Customer Reviews

Philips HN060/37 Noise-Canceling Earbuds

5 star:		(29)
4 star:		(44)
3 star:		(20)
2 star:		(27)
1 star:		(50)

 

 

These are nice earplugs. They fit into my ears well, though they probably won't fit EVERYONE'S ears as well. Plus, some folks just won't like wearing plugs that fit so deeply into the ear canal; those people should avoid the HN060. The generic earpiece fits snugly enough for me, but it's not a custom earpiece, so one shouldn't expect it to be perfect for all ears--Philips should have provided multiple sizes with the HN060, like those provided with Koss ear buds.

Sound is decent enough, though it's certainly no Grado headphone, nor is it remotely close to the sound provided by an enclosed earpiece. No thumping bass, but a reasonably good frequency response in the mids and highs. The snugness of the earpiece does affect the sound quality; the better they fit, the better the sound will be, and the less ambient noise will sneak in. I listen predominantly to classical, swing, and horn-driven jazz, all of which sound rather nice with the HN060. I do not think those interested in heavy bass-driven music will be satisfied with these plugs.

The noise reduction features work well enough to reduce the fan noise of a close-by stack of servers. Airplane noise, air conditioner noise, and other steady amibients are reduced quite noticeably. Don't get these thinking you're going to be immersed in silence--you're kidding yourself. I'm satisfied, but feel that full enclosure headphones do almost as well at noise reduction.

The cloth-wrapped cord is very nice, as is the neck strap. This brings me to the only con I've found, the LENGTH of the cord is just not adequate except for use with wearable audio devices--a problem that most manufacturers seem to have developed.

Overall, a good buy for those inclined to like in-ear plugs. Others should avoid them solely for comfort issues.

Looking over a lot of these reviews, it's pretty obvious that a lot of people don't know what they are buying and are dissatisfied not based on the product but product class (i.e. don't complain about your hair getting blown around if you purchased a convertible - ignorance is not a valid reason to pan a product). I'm thinking the price point here gets a lot of people buying them that are unfamiliar with this type of product, how to use it properly and what noise canceling actually is, hence you get all these negative reviews which seems to have a lot more to do with the type of product rather than the performance of the product within that context - you probably don't get these reviews with Shure or higher end phones simply because the price is prohibitive and keep the general shopper out unless they are specifically investigating.

With that out of the way, these are designed to fit in the ear canal. That works to provide some isolation effect although not as much as higher end Shure or other brands. For good sound quality, they must produce a seal in the canal. If you don't like this idea or can't get used to the feel, buy a different type of product - this is the nature of this type of device not just this product. Current packaging comes with 3 separate sizes to accomodate a broader range - they must seal the canal and most can probably get these to work well enough although they are not as good as custom ear peices (hey $20-40 - get real).

Another potential issue with this type of device is that the wires hang down and when they move you can hear them in your ear - once again nature of the device. This is why high end models have tiny little light wires (that don't stand up to much abuse) whereas these employ a neck cord from which the noise canceling unit also hangs. Not really an ideal or even good choice for sports or high activity listening where you'll be moving a ton although these might actually work okay for some purposes. Buds are really a better choice for this. There are multiple types of personal listening devices, you buy the one that suits your needs, don't complain that you bought the wrong type (i.e. buying high end monitors and complaining about the size, weight, and cord length while jogging).

Overall sound quality is pretty solid when used correctly with good seal. I was actually surprised with the base response and the mids and highs are accurate enough. You get really good sound for $20-40 - much better than I expected and for the price in this class probably impossible to beat unless you go far upmarket in price. Of course if you don't install them in your ear and get a seal - no base, tin, and low volume (once again, know what you are buying).

Noise canceling is okay. Blocks out a lot of ambiet machinery like A/C units or airplane noise. The plugs provide some measure of isolation and when combined with active canceling and some music you won't hear too much else unless you are looking for it or it's quite loud (which is something I like if I'm in a public place so I'm not totally isolated from what's going on around me in case of emergency or need for reaction). Once again, for the pricing it's quite decent. It does require an AAA battery which is included and one can easily forget to turn it off. This unit dangles from around your neck (unless you rest it on a table). This works okay for me, mileage may vary. It's certainly not too heavy although the jogging crew may not like it - but this is not a product geared for that so go figure although if you can handle it bouncing around a bit I guess it can be used.

