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Review on Sennheiser HD 4.50 BTNC Bluetooth Wireless Headphones Featuring Active Noise Cancellation in Black and Silver by Sheppard Priest

Revainrating 3 out of 5

Great but not for big ears

I bought these from a Hong Kong seller on eBay. They paid more for that. I already have Urbanite Xl, Bluetooth. They have a very similar sound signature to the Urbanites. Here's what I liked about them: 1) APT-X doesn't slow down when watching movies and games. 2) Very good sound. I have an HD 600 that I use for music at home. It sounds as clear as they do. I have a lossless track with Katie Melua and Eva Cassidy singing "What a Wonderful World". Most headphones tend to pollute voices to the point where you can guess who's singing what. Not this one, you can clearly see the difference between them through these. 3) These headphones are a lot brighter than the HD 600 and have an amazing vibrancy that's easy to love. 4) Bass extension, bass guitar riffs sound real to my untrained ear. Close enough to the present (I play bass). When he's listening to a track like Melanie Martinez's Carousel, where other bass-heavy headphones like Beats Studio start to distort the sound, he plays with authority and clarity. It's nowhere near as bass-heavy as most other next-gen headphones, but it's not bass-shy either. When they play bass, they do it well. 5) I flew to Ireland and was stuck in a long downtime. The net duration including stop was 28 hours. Paired with a tablet I had enough for the whole time. I had to charge the tablet 5 times while driving, when I finally turned it off, that charge still worked. LiPo batteries are amazing. What I don't like 1) I know you. I admit I'm 6ft 1in and have elephant ears. However, I have no idea why Sennheiser can't make HD 600 sized Bluetooth headphones? I bought the Brainwavez hybrid earcups and they fit perfectly over the ears, but it needed tape and killed the look of the earbuds. same problem with my Urbanite XL. It's more like an Urbanite M than an XL.2) Bluetooth range is good enough for 15-20 feet, GO, after that it cuts out. This most likely won't be an issue for anyone, but my $15 Revain Kinivo Bluetooth headphones have 3x the range. Don't know why Sennheiser can't do this? It's not a deal breaker for me, but I worry that $15 headphones might outperform them. 3) The headband has no real cushioning. It's better than the city, but hardly. After several hours of listening, my head starts to hurt. I fixed it with an extra panel but it looks really bad. 4) The noise cancellation is a compromise experiment, I think it's halfway between full isolation and zero noise cancellation. I think it's because total isolation gives some people headaches/earaches. I used to spend hours at the Marines range using BHP (Ballistic Hearing Protection). These are actually foam-based earbuds with a fancy name. In any case, the lack of ambient noise doesn't bother me. So for people like me, I would like to see more aggressive noise cancellation. Maybe three levels of adjustable noise reduction with an aggressive setting for the last level. At +/- $150 they are great. But if noise-cancelling is all you need and sound quality is as important to you as Nigeria's current drought, I'd recommend Bose headphones. Otherwise they are pretty cool and sound a little better than the Urbanite XL.

Pros
  • Quality construction
Cons
  • Requires outlet

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