Sony's new headphones promise to drown out all outside noise
BERLIN -- Wireless, noise-cancelling headphones that are also comfy and look good aren't that easy to find. Companies including Bose, Beats, Plantronics and Sony have been trying to find a perfect formula for years, but there's always one or two components missing for that perfect package.
At this year's IFA show in Berlin, which will officially start tomorrow, Sony is unveiling the MDR-1000X, its top-of-the-line set of wireless, noise-cancelling headphones with a set of features few such devices can match.
The headphones are of the closed variety, meaning they don't let a lot of sound in or out. The 98/103 dB/mW sensitivity (depending on whether the power is off or on) and a 4 - 40,000 Hz frequency response indicate good sound, but due to the listening environment of the Sony IFA booth not being the best, we'll reserve judgement for a review.
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The noise cancelation, which according to Sony should be "industry leading," was good in the noisy environment, but still not good enough to make us go "Wow." Truth be told, these types of headphones are best tested on buses and plains, where they kill the engine droning; they rarely subdue voices from the outside, of which there were plenty where we tried them on. The headphones do have a "Personal NC Optimizer" feature, which tailors the noise cancellation to each individual pair of ears, but we didn't have the time to get cozy with it.
The Sony MDR-1000X headphones have a couple of other interesting features. The Quick Attention mode lets the sounds from the outside in when you place your hand on the side of the headphone; we've seen a similar feature -- in the form of a button -- on Plantronics' BackBeat Pros.
Finally, the Ambient Sound Mode fine-tunes the noise cancellation so that the headphones catch the ambient sounds from outside, while still killing unwanted noises.
Sony's MDR-1000X headphones will be available in black and gray-beige and cost 330 pounds ($439) when they become available in October.
Stan is a Senior Editor at Mashable, where he has worked since 2007. He's got more battery-powered gadgets and band t-shirts than you. He writes about the next groundbreaking thing. Typically, this is a phone, a coin, or a car. His ultimate goal is to know something about everything.