Other: it does come with a full size stero jack as well as an adapter for airplanes. Pretty handy and nice pricing. 3 sizes of rubber plugs. Comes with a nice little psuedo leather bag/sack. Most of the cord is covered in a nylon/rope style sheathing so it should be durable (the exception is the cord from the lanyard to the actual ear phones which need to be very light).

The Negatives: Seems to require quite a bit of power so you'll have to turn the volume up higher than normal for the same listening level. You can leave the noise canceling on by mistake and drain the battery although it is not necessary for standard listening and the plugs themselves provice a decent measure of semi-isolation for most circumstances. 3 sizes of plugs don't guarantee a fit in every person's ear - mileage may vary. People may not like the in-canal type of product - probably not a good idea for small/irresponsible children. Consider keeping your ears clean and cleaning the plugs as needed. I can't confirm but someone in here did report that they couldn't order replacement ear pieces from Philips - this may have changed, I don't know but from what I can gather they didn't use to include 3 sizes of plugs either so this product has gone through some change over the past year or so.

That's all I can think of and hopefully that's enough for anyone to make a good logical choice. I've had these for 2 weeks and have used them quite a bit. Pretty comfortable overall and I'm happy. For the $33 Amazon has these for I think they are a very solid deal providing one understands what exactly they are buying and not just looking for something generic or slightly higher end to replace the buds on their Ipod. The headphone game is all about tradeoffs and spending the most money doesn't guarantee one a master of all trades (or evena good jack of all trades). Identify your requirements and how you intend to use them, figure out what type(s) of headphones you should be looking at, consider your budget, and see what that leaves you. This product is priced at a decent general level and a lot of people are missing the first 2 parts of that equation which are by far the most important ones.

Seems like a price too good to be true (not purchased at Amazon). Turns out it was.

I had turn major problems,

1) Ear buds eventually wouldn't stay on, they easy got lost/knocked off
2) Battery compartment eventually needed a piece of cardboard to keep the battery in position, other wise would get a buzzing sound.


In general, it could have been a great product.

1) Noise cancelling work, not the best, but works
2) Having a volume control is really really nice
3) The ear buds where comfortable.

In general I wouldn't recommend them unless you have to have a cheap pair of noise cancelling headphones. Then treat them with a lot of love and care . . .

In the saddle of a sportbike, I have very little between myself and 80mph of wind, 4 headers, and two very loud exhaust pipes, all of which are never more than about 4 feet from my head. It's really stinkin loud. Most of us have to either give up the idea of any music in favor of earplugs, or we have to overpower the ambient noise with extreme volumes.

I found these in a local store for $50. Best $50 I ever spent.

When the music is off, you can actually hear everything around you perfectly, nothing is muffled, and conversations are at comfortable volumes.
There are two different "On" settings. One is simply plugged in, without the noise cancelling. Then they are regular earphones, though admittedly, it seems like the througput is reduced. On a scale to 25, If you normally listen at an 8, you'll now need to listen at a 12. You can still hear some background noise.
For noisy environments (on a bike, at an airport, in a crowd) you can turn on the "noise reduction" unit on the cord. Good lord. Suddenly, everything else gets at least 50% quieter. If you're paying attention to someone, you will be able to tell that they're talking, but you wont know what they're saying. If you're not paying attention, everything is ignorable, you wont be distracted. IDEAL for office situations with phones and conversations and microwaves/drink machines.

There are other pros and cons. On its attributes, the cord is very very well designed. Wrapped in a cloth cord a-la-nylon-shoelace, the strength of the cord is greatly increased, and you dont have to worry about damaging it at all. The noise cancellation unit is on the cord, lightweight, easily accessable without being in the way. The cord splits in such a way that you can actually wear it like a necklace, and the slack virtually vanishes, removing fear of snagging it on levers, drawers, arms, or anything carried. the sound quality is excellent. Bass is lacking, but 1/4 inch from your eardrum, you dont want that much bass.

