CX 300 II Precision Noise Isolating Ear-canal Phones, Black

I have one tiny complaint about these. I wish the manufacturer had used better cable so that they were completely tangle free. It is better than what we've got used to over the years, much of it cheap and nasty but for a bit more cost, these would be spot on. I've looked at all sorts. I definitely wanted wired earphones, there's enough aggravation having to charge loads of items without adding expensive Bluetooth gadgets to the list. These are comfortable. I'm fine with the medium pads but there is a smaller and larger set included. A very handy bag with a sprung top is a good addition. Now for the main reason for the five stars: the sound is excellent. Clear and detailed. I've noticed quite a few times with some old earphones I've been using on an MP3 player at the gym that distortion was mysteriously occurring. It was noticeable with some of the Who recordings where the guitar does some accented power chords. Today, clear as a bell. The studio effects of reverb and delay which are present on most recordings were likewise very clear and precise. On today's random playlist was some stuff by Earth Wind and Fire whose studio records are brilliant recordings. A completely different style of music came over really well as did Chick Corea playing Spain. I've got all sorts of expensive music recording gear at home so have a decent idea of what is possible to achieve soundwise in terms of quality. These are surprisingly good.

Best in ear headphones I have ever owned - I'm a big fan of Sennheiser, they're a 68 year old german audio company all about sound rather than brand, unlike *cough* Beats, Monster, SkullCandy, Razer and even Bose nowadays. There's only a select few wearable audio companies I trust and Sennheiser are one of them. I'm on my second pair of these, thanks to a certain playful moggy and have a third pair unopened that I purchased in a sale. These headphones do everything right, they feel extremely well made for a pair of in-ear headphones and are amazingly comfortable, even for long listening periods. These headphones have a design to where one cable from the Y junction is around twice as long as the other, this allows for the headphones to go around the back of your neck thus leaving less cable to hang in front of you, it also aids in keeping them in place while doing things such as running or gym work. the headphone units themselves are also very comfortable and once in do not protrude out of your ears like a lot of in-ear headphones giving them a visually satisfying look. As for the sound, they are just absolutely brilliant and suit a wide range of music from classical to house, to rock and metal to electro and from hardstyle to R&B, and many many more genres. The highs are perfect and are crystal clear, the mids are very good and don't clash with the bass, allowing them to not be washed out by the bass. the bass is great, lows sound smooth but can tremble depending on the type of music you listen to, making the headphones great also for watching movies on the go or at home. I personally use these headphones with a range of devices, such as the following; iPod classic, iPod touch, iPod nano, iPhone, iPad, MacBook and a custom PC. If you intend to use these headphones with a more powerful device such as a laptop or desktop PC, I would HIGHLY recommend turning the volume right down as these headphones are very sensitive and will blow craters in the side of your head if you're not careful. These headphones come with three different sizes of buds and I'd recommend you try them all for a short period of time to find which one suits you best, ideally with these headphones to get the best results you want them as far in as possible without discomfort. I personally use the small size of bud and push the headphones in until they make a clicking sound, the clicking sound is the driver of the headphones moving back thus showing you have a good seal. I can't think of anything else to add to this review other than about the little carry pouch they come with which is made of a high quality leatherette and had a satisfying metal closing band which snaps together with a thud. These headphones have outlasted any other that I have owned and are still going strong today. the first pair that my kitten chewed up I managed to fix with a new 3.5mm jack and also still work brilliantly to this day (almost 5 years later after their purchase) I hope this review may help someone :)

