10 out of 10 people found this review helpful.
Excellent reliability and noise cancellation for those who fly alot.
Date of Review: Dec 3, 2008
The Bottom Line: I highly recommend this product for those who travel and need to protect their hearing.
I started a new job 2 years ago where expected travel would be between 60-80%. After a puddle jumper flight between DC and White Plains, NY, I was deaf for about 30 minutes due to the prop noise.
Considering the amount of travel I would be doing and the thought that I'd really like to be able to hear when I'm 70, I decided it was time to get some sort of noise cancelling head phones. I had considered the "in-ear" version, but I have a hard enough time keeping standard ear plugs in my ears. The "over the ear" seemed a better choice for me.
In my opinion, some people who have written bad reviews of the QC2 might have different expectations of what they are designed to do. For my needs, they cancel out all of the background repetitive noises such as jet noise, prop noise, loud data center noise, etc.
What they are NOT designed to do is cancel out variable pitch frequencies. This means flight crew announcements, babies crying, or adults talking loudly can still be heard through the head phones (albeit muted). To offset this annoyance, any standard CD player or mp3 player will block out the remaining noises and replace them with your music of choice.
For my purposes, the QC2 works exactly as I had anticipated. Combined with an mp3 player full of music, relaxing and even sleeping on flights has become enjoyable.
I've had my QC2 for 2 years now and replaced the AA batteries only 3 times. The durability and battery life make using these under hard travel conditions easier. (For $300, they make you want to baby them... but don't. Bose has an excellent warranty program should you ever need it)
Having broken my QC2 set in over the last two years, I've noticed some quirks about them. First, they are slightly bulky in a world where everything is getting smaller. Considering what they do for me, I have accepted this and just managed to deal with it. For those of you who do a lot of traveling, they might be a bit cumbersome to include with all your other travel gear.
Another peculiarity I've noticed is that on occasion when you are in close proximity to someone else using a similar set of headphones, you will get slight feedback in your set. As the FCC requires all electronic devices to be compliant with accepting interference, I don't necessarily fault my unit for this issue. (It's always the other guy, right?)
And finally, while wearing these on an airplane and trying to sleep, if you manage to lean your head against something where the microphone device is located on the headset, you will negate the noise cancellation process.
Even with all of these quirks, I have never once regretted receiving a pair of these for my birthday. They have been to more countries and more states than I can count, but have never let me down!