Cons: Plugs hurt. large, small, foam, rubber, it doesn't matter. All Earplugs hurt, and these are no exception. They are much more forgiving than most, however, and dont cut off circulation to anything. They are also difficult to position correctly, though once you get it right, you'll forget they're there. You momentarily turn off the music if you yawn. If you have a small head, small ears, or if they are for a child, these are not right for you...the ear canal MUST be large enough to accomodate the plug and music chamber. The sound will be reduced if you use them with anything other than a phillips product, but only slightly.

You can spend $200 and get something better, but unless a little comfort is worth it, Save your money, these are great.

I am what you would call, a serious audiophile. I work in radio and after years of working (very) closely with digital audio, I believe I have quite a picky sense of what I like when it comes to headphones/earbuds. They either work and sound good, or not, plain and simple.

If I had the money to spare, I'd buy me a pair of BOSE Quiet Comforts, but being in radio, I DON'T, so I bought a pair of Phillips Noise Cancelling Headphones, which I was profoundly impressed with. So much so that I went and got a pair of noise cancelling earbuds for my mp3 player. Once again, I am equally impressed. I tried them out the first time while driving in my car (yes, I KNOW I shouldn't wear earbuds while driving, and to be honest, I did it only as a test...) and to also try out my mp3 player on my way to work. I have a rather short commute, and this particular morning the wind was HOWLING quite fiercely. I figured if these little babies could stamp out the wind from the inside of my little Chevy, I might really have something here. I put them in my ears (they fit reasonably well and are almost comfortable--and I cannot STAND uncomfortable earbuds or headphones) before I drove out of my garage and after a couple of songs, I turned off the noise cancelling feature and to my surprise, the inside of my car sounded not unlike the cabin of a 727 in an attempt to hit altitude in record time. MAN was I impressed! With my mp3 player completely OFF I could only barely hear the wind outside my vehicle...and trust me, it was LOUD.

In a nutshell, that is the best barometer for -- in my eyes -- what really counts. Great sound under harsh sounding conditions. Are there better functioning earbuds available? Almost certainly. But are they truly worth the impossibly high price most of them cost? I'm going to say NO. Don't get me wrong, I have several choices, were I to have the budget to afford them, that I would purchase in a heartbeat if I could over these...but being the picky person that I am, I have to say that once I got used to my Phillips, I don't feel like I am missing out so much like I used to.

For the money, I personally believe the HN060 earbuds to be MORE than worth the value and I would absolutely recommend them to anyone who wants great sound but cannot -- or would rather not -- have to spend so much to get it.

Hope my opinion helps.

I have owned a wide range of headphones, from cheap to pricey, and I am in the market to replace my last set of good headphones (Shure e3c). I bought the Audio-Technical "EarSuit" but found that the ear pressure just wasnt comfortable or compatible with sunglasses. So I bought a pair of these, and the best way to describe them is "crap".

I wore them for a day and a half, and got so fed up with having to put them back in, their complete lack of noise cancelling, and the terrible sound quality that I couldnt try them out any longer.

I will continue my search, and consider this a lesson learned, I hope you will to.

For the last couple of years I've carried around a pair of Bose QC2 noise cancelling headphones. They've gone all over the world with me, and have made long-haul air travel a much less stressful experience. The only flaw in the design is that if you turn off the noise cancelling system, the headphones don't work. No battery, no audio. That's dumb - and most of the competition figured that out.

Last Sunday, while on a trip to Silicon Valley, I started to get an annoying buzz in the right earpiece. I changed batteries, but it got steadily worse. Out of warranty. Time to replace.

I mostly use my headphones for two purposes: to listen to my iPod while walking or travelling in a bus or plane, and to listen to channel 9 on United flights. No jogging or energetic exercising.

I picked up a pair of these Philips earbuds at Fry's in Palo Alto (and paid much more than Amazon - sigh!). They worked flawlessly in my hotel room, listening to a movie on my laptop, and on the flight back from SFO to SEA. Ignore the negative reviews above: the noise cancelling circuitry does an excellent job at attenuating aircraft noise, especially the lower frequencies. With noise cancellation turned off, the in-ear design certainly reduces the high frequencies but does nothing for the roar of an aircraft engine just outside the window. It feels like a nicely balanced design.

