I've long suspected that if I was a man with more means, I'd be somewhat addicted to buying headphones. "There's a pair for every occasion!" The little audiophile inside me is often stymied by a lack of funds, and I usually have to settle for what you might call "ordinary" headphones. I'm not saying that I'm overly upset over this, though. It's actually a very good thing that I don't have the money to blow on multiple pairs of headphones on any whim.
As someone who claims to be an audiophile with a great love for headphones, I can't say I have much real experience. Like I said, I can't afford many of the luxurious high-end Audio-Technicas and Denons and Seinhausers and whatevers. I have, however, tested nearly every pair I've come into contact with, and I like to think I have a pretty good idea how high-quality audio should sound. Even distribution, good mid-ranges and low impedance are all top priorities for my critical ear, and it's surprisingly common to find one or more of these areas lacking among popular models.
Here I am with my first hardware review: the Audio-Technica ATH-ANC23 QuietPoint Active Noise-Cancelling In-Ear Headphones (a product name longer than its URL). I bought these prior to my flight to Guam. I was about to spend 13 hours on a plane and my stock Samsung Galaxy earbuds were not going to cut it (even though I'd consider Samsung's earbuds to be better-than-decent for freebies). I wanted in-ear headphones so that I could use them during pretty much any activity. I also wanted something with active noise-cancelling because, you know, planes are actively noisy. They also needed to be comfortable. And of course, they needed to be affordable.
The headphones come bundled with a velvet carrying pouch, an airline headphone adapter and ear-tips of various sizes. In addition to the standard silicone ear-tips, you also get memory foam "Comply" ear-tips. These took a bit of getting used to, but I found them to be slightly better at noise-cancelling and more comfortable over long stretches of time than any of the silicone tip sizes.
Now let's start off with the basics: These headphones are great. In fact, they are simply awesome. Okay, review's over.
But really, as far as sound quality goes, I could hardly be happier with these things. Audio-Technica has always been one of my favorite brands, but they're not immune to questionable design decisions, and in my experience, their budget-level headphones have been far from mind blowing. Since I bought this QuietPoint pair on sale, I wasn't sure where they would fall in terms of quality.
When I truly test a new pair of headphones, I always use high-bitrate music files that I'm intimately familiar with. For this pair, I chose to use what is perhaps my favorite album of all time: In Rainbows (discs 1 & 2) by Radiohead. This album was a doubly good choice because of its wide range of musical tones. While I'm not going to say, "OMG, it was totally like listening to it for the first time," I was definitely more than impressed with these headphones' performance. The humble guitar, hypnotic drums and hauntingly sweet vocals of "Reckoner" were carried beautifully. The echo of "House of Cards" became otherworldly. And don't even get me started on "Down is the New Up". But this is not an album review...
With incredible, gutteral bass tones, crisp treble and most importantly, a clear, unmuddled mid-range, I could hardly believe I was using in-ear headphones. In fact, I would easily say the audio quality is on par with your typical $300-400 over-the-ear studio headphones. And I could not stress this enough: that is amazing. What helps these earbuds achieve this level of fidelity is an in-line amp powered by a single AAA battery. With the amp turned off, the earbuds work perfectly fine, and still outperform my Galaxy earbuds (albeit at a slightly lower volume). But of course, if you want to get the most out of these headphones, including the active noise-cancelling feature, you need to turn on the amp.
The noise-cancelling feature on this device might be its biggest selling point. The product description claims that it eliminates background noise by 90%, and while I find that claim to be dubious, I can say that it really does work. I'd say the active noise-cancelling here does more with enhancing the audible range in spite of background noise than actually eliminating background noise. I've yet to find a pair of headphones that compare to Bose's QuietComfort brand in terms of true noise-cancelling, but these ones still perform admirably -- especially when you consider the price difference.
To get a real feel for the noise-cancelling, I tested these while I mowed the lawn. At first, I was disappointed that I could still hear the lawn mower. I guess I was expecting some sort of magical noise-shield to activate. When I actually started listening to the music playing, I quickly put away my unrealistic expectations and enjoyed the experience.
See, with ordinary earbud headphones, I usually had to crank up the volume to nearly the maximum while I mowed the lawn. Even then, some tones were still drowned out by the noise of the gas-powered engine three feet in front of me. Even worse, I knew I was doing damage to my ears. So then, imagine my delight when I found I could clearly listen to my music and make out nearly every note while operating a lawn mower while the volume sat at less than 60 percent! After finishing, I removed the headphones and did not experience any ringing sensation brought on by eardrum damage. Huzzah!
Alas, these headphones do fall short of perfection. While outstanding at fulfilling its purpose, that little in-line amp is a bit awkward. The AAA battery unavoidably adds some undesired weight to the cord, and although the amp thankfully has a belt clip that you can use on your pocket, I do wish the cords on both sides of the amp were each a bit longer. I haven't yet personally encountered a situation where this is a real issue, but I can imagine someone else could. When the amp is not clipped somewhere, it tugs on the earbuds and it's not the most comfortable. For this reason, I cannot recommend these headphones for jogging/running. Not that noise-cancelling headphones are ever a good idea when you're jogging.
Bottom line: if you find these headphones in the $50 range, you cannot go wrong. If you find them for $80, you cannot go wrong. If you find them for $100, I still could not recommend another pair of earbuds. They sit uncontested at their price point. While there may be better choices for activewear earbuds, as far as pure audio quality is concerned, these are among the best headphones I've ever used, period.
My rating: 4.5 out of 5.0
So what prompted this article? Enthusiasm for some truly great headphones? Perhaps. I've been itching to write something, anything. I've recently resumed slaving on the History of Camp Mix series, but I wanted to take a quick reprieve from those.
I've learned not to announce schedules/deadlines anymore, but you can expect the HoCM articles to start showing up relatively soon. Also, this is far from the last "review" I'll be posting, and you can expect more things like this scattered among the Camp Mix articles.
Why do I announce these things? Does anyone besides myself actually read this blog? Tune in next week to find out! Or whatever!
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