I bought these duty free around a week ago; they were not cheap and advertise "bass pumping stereo sound". But the volume level when used with my latest generation iPod nano is unusably-low. I bought them for running but even the slightest traffic noise drowns out any spoken-word podcast and lyrics on music tracks.

I'm aware that Apple limit the volume on the nano and have turned off their Sound Check feature and set the volume to max, but it's no better.

I've also tried them with my Sensation XE Beats phone which is marginally better, but the sound quality is still very disappointing (not to mention that device is too big to run with, defeating the object).

Unless someone has a suggestion I need to find out how to return them, since they were bought in Dixons on the other side of security