CAT EAR HEADPHONES | AXENT WEAR REVIEW

Time for a different kind of post! I've had these for a while so I thought I might as well review them even though these are the first pair of headphones I've ever bought (I used to just steal my brother's headphones). Anywho~

In late 2014, I happened to chance upon these super cute headphones that I really wanted as my first ever headphones purchase and that's how this came into my hands around November last year. Although there were problems here and there in the delaying of production of these due to lawsuits etc, it still eventually came so I was happy! Thankfully, I am one of the backers that got a working headphone because I've read so many comments of the lights not working and it being so hard to get a replacement from Brookstone (which is now selling these as cat ear headphones after they supposedly bought the rights to it or something) and so if you're interested in these headphones, I think you should really contemplate whether you want them or not since their service apparently isn't the best and thus it could become rather frustrating to deal with.

When I first received these in the mail, I was like omg!! It is finally hereee! I was so excited to open the box and everything! It comes along with the beautiful illustrated box by Yuumei~ 

And then~ it comes with a mini briefcase to store the headphones! When I first heard from others that received theirs first that you get a box, I was excited but this is actually quite chunky lol. I can't imagine carrying this around unless I have somewhere to store it safely, I think I'd rather just hang the headphones on my shoulders. But, it is convenient if you really want to keep your headphones safe since it is pretty sturdy. 

Here's the product! Isn't it pretty? It's chunkier than I thought though~ When I wear this, it does feel rather heavy in comparison to other headphones I've tried and played with but I guess that's how it is since it has functional ears as speakers and proper cushioning. Although it is heavier, I can still wear this for 5+ hours without feeling too uncomfortable usually, but sometimes, I put this on and it gives me a headache lol, it is definitely quite heavy for sure. But yeah I've been gaming with this every now and then and it's pretty good. You can also move the ear pads(?) and let them sit nicely on your shoulders with the lights face front, but because of this, it can get quite annoying putting the earphones on since it keeps flipping around and it's heavy loll.

As for the LED lights, I charged them fully (couple of hours for a full recharge, maybe ~4? I forgot) and tested how long they lasted continuously and they surprisingly stayed on for a solid 10 hours. Pretty cool. Though it's kinda funny that the blue lights on the cat ears and the ones on my ear cups are a different hue though. The cat ears are like a light cyan whereas the cups are more like a baby blue lol. Oh, and just a heads up, you'll probably have to recharge the lights every time you use them because even if you don't use them, the lights lose their power and won't turn on. I charged mine and left it for a few days without using it and then when I tried to use it, it didn't work! Then I recharged it and it worked again so yeah~ it's annoying like that.

 I have to say that the cat ear speakers were rather disappointing though, when I tried increasing the volume to an audible level for those around me, it sounded quite scratchy and I can hear some static when I listened closely but I guess it's fine when you listen to it as a whole. Another gripe would be that, it's quite low volume for speakers, your environment would have to be pretty quiet if you want others to listen to your music through the speakers. But yeah you can tell that the quality is definitely very average if not bad (I'd say bad). Personally, I have no reason to use it unless I wanna be cool (which is never) so it seems more like just a gimmick to me, realistically, I wouldn't use it at all.

 The specs make no sense to me but maybe you'll want to see so here~ Specs are (copied from website):

Headphone Audio:

20Hz-20KHz frequency response

32 Ohm impedance

40mm drivers

Cat Ear Speaker Audio

200Hz-18KHz frequency response

4 Ohm impedance

32mm drivers

This also comes with a detachable boom microphone that is great for gaming~ Quite convenient. This works fine without a cable splitter on my laptop but many have been required to purchase a separate splitter in order for the mic to work on their pc etc. It is a bit short I guess but with a flexible cord~

I'm not a person that knows much about headphones but I think the sound quality is fine but not excellent. It's decent I guess. I can't tell the difference between this and my brother's $50 Sony headphones but that's me haha. I'm a very easily satisfied person, if it works, then it's fine. Noise cancelling is pretty decent, once I put these on, I'm in my own little world~ actually, not really lol I can still hear myself typing with this hahaha. 

