Microphone

The microphone with ball characteristics sits in the cable. The all-round carefree characteristic never completely tears off the communication even with twisted cable, but one catches oneself acoustically many things that one would have better left out. In the ideal case, however, the comprehensibility can even be described as very good, even if there is no real low-cut and no clipping. So spitting and pumping loudly is not, otherwise the opposite gets a fat punch into the membrane.

Measurements and sound check

The measuring curve shows us a classic bathtub, which, however, with a rather high foam ceiling and a protruding knee at approx. 2 KHz is still quite well filled. But let's get to the graphic and then the details:

Anyone who thinks that the bass sound is real bass is wrong, because the peak is at quite high 125 Hz, i.e. the classic upper bass. There is nothing dominant about it anymore and that's a good thing, because the 32 mm drivers are everything, just not real punchers. This is acoustic lady boxing in flyweight, nothing more. Helene Fischer's breathless-synthetic big bass drum becomes a pot beat, but you won't really miss the samples either. Speeches from the contraoctave and even more exquisite basement seats are no longer noticed.

Which brings us to the middle. Although they are a bit handicapped at level and resolution, they still keep a bit of a connection. The basic tone ranges of pretty much everything can accept with it and we have even heard shimmering forms of acoustic subjugation of whole frequency ranges in the 50-euro class (or not). Overall, the level strength at oberbass and middle is not exactly Thor's hammer, but it is enough in extreme cases for volumes that could make seat neighbors in bus and train mutate into furies. Over-ear and so on.

In the area of the middles and upper middles, the hump contributes at approx. 2 KHz to the increased phone feeling, because the holde at the other end remains quite dominant in the ear, just as the overall voice quality is not a bad one. Only synchronous speakers with extremely low voices should be removed from the telephone list, because the overfat upper bass then overlubricates the overall votrag of the opponent. Asexual chicken voices, on the other hand, are in full swing. The resolution is not even bad and the stage is also an acceptable average. However, you shouldn't expect filigree performances and gaming is nothing, as the location is sufficient for blind cow 2.0 in 3D.

So where do you pack creative flex? Best in the colour-matched travel bag! The parts are useful and cheaper to use on the go than they seem cheap. So you can have a lot of fun, even on the beach. But then the acoustic crusade ends, because they are nothing for ambitious, orthodox music enjoyment or a proper atheistic gaming feeling. But they don't want to be. It is the typical non-denominational always-there-on-the-ear headphones, whose possible loss due to unintentional lying does not cause sleepless nights or gives the account the knock-out blow when new purchases are due.

Conclusion

It's also much cheaper, worse and less inconsequential than what Creative offers with the Flex for just under 19 euros. It doesn't cost the world and it doesn't take much effort to test the parts yourself. The risk of suffering a hearing or blood fall after the box office collapse tends to be pretty much zero. 

Usable? Yes! At least as long as you don't expect audiophile island feeling at the slingshot price. The Flex are a good mixture of cost-down and the desire to be able to look in the mirror early as a manufacturer. After all, there is already real mediocrity here at the smallest KiK price and those who are not so demanding, still really saves money for perhaps more important things in life such as. an ice cream for the worshippers, or even some solid beer for the pals. Depending on.

Tested, fits (in almost every handbag) and should probably last a while if you don't exactly appear in it. You can't ask for more for less than 20 euros. So from that point of view, that fits.