I was looking for some small 'phones to use on the train and in the office. These got rave reviews, for the price, and on Amazon were even cheaper, so how could I not buy them! I must have unusually small ears, because all standard in-ear 'phones just fall out. These come with 3 sets of different sized silicone adapters. The smallest ones just about work for me. In use they are comfortable, but because the 'right' lead is much longer than the 'left' (and not adjustable) it took me a while to get used to slinging it around the back of my neck, which works pretty well. Audio quality is pretty good, though bass is a bit lacking. To be expected I guess with tiny buds! They isolate background noise fairly well so you don't have to have them turned up too loud, but they can generate some volume if you need them to. Even when turned up loud other people don't seem to notice, so they're great on public transport for the 'don't annoy others' factor :-) Downsides to these 'phones (for me) are practical ones: The cable is quite long (which is good) but heavy (which isn't so good), meaning that the sheer weight of it can drag them out of your ears. It would have been really useful if they had included a clip, for shirt collar or wherever, to provide some strain-relief. Luckily I found one that fits on an old 'phone hands-free kit and it REALLY helps. The other thing about the cable is that the material it is made of is very sticky, like those easy-grip coatings and covers you get on some things. This means that it catches and drags on almost everything, which again doesn't help when there is no clip to resist the pulling. Overall I like them. They stay in most of the day, sound good and are comfortable. Greg

I'm very happy with these in-ear headphones for my iPod. Generally, I find in-ear headphones really uncomfortable and they make my ears ache after about 20 minutes' wear. These ones, I can keep in for as long as I want (easily over an hour) without any discomfort, I'm pretty much unaware of them in my ears. They fit very snugly deep inside the ear (and I mean deep!), which is surprisingly comfortable, and cuts out external sound very effectively. The earphones come with small, medium and large pads which you can change to suit the size of your ear. The small ones give me a noticeably more comfortable fit and a better seal, meaning they stay put when I move my head! Because of the better noise performance, I am listening to my iPod with the volume at about half the level I needed it on with my earphones that came supplied with the iPod, but I'm hearing the same level of volume in my ears. In other words, to get the same amount of noise, I'm using a lot less volume, which I hear is better for your ears, and for your technical equipment! Win, win! I'm not very qualified to comment on sound quality, but to an ammateur listener, I'd say these provide good quality sound which picks up subtleties in the music I hadn't noticed before. I'd say they are slightly better in sound quality than the iPod earphones. The carry pouch they come with is also very useful to prevent tangling. Highly recommended if you want some good quality but affordable in-ear headphones that will be really comfortable.

My old Sony earphones packed up after 2 years of me not looking after them so i thought I'd give these a go and pay £14 extra compared to another Sony earphone replacement. It is Sennheiser after all. Packaging: Earphones came well packaged with a pouch and spare buds which was nice. Very good packaging. Fitting: For me they are not comfortable; they fall out even after trying all bud sizes, smallest are the best but even then they don't fit snug. It was nice of them to send many bud sizes though. Sound: This is where i was slightly disappointed. And i am comparing these to my old Sony MDR-NC31EM's. Both were on a preset equaliser setting i never change it. And I have to say in terms of sound quality and bass the sony headphones blow this out of the water. The sound is clean on the Sennheiser but it does not match the trebl, highs and lows of the Sonys and the bass is not as good either. I adjusted the equaliser to try and improve the experience and it still sounded mellow. Verdict: These are very nice earphones with top build quality, but would i buy them again? No. I thought i would give them a go but was left disappointed. My old Sony earphones can be had for as little as £19.99 on the web compared to the £33 i paid for these.