Oh, another thing about these headphones, depending on how you wear them, if you bend over or bend backwards, they might fall off so be careful lol. But mine are usually fine, I've never really had a problem with this but others have and I thought I might mention it just in case~ But, I only game with these so yeah~

In order to cater for different sized heads, you can extend the sides to better fit your head. For me, It fits nicely without me extending anything.

On the right side, you have the buttons for lowering the volume, increasing the volume, hole for charging headphones, turning on the cat ear speakers and then turning on the LED lights. Sadly, if you turn on the cat ear speakers, then that'll be where the music then comes from and so you can't listen to your headphones and have your cat ears working at the same time. Also, it can be difficult and annoying to press these buttons when you're wearing your headphones since they're a bit hard to reach (for me anyway).

In addition, the + and - buttons are only for the cat ear speakers so if you're listening to the headphones and want to change the volume, you'll have to change it on the device it's plugged into. Also, every time you change from the headphones to the cat ear speakers, the volume auto resets to the lowest volume and so you have to increase it every time you alternate (which can be annoying) between the two.

I just realised this after having these headphones for months that if you were a backer for the Axent Wear Campaign, the cushion that is placed on top of your head will say "AXENT WEAR" whereas if you buy the headphones now from Brookstone, it will say "BROOKSTONE" instead. I guess that makes me feel a little special lol. Anyway, on the left side, you have the holes to connect the headphones to your chosen music device etc and for your mic as you can see. 

Closer look at the cat ears!

And you can flip those ear cushion cups whichever way you want to sit on your shoulders etc~

This is so embarrassing but sorry for the crappy selfies hahaha. I just thought it would be a better review if you could see what it looks like on my head. Don't mind my eyes looking at different places, I obviously suck at taking selfies lol!

Without the LED lights on. Also, as you can see, the headphones do sort of bulge on the sides making it look quite chunky and wide but oh well.

Lights on!

Lights on in the dark! Now I don't need to be scared of the dark loll

Anyways, overall, I think if you're interested in the whole concept of the cat ears and mainly want it for the cats ear appearance rather than as a headphone then you'll probably love this since I think for a headphone, it's really nothing special but it works decent for gaming and listening to music. For now, I have only seen one person with these around in Town Hall hahaha and I'm just too shy and lazy to lug these around on the go so I only game with these but I might wear them to SMASH or something this year just to make some use out of these loll. I mean, they were rather expensive!

 Not sure how much they are now, but they were I think $150 USD when I backed the Indiegogo campaign la. I'd say I'm quite mixed on whether this is worth it or not since I did buy it because I liked the cat ears haha. But I do think you can probably find better headphones for that price so yeah, it really depends on whether you want this more for the ears or the headphones.

MQ Fusion, Macquarie

This is probably like the third time in my whole entire life that I've been to Macquarie, like no kidding. Probably second time to the shopping centre haha. To be fair, Macquarie takes like an hour and a half to get to, which is okay for me but having to change trains like twice just turns me off it unless I need to go there lol. But yeah, my friends love Macquarie shopping centre though so we went~ and of course, I ate food hahaha.

I can't remember the prices of the dishes but they ranged from around $10-15 and we ordered 3 dishes that came to a total of around $38 or something with three people so it was fairly cheap and filling. I believe this shop is a Vietnamese Thai fusion and is called MQ Fusion (Shop 409 Level 4 Opposite Event Cinemas Macquarie Centre, 197-223 Herring Road, Macquarie Park); easily accessible to shoppers and those working near the centre. I saw quite a few office people having lunch here. It's a pretty small place that you'd probably walk past if you weren't looking, the only reason we stopped was because my friend saw salt and pepper soft shelled crab and pulled us in hahaha.

