Do Beats Headphones Still SUCK?
Linus Tech Tips
·Linus Tech Tips
·2019-05-06
·
3,310 words · ~16 min read
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step into my office lonis take a look at my Wares yeah I'm pretty sure I'm the
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one who paid for them okay so here's what happened we were going to review
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the Microsoft Surface headphones because we were intrigued Microsoft wait a
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second you didn't even pay for these they sent them to us okay these ones yes
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I paid for other ones and these well I paid for these which hurt as much as
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paying for all the other ones combined yes okay so basically what happened was
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we were going to review these and Microsoft sent us a review sample two
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three weeks after everyone else's reviews were already up and we were like okay we need a new angle so we're going
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to turn it into a four-way Roundup of
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the premium noise cancelling over
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headphones on the market this time not failing to include Sony's offering the
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wh1000x M3s so James has prepared sort
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of a a blind taste test of sorts I guess
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you only need your ears though if you were blind would it matter no it
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wouldn't and you know what else wouldn't matter if you guys listened to this
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message from our
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sponsor I want to unbox these ones no you have okay so each of us will start
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with one of the sort of wellestablished players okay well I mean I guess
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arguably this is is well established but maybe not with our audience so much so
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I've got the Sony wh 1000x M3s and I
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have the Bose Qui Comfort 35s version 2's Google Assistant these are similar
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but yours is kind of nicer I like this this has got like kind of a crush
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resistant that presses quite a bit yeah this divider actually serves a couple of
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purposes you have one of these though uh yeah actually oh and you can see you can
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actually see what's in yours Sony's done a good job of their case here so it
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holds your you got your air airplane adapter yeah mine are just sitting in
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there you've got your 3 and 1/2 mm Jack in case you're a caveman and your phone
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still has one of those on it you've got I don't like how short this cable is but
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check this out USB type-c charging on
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the Sony love that everything USB type-c
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all the things
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please it's all it's equally short uh
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but it's also micro okay let's do uh let's open up the
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beats and the and the surface I'm expecting this to be like the greatest
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unboxing experience of all time because
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from what I've heard about the headphones themselves it better be the
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greatest unboxing experience of all time I've got it upside down I got
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this I'm expecting steam to come out no
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change the way you hear sound to make
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these headphones sound better okay I'm being a jerk I'm being a
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jerk I actually haven't tried headon in a long In fairness it's pretty robust
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feeling it doesn't have like an actual reinforcement no it's not low profile
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you can actually see like compared to the Sony it is quite a lot thicker and
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same goes actually for everyone everyone else well these guys went with the wider
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flatter ooh do these even fold though
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they don't fold what they don't fold
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what uh okay so I just get this cable
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okay so 3 and 12 m and I just what throw it in there 3 and mil oh but I do get a
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nice long charging cable micro
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b USBC nice and then I get a carabiner
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industrial design wise I would say these are like the dad hat of headphones what
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dad hat he doesn't understand that Dad hats are in I mean I just mean they're
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not that flashy or modern they're kind of the standard they still look great
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matte black is always a good idea and honestly you're no more
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dad hat than these yeah I am those are smoother one thing that stands out about
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these to me is you hear that that's
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brutal nice swiveling ear cups though and same here one thing they've done
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well is look how deep the cushioning on the top bar is squeeze
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mine yeah actually not not impressed
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with that said but everyone knows bows are comfortable over long periods yes
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they are and part of it is that they they grip R the side of your head a little bit more I feel like these are
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relying a little more on the top headbands than the qc35s do I think it
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is just the way these seal around your ear and kind of grab onto your head but it's not uncomfortable they've basically
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got it perfect all right this is what I'm really curious about though cuz I've
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tried those I've encountered these before these are heavier did you see
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that though there is almost no padding on the headband that click that's
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satisfying they nailed that these don't fold at all oh a nice headband though
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basic ratchet no swivel yeah I feel do
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the air ear cups do a bit right not much not really yeah barely when you take
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them off you want them to go on your shoulders level and stuff like that oh
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you seem like the kind of person who actually used to wear overthe ear
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headphones in public these don't go as big as the
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other ones either see they didn't get the they didn't get the cage Force right
