Sennheiser Momentum On Ear Unboxing & Review
Linus Tech Tips
·Linus Tech Tips
·2014-05-07
·
1,919 words · ~9 min read
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Buy an Intel Knuck Barebones PC and get a limited edition t-shirt and in-game
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items for Planet Side 2. Click now to learn more. So, let's go back to my
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original unboxing of the Momentum for a moment. I called them fashion
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headphones, and I meant that in the most derogatory possible sense, and I was
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wrong. Honestly, it's a miracle Sennheiser talks to me at all at this point. I used a very flawed testing
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methodology. We all learn, I suppose. I only had about an hour with them, so
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they weren't properly broken in, and I was using what must be one of the worst
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audio sources in the world, which is the HTC1 with the stock media player that
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comes with it. I had recently switched from the iPhone 4 to this one, and I had
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no reason at the time to assume that this one would be so terrible, but I
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blamed it on the headphones, and I was incorrect to do so. So, like I said,
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miracle of miracles. Sennheiser reached out to me about their newer Momentum
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skew which at the time I didn't realize was different and that was less expensive and asked me to maybe take
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another crack at the Momentum series. So this my friends is the Momentum Onar. It
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is available in a variety of different colors from blue to green to ivory to
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pink. It uses an onar style. So that is to say it is supraoral and sits directly
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on your earlobe as opposed to around your ears sealing against your head and
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uses allcantara materials instead of leather. So this is still considered a
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premium material but obviously not to the same degree that leather is and
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that's present on both the ear pads as well as the top of the headband. In
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terms of accessories, we see some costing down here as well. So, the hard
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carry case that came with the original
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Momentum is replaced by a soft fabric
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carry case that honestly isn't particularly rugged, but it does have
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stiff boards in the front and the back, so I wouldn't expect your headphones to
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get completely destroyed sitting inside them. It's rugged enough for what you're
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putting inside them. It comes with a couple of different cables. So, one of them is just a straight connector cable.
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So, this locking connector goes into the bottom of the headphones here. And then
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there's a plain three-pole that goes into your media player. And then it also
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comes with an alternative four-pole connector. So, this one is a right angle
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connector and can be used to control audio on an iOS compatible device. So,
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you can control volume up and down. You can skip tracks, you can pause and play
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tracks and all that kind of good stuff. It also comes with a little carry pe bag
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bag that has a drawstring. You can put it in this and then inside the hard
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shell or you can just chuck it in this and throw it in your bag, which is what I think a lot of people are more likely
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to do just because portability is key. It's called Momentum. Build quality
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hasn't been degraded from the original Momentum. Every stitch is perfect. It's
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got gorgeous little color shifting Sennheiser logos on either side. Little
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Momentum badges that are perfectly attached and none none of it comes
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apart. It's screwed together. So, they use little torque screws on the insides
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of the headband to hold everything together. And it really does feel in
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spite of the thinness of the metal used and the lightweightness of the whole
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thing very very solid. I even I mean it's even little things like they put
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holes in the metal aside from the ones that slide in order to adjust the ear
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cups presumably just to reduce weight.
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Now let's get into the somewhat tricky
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part, a bit of a sticking point for these for me, and that's fit and comfort. out of the box within about 10
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to 15 minutes, my ears would be so
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tender that I could barely press on them like this. I don't tolerate Super Ral
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headphones very well, and these were not any kind of exception. With that said,
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the Alcantara material breathes extremely well, and they're quite
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comfortable in that sense. So, and they sound really great, so I wanted to give
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them a chance. After a couple weeks, they're quote unquote special foam. They
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don't call it memory foam, so I don't know what kind of foam it is, but it's special foam. That's what that's what
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they call it. Um, after a couple weeks, it did start to break in. It is
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springier than your typical memory foam. So, I kind of saw that and I went,
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"Shoot, these are going to be putting a lot of pressure on me at the start, but
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maybe maybe they'll break in." And they did. And this isn't the first time I've
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had that experience with Sennheiser. My HD555s fit like a glove. Now, they
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sucked. When I first got them, the clamping force was way too tight. And
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that is something that you can adjust quite easily with the Momentum on ears due to the metal construction of the
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headband. The headband itself actually speaking of which is not really my
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favorite design either. The original Momentum are a little bit cushionier but
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both of them are are quite hard. It's these two somewhat hard material bands
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across your head and I did find myself rather than wearing them in a more
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natural position which would be closer to the crown. I did find myself shifting
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them forward a little bit to get the weight distribution better, which feels a little bit more unnatural for me, but
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did improve the comfort dramatically. Now that I've had them well over a
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month, I'm able to easily wear them for a couple hours without them being
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uncomfortable. So guys, if you do decide to buy them, buy them from a place with
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a great return policy that's like 14 days or 30 days. Spend a bunch of time
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with them and find out if they're going to be okay for you in the longer term.
