Generic IR headphones work with rear-seat entertainment.

[donkmeister]

This might be useful information for anyone who would benefit from using the rear-seat entertainment on journeys but doesn't want to buy the official Lexus headphones for £110 a pair. 

My LS460 was missing the headphones when I bought it... TBH no great loss as I didn't fancy wearing 15 year old second hand headphones anyway 😆

From some investigation I learned that the signal is transmitted via IR, and uses a standard modulation so you don't actually need specific Lexus headphones. So, as an experiment I bought some cheap eBay IR headphones, £15 a pair. They arrived this morning and sure enough, they work. Stereo sound, sat in the rear of the car only. 

So, any generic dual channel IR headphones should work but the ones I bought are on eBay as "XTrons Dual Channel IR Headphones".

If you were to get the same ones as me; what are they like? Well, unsurprisingly for £15 they are not going to be scaring Sennheiser and Sony. But, I think on the whole I'm very happy with what I've got for £15. Sound quality is decent enough; I watched a few minutes of a DVD, listened to a few minutes of FM radio and then had a few minutes of some bass-heavy music, and they handled it all just fine. The highs weren't sparkling, the bass didn't grip me, but I don't know how much of that is the IR transmission system and how much is the headphones. The spec sheet appears to be honest, which is refreshing too. I'd say they are more than adequate for watching a film during a long car journey. For £15 I'm not going to be precious about them either, whereas the official Lexus ones being £110 a pair I'd be a bit dubious about letting some people use them.

They sort-of fit in the rear door pockets when folded; they definitely don't fit in the remote control compartment but I tried!

 

[chatmandu]

Hi Donkmeister, 

My second hand RX 400h has the premium in car entertainment system, but no remote control or headphones. 

I've ordered a set of those Xtron headphones, so thanks for sharing that information. 

I can see you've got a remote control. Do you happen to know the remote codes? 

Thanks, 

[Cotswold Pete]

Infrared is able to deliver high quality - and maybe the headphones need a bit of running in to get to sounds at their best.

Recently bought some ne AKG phones for home and once they had about 40 hours of use they sounded as good as the reviews suggested.  Bass better and highs better defined.

[donkmeister]

On 6/1/2023 at 11:38 AM, chatmandu said:

Hi Donkmeister, 

My second hand RX 400h has the premium in car entertainment system, but no remote control or headphones. 

I've ordered a set of those Xtron headphones, so thanks for sharing that information. 

I can see you've got a remote control. Do you happen to know the remote codes? 

Thanks, 

Sorry for late response. No idea about the codes I'm afraid, the original remote was still with the car when I bought it. 

[Bluemarlin]

On 6/1/2023 at 11:38 AM, chatmandu said:

I can see you've got a remote control. Do you happen to know the remote codes? 

Thanks, 

If you can find out who makes the player Lexus uses, and the model, then a unversal remote like Harmony will likely have it in its database.

I vaguely recall reading somewhere that the manufacturer was Veba, in which case, for a fiver, you might want to take a chance on this:

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/334926716741?hash=item4dfb301f45:g:~GgAAOSw9qdkmaaC&amdata=enc%3AAQAIAAAA8CrGigjocb4gW6Qfd3ot7o3bg7RyUYA6lg3PWFKa%2B9vbM1Z6Kc4dD2Rq1jEpKr18%2FCCvwwn2Y%2Fx3ziTa%2FqxPHL8dtpTmagG6ezXLrBvssr7Y4fh8tFTPpVRLEI9YOlbFaPjIPR8IGWyIOADb8IEE1Wd8WEpIgzCi%2BPaMHY4iRn6Av4bVl%2FYdcBZf8MmMP2h%2FQ5iFcwTOSG8GPKToVG8U659MflF0lJIfEZwIgXvY0vI11CZ4BggcVJo9rOl9kdsmbfdgbIaY7237dv3hwVILqmj19iGRvND56EIqIVsFCmkBMHIiJiOJ8vIz6s6zFQuowA%3D%3D|tkp%3ABk9SR-b6gOmmYg

 

 

[ColinBarber]

The original ICE system for the RX series II (screens in headrest) is Veba. 

[chatmandu]

Brilliant.

I'll try and get a replacement from eBay.

Thanks for taking the time to reply.