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I feel like those aren't really even over ear they're like somewhere between
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on ear and over ear my ears touched the drivers and it's like just a hard
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plastic that's a real bummer and that over time that can be uncomfortable
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really nice foam on the ear cups though although I don't know if it's quite as
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nice as the Sony's Sony's have just like this
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spectacular memory foam on here I'd be more comfortable at the office with
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those than on the bus if you're trying to get laid this is the these are what
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you need headband a little bit on the skinny
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and not padded enough side for me but I think they've done a better job of the
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clamping pressure oh we haven't tried any headbang tests
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give me like
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a all those are done already
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whoa not bad they hold pretty well give me these hold
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on okay that's Bose clear
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Victory okay Sony won I would say Bose
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next say Bose two uh tie for third then
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cuz I don't think either of them really stands out to me so the second ranking
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is feel and comfort and we're going Sony Bose in
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first then surface then beats and then
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for the headbang test clear ass
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Victory um everyone else fail tied for
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second I'm calling all the others a fail so we can go with that if you want
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whatever so right now what we're testing is interacting okay so play pause skip
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go back turn the volume up and down okay so I actually have butt but on the Bose
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up and down for volume and then you double click this to go forward triple
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click to go back single click for play and pause what's new is this button
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which would it's called the action button you can toggle between noise
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cancelling on noise cancelling off or you can use it to activate the Google
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assistant so one tap will the Google Assistant will tell you your notifications and stuff and if you hold
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it down you're going to summon the assistant and then you can talk cool as
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for oh wait wait wait wait there's one more thing only the bows have this and I
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actually think it's huge an actual toggle for on so my navigation is all
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handled via touch then okay so that's volume up is it beeping when you do that
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I can't hear you volume down volume down volume down volume down does it go beep
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yes it does how do you feel I actually don't mind it now there is a physical
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button back here that I just found so that would be for my assistant try a
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double there it
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is okay so with that button you found a the
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back it's the same deal as with the bows where if you don't hook up the Google
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Assistant that's your button for turning on noise cancelling and then ambient and
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then off it toggles through them but if you do hook up the Google Assistant you
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lose that and you use it to hail the assistant so then you have to use your
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app on your phone to turn on the ambient and all that stuff I don't prefer it and
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I'd rather have a physical button personally I tend to agree these I want
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to try the be so this is not capacitive these have buttons so you only get the
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one button so press once to start and stop twice I'm assuming next
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track it's feels really cheap that was what I noticed too it's nice having a
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physical button but that like the sound of it as you're pressing you hear it and
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the feel of it is awful the feel of it is really cheap another one thing you
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can do though allegedly is if you double click and hold you'll fast forward if
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you triple click and hold you'll go back but I couldn't get it to work on my Android phone maybe it works with the
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iPhone or something I think so can you even do volume up and down on this
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here's the be logo there's an outer ring oh there we go but then but then you
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can't use the side right yeah no the sides don't do anything that's so weird
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that's the thing that's always bothered me about Beats why have such a cheap
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button the thing is that apple is literally in my mind anyway the king of
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haptic feedback these are how much 350
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they're all 350 okay can I tried the surfaces no man
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I'm trying the surfaces these I think in my opinion are the Undisputed interface
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Kings check this out the volume is a knob nice it's really smooth to turn and
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then on this side you turn it one way for turning up the noise cancellation
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and you turn it the other way and it turns up the ambient noise oh so totally
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I don't have to go into the app like all the other ones you have to go into the app and set that they also have
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capacitive ear cups for the pausing and seeking but it's both ear cups so you
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can just use either and there's also a mute button on here I do like this
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that's nice e it feels good
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so interface C clear winner for me for the interface yeah oh we should mention
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these also have uh Google assistant and Cortana and Alexa inter integration yeah
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Cortana there's a separate app you can get cortana's dead now though you heard
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about that right what yeah Microsoft admits Cortana and also ran yeah it's
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rough it's rough I'm willing to say I personally I'd give the edge to Bose
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just because I don't like touch interfaces as much but I'm willing to
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say tie here because it comes down a personal preference with the cable that
