Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

I purchased a set of Audio Technica ATH-ANC27 Noise Canceling headphones five months ago because I was working in noisy places and also doing a fair amount of traveling. I have found these headphones to be a reasonable compromise between low end headphones and the high end $300 Bose models. This type of noise canceling technology is best at counteracting smooth, steady sounds such as the incessant roar of the jet's engines, or the whir of a computer server's fans. When you put them on and turn on the switch, these sounds magically disappear. Conversations and other random types of noises are muffled but do not disappear. When you travel by air twice a week, as I am doing, noise canceling technology really makes a difference. It just makes the flight time go by faster and more pleasantly. Similarly, when you are working in an office with lots of noise, it minimizes the noise and puts you into a kind of cocoon of privacy. The phones use a single AAA battery and I have found that it lasts quite a long time. Typically I change the battery about every 2-3 weeks. I don't use the phones all day every day, but probably about 20 hours a week, so I would say it uses power very efficiently. An LED indicates when the phones are on (unfortunately it makes it easier for flight attendants to spot it and make you turn them off during takeoff/landing, silly though it sounds). The on/off switch is easy to find with your fingers and the phones do work if the battery's dead or the switch is off, albeit they don't sound quite as good and of course there's no noise canceling. As headphones go, these are middle-of-the-road quality, with good bass and moderate high end. They come with a cable and several types of adapters for archaic airplane headphone jacks and 1/4" jacks. The cable is a standard stereo mini-jack at one end and a micro-jack at the other end to plug into the phones. Thus, you can wear the headphones without a cable hanging down if you just want to use them to muffle sounds. Note that this cable is rather specialized and you don't want to lose it. I think they should have used a regular mini-jack on the headphones. The phones do come with a rigid, zippered carrying case so you can keep all this gear together, and the earpieces rotate so it can lay flat. The main problem I have found is that the phones are a little bulky and have a tight, heavy feeling on my head that gets annoying after a few hours. And after about two hours my ears start to get sore from the pressure. Bose makes a lightweight model that supposedly is quite comfortable to wear, but for $300 you would expect it to be pretty close to perfect. For $50, Audio-Technica is a reasonable alternative and you can save the $250 for a nice Android phone or iPhone or iPad to enjoy on the flight.