Why did I buy this when I said I liked the Sennhesier ones? It was simple. I needed to connect to more laptops.
I use three laptops to do my work as a consultant. One the client gives to me, and two are personal. One has Linux and the other has Windows because the consulting company needed it for my onboarding. Otherwise I would dual boot it to the Linux.
The Sennhesier can connect to two devices. It is connected to the laptop for the client and my iPhone. That way when people call I don’t have to take off my headset I can just answer it. That leaves the other two laptops without headphones.
During the day I have to research answers for questions that the client has. Since I don’t want to disturb my neighbors and I focus better with headphones, I thought I would buy a cheap second pair. This also allows me to have a backup pair of headphones in case the main one breaks. I have been using them yesterday and they work great.
How do they compare to the headphones that are 3 times more expensive? The sound is very good and certainly adequate to me. Some reviewers in larger publications said that it lacked bass response. You can adjust that in the smartphone app which I didn’t bother to download. To me I don’t enjoy heavy bass so it isn’t a minus.
The comfort is different than the Sennhesier. The Sennhesier goes over the ears and this rests directly on them. You would think that would be less comfortable, but these are so light and so little pressure that I don’t mind. They are more comfortable to me than earbuds which I never could feel comfortable using. They also don’t have that strange sense of pressure that the other headphones do in my inner ears and they block the noise and I don’t notice outside sounds when music is on.
Writing this review I put them on just to block noise without music on and they do a great job. The Sennhesier over the ear design is slightly better at blocking noise without music, but they also create that sense of pressure which I don’t like. I have to take off the Sennhesier regularly to let my ears “breath” or it feels uncomfortable. Yesterday I had these on all day without any sense of that kind of discomfort.
Both of these headphones are an improvement in comfort over Bose noise canceling headphones that I bought in the past. Those were very uncomfortable and cheaply made. I will not ever buy Bose again. I am also disinclined to buy Sony after the way that they treated me with the PS5 store issue. When companies treat you badly, you don’t support them. So I am open-minded with companies that say they do noise canceling. I am not open-minded enough to go with Ankler. I have experienced their products and am not impressed. I would not buy anything from Ankler.
These headphones were pretty cheap. They cost about $40 on sale at a retailer. The build quality isn’t great but for the price they are acceptable. That is really the only negative to this product which it is questionable how long they will last. However with that said I have a Bluetooth speaker from JBL which has lasted for 3 years and is still going strong. I have had a good experience with JBL generally so I am hopeful.
Does this mean I am not using the Sennhesier anymore? Far from it. I use it everyday in my meetings with my client. It is my main headphones and I am just adding an supplemental pair for backup and testing. Its fun to test new products.