Sennheiser Momentum Wireless Headphones - Masters of Isolation?
Linus Tech Tips
·Linus Tech Tips
·2015-05-07
·
1,601 words · ~8 min read
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sennheiser's momentum Wireless in theory
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just a Bluetooth radio and a battery strapped to a product that's already
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enjoyed significant critical and Commercial Success or is there much more
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to it than that well I took it with me on my recent trip to Asia to find
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out Intel's new 750 series ssds utilize
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the NVMe standard providing speeds never seen before on a consumer storage Drive
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click here to learn more so truthfully while my intention
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was to review the Sennheiser momentum wireless headphones on the plane ride to
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Taiwan at the beginning of my trip makes sense right active noise cancelling
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headphones on a plane the first time I ever actually had cause to use them was
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in a taxi van in koala lumper an
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exciting ride where I saw cows on the back of a truck drove on the shoulder of
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the road in a cab for the first time ever and my 8-month-old daughter had a
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massive poop explosion in her car seat that caused her to cry uncontrollably
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with nothing we could really do about it other than tune it out until we finally
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arrived at our destination for those who don't have kids the experience is about
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like
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this but there's good news with the momentum Wireless paired to my phone
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it's more like this
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so the noise isolation works but actually not necessarily and quite the
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way you'd expect just like its wired cousin the momentum Wireless features a
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closed back design so a lot of the ambient noise is actually passively BL
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blocked by the plastic ear cups and dense memory foam that's around the
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outside of your ears that's what reduces the baby's crying sound but unlike other
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more aggressive solutions that I've enced ened in the past sennheiser's
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active noise cancellation system which uses I I don't know like three
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microphones whatever correct me if I'm wrong I left that part out of my script
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to measure surrounding noise and generate its own white noise to cancel
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it out only really works on low frequency noises like the rumble of a
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train or the sound of other cars on the road now two of the major complaints
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about active noise cancellation or that it can cause a perceived pressure
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sensation on the ears and that it can alter the acoustic performance of the
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headphone by introducing its own flavor of background noise and while I
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definitely detect the pressure when momentum Wireless is powered on I don't
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find it as unpleasant as say for example Brandon's Bose qc1 15s and I cannot
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detect any actual White Noise sound coming out of them unless I
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intentionally break the ear cup seal with my ear by looking really far to the
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side for example the environment around me just sounds quieter which in my mind
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makes this headphone a commuter's delight since it blocks that constant
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droning sound that you hear while leaving important things like uh PA
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bulletins for example uninterrupted that is unless you've got your music turned
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up so loud that it drowns those out too there's nothing I can do about that
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which I guess Segways pretty well into the rest of my comments on the product
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now that I've spent literally half of the video introducing it and talking about the ANC feature it's the momentum
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2.0 with a battery and a Bluetooth module bolted to it and that's
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basically the momentum 1.0 with more
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robust ear cup wiring thicker leather covered ear cushions that actually help
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with the rock hard leather headband that for some reason made it into the 2.0
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revision and now a folding design the
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look is still a fantastic joining of classic Sennheiser and modern design
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languages that should appeal to Millennials and the more mature audien
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is alike and the product build quality is still outstanding with a combination
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of plastic surprisingly lightweight metal and leather
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construction okay I left out a couple small details obviously it weighs a bit
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more since it has a battery and some extra ports and buttons but all of this
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was pretty well implemented and the cushier ear cups compensate nicely for
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the extra weight again in spite of the armored top band the charging port
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although regrettably micro USB can be used at the same time as the optional
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3/2 mm headphone Port if you wanted to run it wired or if you're out of battery
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or whatever else the power button is both easy to reach and out of the way of
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accidental presses and finally onar music controls are handled fairly well
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with play/pause track skipping and
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volume control working flawlessly on my Motorola Android phone with my only
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complaint being that Sennheiser needs to revise the switch in the push button
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previous track is three presses so a mushy actuation Point actually makes it
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kind of hard to do accurately which leads us finally to the meet and
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potatoes of a headphone review how do they sound lonus man you just go on and
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on about other stuff it's like you're trying to pad your viewing session
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length numbers by teasing us with nonsense for 6 minutes before you get to
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the good part look you're even doing it right now okay well I'm sorry about that
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frankly I didn't put it off until the end for this one uh because of just
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wanting to tease you guys I did it because I don't really feel like I have
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that much to say they sound great in my usual Suite of top 40 trash and some
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high bit rate classical stuff so that I can pretend I'm working on reviewing
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headphones as opposed to just listening to music I like on high-end cans nothing
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I've tried in the last year has jumped out at me in this price range and said
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hey look at me I'm a clear competitor for both the style and sound quality of
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the siser momentums Lord knows the urbanites didn't so I feel like while
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Sennheiser probably could have improved the wireless version acoustically they
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maintained the status quo and tacked an extra 50 bucks on to the price for
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Bluetooth and and well Wireless so that ties into the
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conclusion then pretty nicely did you hate the momentums from the moment you
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laid eyes Andor ears on them or are you more of an IM guy when you travel like
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me well then these aren't likely to change your mind did you feel like the
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momentums were perfect except that they didn't fold had thinner ear pads and
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lacked a battery and a Bluetooth module would you pay a little extra for all that stuff well then you're the big
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