HAHAHA, sorry, I obviously was not awake since I didn't even bother moving the sauce etc to show you what the roast pork looked like hahaha. Well, doesn't matter anyway since I didn't like this dish. The meat was reallyyy hard! It seriously left me munching on it for days, I thought I'd never finish it lol. It's quite lightly salted, probably to complement the sauce that I wasn't really into since I don't like dipping roast pork in any sort of sauce but yeah, wish it was tender.

This Salt and Pepper Soft Shell Crab although looked really good, had quite a thick batter so I wasn't the biggest fan for it. In addition, even though it was salt and pepper, it was really bland and so you were practically forced to dip it into the sauce if you wanted any sort of taste to it, Sauce was a bit sour and refreshing which was a nice complement but not my cup of tea.

My motto for trying new restaurants is always that there needs to be at least one safe dish that can't go wrong and this time, it was the Pad See Ew for me and I'm so glad we picked it because this was actually really good! It was lightly sweet but not overpowering at all and had a good balance of veggies and beef making it a very comforting dish. Beef was very nice and tender as well. I wouldn't have minded if there was more meat though hahaha!

I'm not particularly impressed with this place especially since 2/3 dishes weren't what I would've liked but I think for a quick and cheap lunch with a good ol' pad see ew, it's definitely worth it. But yeah, I wouldn't come back again.

Food Review | Bar Asia, Parramatta

Before I start, just wanted to say that I started another blog on stuff like anime and manga reviews + me trying to study Japanese and maybe some Chinese every now and then lol, just to separate things and make it more organised but also give me some more freedom in rampaging on about my interest in anime haha. This is the link if you're interested! =D

I think the day that food in parra is all going to become expensive is soon lol especially since they're trying to make Parramatta like the next CBD zzz. While I'm glad that there's more options of food in parra these days, the prices seem to go along with it. Everything I fondly remember of this place when I studied here in high school is sort of lost but whatever, my opinion won't stop this place from changing and it's supposed to be a 'good change' after all~ 

Anyway, I saw a drool-worthy dish of Bar Asia's (277B Church Street, Parramatta) on Instagram, so I happily suggested it to my friend for us to try it out for lunch. Although it is a bit more on the expensive side, we thought we'd just treat ourselves once in a while! (Although I probably treat myself all the time lol) There was no line and there were around 10 tables inside with a couple outside so pretty spacious and the food was served really quickly after I ordered at the counter. Efficiency at its best!

Lemon Grass Beef Vermicelli ($13.90)

This was the one I saw on Instagram! It looks pretty good yeah?! It has fresh herbs, bean sprouts, cucumber, fried onion, peanuts and dressing that makes it look so appetising~ The beef was very tender and the best part of the dish obviously hehe but I wasn't very fond of the dressing. Maybe it's because I usually eat pho when I have Vietnamese food but I thought that this was too sour for me. It was refreshing but it had that strong taste of fish sauce that I didn't really like with the noodles since it soaks it all up. The dish also has a lot of veggies so it's a well balanced meal but yeah, not my thing.

Grilled Chicken Vermicelli ($13.90)

My friend ordered this one which was basically the above except with grilled chicken; which was really tender and yummy as well. 

Pork Belly with cucumber + hoisin sauce ($5.90 each)

Dayuum, these sliders were expensive hahaha. Saddeningly, some of my pork belly was a bit hard so it wasn't as tender as I thought it would be. In addition, there was an overload of hoisin sauce which even the freshness of the cucumber couldn't save and so it just became super salty after a few bites. Otherwise, nice and fluffy bun yay~

Vietnamese Iced Coffee ($5.50)

Frankly, I've never actually tried Vietnamese iced coffee, so this was my first time! But, surprisingly, I really liked it! It was a tad bit too sweet but that's okay, I love sweet stuff. It was also really smooth and milky. I would recommend this. But, don't leave it for too long, otherwise the ice will melt (just like minee) and then it'll taste like water eughh.

Overall, I think it was an all right place but considering the price and that I don't often eat Vietnamese food anyway, probably unlikely I'd come back. Maybe I should have tried their Shaken Beef dish, that sounds yummy haha! But yeah, nah, I think I prefer my food more plain.