4. Mechanics, Continued

Apple’s headset; the microphone is circled in red. It’s about 4.5" from the point where the wire enters the right earbud.

Apple’s microphone and built-in switch are very close to your mouth; about 4.5" from the bottom of the place where the wire enters the right earbud. The mic on the Rivet headset is quite far from your mouth, the closest I could get the Rivet mic to the place where the wires enter the earbuds was 21.25".

The built-in switch on each headset’s microphone worked exactly as it should, answering and hanging up on calls whether the iPhone was in active or sleep (but not power off) mode. If no phone call was in progress, the switches also started and stopped whatever music or other content was currently set up to play on the iPod part of the phone.

Finally, a word about the diameter of the earbud sound output ports on each headset. The Rivet’s sound output port is 0.125" in diameter, while the Apple’s is 0.50" in diameter. As you can see, the Apple headset’s sound output ports are significantly larger than those on the Rivet headset.

Each earbud on the Rivet headset has a sound output port that is 0.125" in diameter; the Apple earbud sound output ports are 0.50" in diameter.