Sennheiser is a top manufacturer, and these are amongst their best products. I've used assorted Sennheiser and AKG headsets/phones/buds professionally and privately since the early 1970s, and the sound with these tiny buds is as good as the best. The bass is purer and smoother than many hi-fi loudspeakers. The top is sweet and clear, often a problem with older ears, but nothing is woolly with these buds. They are also very efficient, so need a lower volume setting, and the batteries on my ear-player last significantly longer than with its original earphones. I listen to a wide range of material from jazz to pop to choral to orchestral to speech. It all sounds very natural, and I have applied almost no equalisation in the player, nor any SRS, nor any Extra Bass. With these, the original sound sounds best, stays in your ears and does not disturb even your closest neighbours on the tube. BUT, there is a definite trick to making sure the sound is good. The seal to ones ear must be air-tight, otherwise bass is lost and extraneous noise leaks in. How then? Lubricate them! Moisten the ear canal, and also the soft rubber adapter, to allow it to slide in easily and find the best fit. Also, don't push it in too far as this might bottom the adapter on the curve of the ear canal and block the sound outlet. As Ronnie Barker might have said, you may need to jer-jer-jer-jiggle it a bit. Most ears do not have a circular canal, more often it is almost triangular, so it is a miracle these buds fit so well in so many different ears. Try each of the three different sizes for the best moist fit! I don't go jogging with them, but I do walk a lot, as well as use public transport every day, and the movement rubbing on the leads could be a problem. But by stowing the long lead around the back of the neck and using an inner pocket for the ear-player and any surplus lead, the unwanted noises are reduced to an acceptable minimum. And of course when sitting still there is no problem at all. I was wondering how durable they might be when I bought my first set of the original CX300 ear buds seven years ago, and I have been careful to avoid knots with stowing the lead when not in use; one pocket is dedicated to the ear-player and buds. The cords are reasonably tangle resistant, but a determined vandal could wreck them quite quickly. For all that time in daily use over maybe seventy thousand miles my old set continued to sound as good as new, with no signs of deterioration in the rubbers or the leads, so when eventually the left bud went open circuit at the join to the voice coil it owed me nothing. I was very happy to buy this new set as a replacement, and it has proved to be every bit as good, still with the clean full range sound. These CX300-II deserve the highest recommendation.

I bought the Sennheiser CX 300 II Precision in Black, having spent £26 on the pair of earphones. I have previously used Sennheiser, currently owning a pair of headphones with which I am very content; the sound quality is superb. I expected the same quality and high standard from these pair of earphones but was severely disappointed... Every time I see the words "Heavy bass" or "Improved bass" I scream internally at the stupidity and naivety of everything associated with this phrase. The front of this box states an "Enhanced Bass" sound, being Sennheiser and based on my previous experience with them, I didn't think too much of this, that the bass would just be a feature that has been fine-tuned along with the rest of the parameters involved in equalization. But, no. I was wrong. The bass is clearly the driving point of these earphones and the majority of earphones currently being sold to consumers. Every bit of marketing clearly advertises a 'Heavy bass' sound in most earphones I have stumbled across and this does NOT improve the sound quality of the actual earphones at all. As for these earphones in particular, there is no clarity in the sound whatsoever. The bass gets so much in the way that it muddies everything up. Having experimented with all the different EQ settings on my iPod Touch, nothing seems to be able to rectify the horrible, horrible decisions instilled in the manufacturing of these earphones. Even the 'Bass reducer' setting is unsuccessful; the balance between the bass, mids and highs become uneven with the bass being noticeably absent as a result of this setting. As a result of the ENHANCED BASS being the focal point of these earphones, the stereo sound is greatly diminished at the expense of the boosting of the bassiness in the center of the stereo image; while you'd expect a clear sound to be distinctly emanating from the LEFT and RIGHT channels, everything is pushed towards the middle, leaving a stereo sound that is not very wide at all. SUMMARY: The "Enhanced Bass" is the most idiotic feature to be sold on a pair of earphones, Sennheiser's in particular. At the expense of this, the stereo sound is terrible; you may as well be listening to something in mono. There is no sound clarity whatsoever, everything is so dark and dampened and there is no room for music or sounds to breathe at all; no room for them to interact with each other harmoniously and subsequently flood your ears with a very reasonably balanced mix of bass, mids and highs. I have heard better sound quality from a pair of Sony earphones that have cost so much less than Sennheiser's. Unless you enjoy your bass, depending on your preferred music genres, and very narrow stereo images, do not waste your money on this.

