Sony MDRNC7/WHI Noise Canceling on-ear headphones (White)

 (367 customer reviews)

Based on the price, I took the plunge. The construction is pretty solid and look good on the head. The pads are very comfortable with a soft "vinyl" type material. The "arms" of the headphones wrap around the head really well because of the hinge at the top of the headphones.

But to the most important feature: the noise cancelling function was not dramatic during flights - it worked well for a semi-quiet office environment, but my primary need for this is flying. And during flying I noticed only a slight change. Good for the price, but not if you are looking to use this while flying or similar environments investigate other options.

Pros: Fairly good sound, smaller profile, great price point, comfortable, foldable, stylish

Cons: Non-detachable mini-plug, soft pouch (no hard case)

There are better noise cancelling headphones out there, but not for less than $50. At $49.99, these are great headphones for the traveler on a budget. I previously bought the MDR-NC6s and they worked pretty well for me. I originally got them to use while flying, but I also use them at work to remove the annoying hum from our company computers. The NC7 is a great upgrade from the older model. They noticeably cancel more of the ambient noise than the NC6. Also, there is virtually no lag time between when the noise cancelling is switched on and when it actually kicks in. The NC6 took a few seconds to begin actually cancelling ambient noise. Also, a common complaint that I've had (and read about) with the NC6 is that there's a faint, yet audible hiss while the noise cancelling is on. This has been greatly reduced to a...Read more

I waited to take a couple flights before I put in a review for these headphones. If I could give an extra half star I would because of the price.

Looking at other reviews for various models, I was surprised how many people think Active Noise Canceling will handle things like voices, phones, assuming they will encase you in a cone of silence (see Get Smart). This is not what they are for. They cancel out (but not NEARLY all the way) low frequency constant tones - car noise, aircraft noise, lawn mowers, etc. This made looking at reviews difficult because people who could hear their fingers snap while wearing the headphones gave a poor rating.

The overall sound quality is poor. My fifteen dollar Koss over-the-ear KSC75s sound worlds better than these. Strangely, they sound a bit better when they are switched on (some bass response compared to almost nothing while off). Since I bought them for use in noisy environments, I wasn't too worried about this. I...Read more