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comes with it oops oh an inline remote there's
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inline controls I mean do you disagree would you put this above any of the
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other three hell no no all right no no no all right this is the airplane sound
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okay not bad First Impressions wow big
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difference and that my friends is why Bose has so much respect when it comes
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to noise cancellation with that said I'd say the Sony cancellation is damn near
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as good but I don't feel the same pressure on my ears with bow they've
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done such a great job of tuning that my face is like this cuz I just heard the
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music you were playing I Love My Little Pony's music
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definitely weaker I don't think these are even
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working yeah those are that's on yeah that's that's on this is just a much
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less aggressive algorithm that they're using so they're leaving in some of the
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higher pitch of the airplane and they're only taking out the low Rumble but
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that's also why you're not getting that same pressure on the ears that you get
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from the Sony I'd say they're the worst in that regard out of the bunch I don't
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know I think I kind of like the Sony I think even pressure-wise I might prefer
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this just to totally confuse everybody
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okay wait we can do there's one more test sure variable high frequency noises
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like your worst
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nightmare I can really hear them fighting it so in terms of loudness I'd
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say this is about like having the baby about two rows away Sony does less to
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the tonality of the baby cry but probably blocks as much of the raw noise
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I think the baby gets more annoying with the surface
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headphones these are just terrible the noise cancellation on these is not very
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good are they even on yes they're
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on if you have to ask that's not a good sign really oh yeah it's on it just
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sucks that's another clear win for both Bose and Sony in my mind yeah agreed and
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a clear loss for honestly these weren't great either clear loser clear also
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loser third it's not second yeah it's not close it's it's a distant second
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close second well close to third so yeah let's do let's do a quick listen he we
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should listen to the same song though you give me one of your songs I'm I'm
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I'm down I'm down it's pretty crunchy not bad I find the bass a little
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bit more natural sounding on these oh yeah they're they do have a different
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signature but a little smoother I would say they're pretty similar me too
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okay
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withhold I find both of these lacking distinctly in completely different ways
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I find vocals don't really come through very clearly on
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these no Basse no B ironically you would
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think that these had the would have the most overstated bass but it's not even
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like muddy and overpowered just there's just really nothing there um these ones
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I felt I detected a little bit of distortion I couldn't put my finger on
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it um they were clearly not as good as either the Sony's or the Bose but I
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preferred them to the beat I felt that these had a wider Sound Stage uh these
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are a little narrower a little tennier but to be clear I think for a lot of
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people any one of these will be good enough I agree with that I mean given
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that most people are fine with like ear pods like truly the ones that just with
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your head phone yes I I don't think anyone's going to pick up one of these
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for a few hundreds and say oh well the
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sound quality simply I mean you're buying them because they're Wireless you're buying them because they're noise
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cancelling and you're buying them because of the interface or or the
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assistant or whatever other features it is that you care about which is why I
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think honestly when it comes time for the conclusion
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here it's so much more complicated than just like which one sounds the best and
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is the most comfortable because there's a lot to these so why don't you do your
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rankings first and then overall overall
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well I mean sound I think we've got a pretty clear hierarchy don't we once
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again these two are clearly the best if you're a more Discerning listener I'd go
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for either of these then these then
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these okay you know what I'll let you go first for the overall overall the
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overall it's time for overall it's time for the overall overall My overall
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ranking the bow number two the Sony number three and I really like this
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interface but overall number three the these These are good I would still buy
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these the noise cancelling sucks true okay go ahead I'm going to let you
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finish good enough for an office good enough for an office they also don't
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fold so on the go for a plane definitely get these don't buy these ever okay so
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I'm going to go ahead and I'm going to say I'm not even going to rank these two
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so then between these two I mean really
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it comes down to physical buttons versus
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touch interface but then USB type-c oh
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yeah and the fast charging Sony there it is you did it Sony you did
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it don't even bother Sony or if you don't like the Sony get the bows but I
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just I wouldn't even if you can if they're beside each other at Best Buy
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