first a bit of background: i do sound enjineering, i work on a sound desk alot. and sound quality really really matters to me. obviouly i use expensive studio grade cans when working on the sound desk. i brought these as a mobile pair of earphones to listen to general music. and these querky little buds have stepped up to the plate with all the £70 earphones out there! ... i absolutly love this product. i have this thing for sennheiser products because they give you GREAT sound, great looks, outstanding comfort at a resonable price. the levels are good although it can sound abit "tinny" if you have the fitting wrong so just wiggle it abit to get a snug fit. it is really comfortable to wear and i fiddled about with the sizes of earbuds and found the meduim perfect for my ears. Obviously this might not apply to other people. the strength of the product is amazing it has been crushed in my bag so many times and it hasent been damaged at all. it is very solidly built and i dont see it breaking anytime soon. i have had these for about 2 months now and they are still just as good as they where out of the box. Cons: if it is a cold day, the earpeices may fall out quite abit due to it not being able to get a grip in your ear, this is a stupid thing to say in a reveiw as they cant do anything about it, but it's just a warning to others. the postage was good and arrived in really good time. WELLDONE sennheiser and i'll be looking forward to buying more of your products.

Tout était parfait, article /envoi

Very good sound and earfit, but phones are ceasing to have a 3.5mm jack connector. I use my old phone .

Bonne qualité d'écoute. Très bon rapport qualité prix. Résistant. Est passé dans la machine à laver, fonctionne normalement après cela.

Average earphone and overated price. Atleast mic should be given in these one. Think before you buy this one. No dount sound quality is good but these are expensive.

p.s.: nach einigen tagen intensiven nutzens bin ich sehr begeistert, diese kopfhörer sind wie für mich gemacht und es zeigt mal wieder, dass man in dieser preisklasse sehr gut klingende headphones bekommt, die manch teures exemplar alt aussehen lässt. mein geliebter sony inear kopfhörer gab nach ca. 10 jahren den geist auf, es gibt ihn leider nicht mehr...r.i.p. ich habe als ersatz teure teufel inears und diesen sennheiser geordert,die 110 euro preisunterschied sind ausser bei der verarbeitung kaum zu spüren! überhaupt: ich hatte schon viele inears ausprobiert, die preise sind hier kein klarer indikator für die klangqualität, um die 30 euro gibt es sehr gutklingende modelle. mit den richtigen pads gibt es hier einen mächtigen bass auf die ohren, perfekt für drum&bass etc., richtig sitzenden stöpsel sind bei inears absolut essentiell, speziell für die bässe, ich habe eine große sammlung von alten inears und probiere immer aus. diese inears sind klein und leicht, sehr bequem. tatsächlich sind es die am angenehmsten und best sitzenden inears, die ich kenne, kein langsames rausrutschen etc. wie bei manch anderen, man spürt sie kaum. klasse! sie sind auf wunsch sehr laut, der klang ist für den preis wirklich erstaunlich, kommt den sony sehr nahe. bässe, mitten und höhen sind ausgeglichen, ich habe bassbetonte eq einstellungen und fest sitzende aufsätze, der bass geht tief runter und ist fett, dass es eine freude ist! die kabel sind hier sehr dünn und wirken nicht sehr robust, dafür macht der abgewinkelte stecker einen stabilen eindruck, mal schauen, wie lange das durchhält, hier hat der teufel klare vorteile. die teufel sind robuster verarbeitet, der klang bei klassik und pop super, aber der bass ist nicht so mächtig...geschmackssache. der klang dieser kopfhörer ist genau mein ding! für basslastige musik gefallen sie mir mehr als die teuren teufel kopfhörer, die dafür bei klassik etc. die nase etwas vorne haben. diese inears kann ich weiterempfehlen, bei dem preis wird es kaum bessere geben! ich habe sie gleich nochmal für meine frau geordert, die sie auch super findet. sie kommen meinen alten sony sehr nahe, ein würdiger ersatz. danke für das lesen und ihre geschätzte aufmerksamkeit!