These are the best kept secret in the world of pragmatic audiophiles. Neither retailers, nor publishers of high-brow audiophilia want you to know how good these are because you may just stop paying attention to the four-figure stuff 😉

And “these” are back once again for ordering at Massdrop, just in time for the holidays, it’s the Massdrop X KOSS KSC-75X Clip-ONs going for a very down to earth price of $20 with free US shipping and returns, and discounted international shipping. They come with the usual Koss limited lifetime warranty.

One difference between these and the original KSC-75 is that the Massdrop edition has a utilitarian 1-button remote/mic for the smartphone/tablet/DAP users 🙂

This drop is in “pre-order status” with nine days left (as of the time of writing) and they are estimated to ship in late November 2020.

I’m going to jump onto this for sure (unless I forget like the previous time) because my trusty old KSC-75 (which I found on the clearance/trash-bin of an Office Depot (if I recall correctly)) [see text and pictures unboxing] has now become “mono” [only one side plays sound]…

This one you can HYPE HYPE HYPE without fear!

PS: this has the added benefit of not messing your hair (for those lucky enough to have hair that is) and it doesn’t put too much pressure on your head and jaw with prolonged use (eg some over-ears and on-ears) or doesn’t keep your ears sealed to the world for too many hours (eg in-ears)… These type of clip-ons and the classic earbuds are, in my humble opinion, the easiest on the ears, especially for prolonged use…

Quite possible one of the best bang for the buck headphones out there and now it comes with a mic/remote combination thanks to the Massdrop KSC-75X edition. And this goes for just $20 with free US shipping and returns, and a lifetime KOSS warrant to boot! And you can change the earpads.

In case you are not familiar, these are open clip-ons, and among other things they are a lightweight alternative to over-ear headphones for long listening sessions for various reasons (heat, eyeglasses, discomfort, skull pressure, hairstyles, toothaches, headaches, etc, etc).

I have the original KSC-75 that I “rescued” from the clearance bin of an office supply store a few years ago, and have a text & pictures unboxing of them. I do not yet have the KSC-75X but I will be placing an order of this mic/remote version.

For those not familiar, Massdrop has something they call “in-stock drops”. This is what normal-model retailers (eg Amazon, Best Buy, Target, etc) call in-stock and ready to ship. The items are in-stock at Massdrop and ship within one business day after you order them. You don’t have to wait for weeks and weeks for shipment…

And if you are a fan of the Koss way of things but also want to have the modern luxury of a mic/remote, the Koss x Massdrop partnership [yes, you can find fanfics about those two] has two of the very classic Koss models with a single remote and microphone on the cable offered as in-stock drop with free USA shipping and returns and the usual Koss lifetime warranty.

The two models are the open-back lightweight on-ears, yes, you guessed it, the PORTA PRO X going for just $25 in the classic black color scheme. The other one is the (semi)-open-back clip-ons KSC-75X going for $17 with a single button remote with mic on the cable as well.

I’ll leave the debate on how to classify clip-ons to y’all as they are a bit on-ear and a bit earphone 🙂

A lot has been written about these two headphones, and given the prices and free US shipping and returns they are among the best bang for the buck options out there ~ especially if you want a mic/remote combo. After all, even dedicated DAPs make use of the in-line remote controls these days ~ even my good old Fiio X1 DAP does dat [read the last three words faster and faster]…

I don’t [yet] have these Koss X models, but I’ve had the good old KSC-75 clip-ons for a while know ~ I “rescued” them from the clearance bin of an office supply chain store!

I love my good old Koss KSC-75 open-ish clip-ons, which by the way I found in the clearance bin at an Office Depot (if memory serves me well) a few years ago. They are small enough you can use them in bed, especially if you sleep on the side (eg listening to podcasts or audiobooks). Or if you don’t like things hanging on your ears while you sleep, you can set them on or near or under the pillow and use them as mini speakers. But they don’t have a remote, which makes it a pain if you use DAPs or PADs (phones as DAPs) and like to frequently pause sound.

Fear not however, help is on the way. As part of the new ship, Koss X Massdrop [yes, there are fanfics about these two!], they have released a version of the KSC-75 with a mic/remote (a one-button remote), the KSC-75X, and it is an in-stock drop at Massdrop for just $17. Despite the small price, they do come with the Koss limited lifetime warranty!

US shipping is FREE BUT they are also offering expedited shipping options for more… International shipping is not bad ~ all the countries I tried in the shopping cart showed a flat $5 shipping fee. And it makes sense, these are tiny little things.

I don’t YET have the new KSC-75X but I had posted a text and pictures unboxing of the good old KSC-75. I don’t know if the packaging is the same as the new KSC-75X. One could argue this might be the best bang for the buck headphone? I’m sure there are hundreds of threads on this topic in the forums, enough to spend a few years reading non-stop 🙂

A close-up of my good old KSC-75 [not the KSC-75X sold by Massdrop]:

PS: “in-stock drops” are products that Massdrop has available in their warehouse, so they ship within a couple of business days of purchase. The “XX hours left” does not mean the listing will end. Rather, every 24 hours the listing closes, and every order that was placed during those 24 hours gets processed and shipped. So, unlike the traditional Massdrop offers that have a 5-day or 7-day window, the “in-stock drops” continue daily until Massdrop runs out of them.