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If you don't object to earphones as opposed to headphones, I'd look into Etymotic earphones which have high noise isolation due to their snug fit in the ear canal as opposed to phase cancellation which I believe Bose uses. Physically isolating the music from ambient noise as opposed to phase cancelling the noise would seem a truer or cleaner method. The high noise isolation of the Etymotic earphones should allow for listening at lower levels; less likely to have to listen at potentially harmful levels. I wish I could offer first hand experience but I have not heard the Ety's. I plan to pick up a pair of ER6i earphones to use while flying or in the bus with my iPod. They can be had at discount on eBay for around $90. I can say that Mead Killion, owner/founder of Etymotic is very well respected in audiology and acoustics circles. http://www.etymotic.com/ephp/epcomp.aspx
Etymotic is a good name, much more reasonable than Bose, which in many's opinion is too pricey (advertising sells! is how I look at Boses!). Noise isolation definitely is desirable from the perspective of fidelity, but how the eagplugs fit in one's ears is a challenge sometimes. I was recently on 2 international trips, to Australia and Africa, from the east coast, using one of those little MP3 music players, and did NOT have a noise-cancellation headphone. It was not very enjoyable in that the music was highly corrupted with the ambient noise in the cabin. So I just bought a little Phillips nose-cancellation earphones, and see how it works. After rebate, it cost me only $5 from buy.com, with Google checkout ($10 reduction, off the $14.99 price, dirt cheap). I tested the phones. While the music coming off the phones is somewhat disorted, but it's bearable. Not sure how it'll function in a plane cabin yet. I often wonder, is it worthwhile to spend $200, $300 to listen to MP3 type of music? I presently use a Sensa player. I suppose it's similar to an iPod. One cannot expect hi-hi-fi coming off these gadgets (I can be dead wrong. The iPod may be a true hi-fidelity player?). So, is it worth spending $300 for?
Can't ask for "hi-fi" in a cabin really! Thanks, George.
Quote from: goldlizsts on 7 Apr 2008, 08:26 pmEtymotic is a good name, much more reasonable than Bose, which in many's opinion is too pricey (advertising sells! is how I look at Boses!). Noise isolation definitely is desirable from the perspective of fidelity, but how the eagplugs fit in one's ears is a challenge sometimes. I was recently on 2 international trips, to Australia and Africa, from the east coast, using one of those little MP3 music players, and did NOT have a noise-cancellation headphone. It was not very enjoyable in that the music was highly corrupted with the ambient noise in the cabin. So I just bought a little Phillips nose-cancellation earphones, and see how it works. After rebate, it cost me only $5 from buy.com, with Google checkout ($10 reduction, off the $14.99 price, dirt cheap). I tested the phones. While the music coming off the phones is somewhat disorted, but it's bearable. Not sure how it'll function in a plane cabin yet. I often wonder, is it worthwhile to spend $200, $300 to listen to MP3 type of music? I presently use a Sensa player. I suppose it's similar to an iPod. One cannot expect hi-hi-fi coming off these gadgets (I can be dead wrong. The iPod may be a true hi-fidelity player?). So, is it worth spending $300 for? I don't listen to heavily compressed MP3's on my iPod. I am willing to sacrifice the number of available songs on my iPod for the quality of the songs.I agree that if you are playing heavily compressed MP3's on your portable device, it probably doesn't make much sense to spend hundreds on headphones.George