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Remember, I'm a bit of an, you know, outside sort of scenario. I wear
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earrings all the time and that really doesn't help with Super Ral headphones.
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Now it's into listening time. I validated with the on ears as well that
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that stock HTC1 player makes them sound like junk. There are alternate solutions
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out there. So Power Amp is one that's quite popular because it does have a
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graphical EQ. However, EQ is not the beall and endall of making music sound
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better. Just it just isn't. And I've
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discovered since then that Apollo is a fantastic little music player. However,
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it's not on the Play Store anymore. So, you will have to run out and look for
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it, but I can no longer tell the difference between the output from my HTC1 and the one from my iPhone 4. Now,
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I can't really apologize for this cuz I am what I am. I didn't listen to
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classical music with it. I'm a top 40 listener. It's terribly mastered. It's,
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you know, compressed. It's this, it's that, all that stuff. I'm sorry, but I
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am what I am. And I believe that I'll be using these the same way that most
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people who buy something like this will be using them. I plugged it into my
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phone and I listen to the kind of music I listen to. And honestly, I love them.
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I actually like the sound of the on ears better than the original Momentum. And
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I'm not quite sure why it is, but it may have something to do with the fact that
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the original Momentum don't seal quite right at the bottoms of my ears. And
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that is an advantage of the superl design. It does allow them to seal
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against your ears very, very effectively, even if that does cause
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some discomfort at the beginning. So, this leaves us with final thoughts. You
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know what? If you want something portable that looks good, the Momentum
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Onears are definitely worth a look. Compared to other fashion headphones,
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they sound dramatically better than other ones I've heard. And I'm not
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saying, you know, I'm not even going to say Beats are terrible because if you
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believe Beats are terrible, you already know that you believe that. And if you don't believe they're terrible, you
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already know that, too. So, all I'm going to say is give something else a
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try. go somewhere and try the original Momentum if you have a bit of a bigger
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budget or try the Momentum on ears if you don't mind the Super Ral Design or
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you have a bit of a lower budget. Just give it a try because they sound so much
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better than many of the other solutions out there with respect to fashion
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headphones. With that said, you know, are they the best value in the world?
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Maybe not. Someone like some an IM lover like uh one of our employees here, Edel,
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is going to say, "Well, there's better values out there. They're even less bulky. They sound better. They cost
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less. Yes, IM exist. We're aware of this. For the same price as s sort of in
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the same price range as these Momentum, you can get Sennheiser IE8s, which
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undeniably sound better, but not everyone likes sticking things into
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their ears, and some people like their headphones to be a fashion accessory.
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Which leads us to yes, there are better values when it comes to over-the-ear
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headphones as well, but a lot of the time they don't have that same look and
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they don't have that same portability that something like a Momentum skew
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does. Not everyone wants to sit around on the bus with huge, you know, studio
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monitor cans on their ears. And while some people will do it, not everyone's
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into that. So, if you're looking for a fashion statement from a knowledgeable
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company that actually knows a thing or two about audio, consider the Momentum
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Onears, give them a try. That's all I can really say about them. I really
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liked them. Leave a comment with your feedback. What do you prefer? Would you
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rather have IM? You know, they're going to sound great. They're going to be a
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great value. Would you rather have, you know, overthe-ear large cans and just
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wear those out in public at your desk, wherever you happen to be, or do you
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prefer a different pair of headphones for different purposes? And would you be
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a fashion headphone buyer? Let me know what you think. Like the video if you
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liked it, dislike it if you disliked it, and leave a comment with the thing I
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said before about commenting. And as always, don't forget to subscribe.