As for audio quality, I'm no audiophile, but it sounded about the same as my iPod's factory-supplied earbuds. Not outstanding, but perfectly acceptable.

I purchased a pair of this a while back and subsequently one of the plastic tips fell off. When I called phillips, they said they didn't have replacement parts for it, and that I would have to offer a receipt in order to claim a whole new replacement set. I hate companies that make products without replacement parts, and I won't be buying anything more from them.

The earbuds themselves featured a rather unwieldy design and a neglible volume control. There's no real way to wind up the cord without getting it tangled, and the sound quality was so-so.

Addendum: I have since found out that you can order replacement parts from another site on the web, unafiliated with Phillips, or even on Amazon, if you look up double flange replacement tips.

Like several of the others who commented earlier, I got these headphones at Target on sale for $30. I can understand both the negative and positive comments of other folks, and some of the negatives for one person can be positives for another.

-- The noise canceling DOES indeed work. Up to a point. I bought these just before taking a flight, and it's clear, even without listening to music that if you turn them on, it "addresses" the ambient noise. I'm using the term "addresses" because if you think these headphones will eliminate every sound around you, especially given the price, you're being unrealistic. (Do the Bose ones even totally do that?)

The loud low-pitched hums of the plane were definitely REDUCED. Perhaps the term "noise canceling" is what the naysayers object to; "reduction" would be better. I also use the headphones walking around a busy downtown traffic area, and it does help. But I do still hear the trucks and jackhammers. There definitely is less reduction effect for higher pitches like sirens and such. When you turn the noise reduction on, ALL mid-high frequencies seem boosted upwards. No thumping bass with these, which for me is fine.

I don't consider myself an audiophile, but I will even admit that the sound from these headphones (even without the noise cancellation) is adequate but not remarkable, but I paid $30 for these things and I think audiophile sound is an unreasonable expectation at this price. The lows do sound a bit distorted.

-- Yes, the earbuds go IN the ear canal. Look at the larger picture to see that these are unlike most other earbuds, which don't go in as far. The pros of this setup-- it provides what's called "passive" noise reduction in addition to the "active" electronic noise cancellation by sealing off outside sounds. The cons-- Yes, they get kind of dirty inside the ear, and I do find them slipping out over time, so every so often I have to push them back in. Sometimes my ears feel a bit itchy.

-- There is a lanyard-type cord that goes around your neck, supporting the weight of the unit where the battery goes (has inline volume control and on-off for noise reduction). I like this setup in some ways, because you don't have to worry as much about the weight of the unit pulling the headphones out of your ears, as others have noted, your neck supports the weight of the unit. You can pull the two headphones out of your ears if you go into a store and the whole thing is still hanging around your neck-- that's nice (though geeky looking). The only thing I find objectionable about it all is that there is a tangle of cords-- it's hard to easily bundle it all up and shove it in a pocket (or the case they give you) without tangling it all up. Most of the cords (except for the two segments going from your neck to the headphones)is in a braided nylon cord, which does reduce the tangling somewhat.

I hope this helps others who are uncertain if they want them...

Considering the price of these headphones, the noise canceling function is decent. The way they fit deep into your ear takes a little getting used to, but if you are used to wearing "in-the-ear" headphones similar to Sony's MDR-W08L, then these will not feel much different.

They come with small, medium and large earpieces to help accommodate different ear sizes. If none of the options fit well in your ear, then these headphones will not work well for you. They come with the medium size attached already, which fit well in my ears. With the proper fit, you should already notice a slight difference in the amount of noise you hear once you put them in.

With the active noise canceling function turned on, you will hear a slight hum in your ear. I noticed a reasonable reduction in the noise around me. The typical humming of my desktop computer was almost completely cancelled out and the talking on the television was significantly reduced, though I could still hear the words clearly, when I tried.

There is a significant difference in the sound quality of my music when the noise canceling function is turned on compared to when it is off. When it is off, the sound quality is truly disappointing. There is no bass response and the volume on my iPod has to be turned up pretty high to get clear sound. However, when the noise canceling function is turned on, the sound quality is significantly better. The bass response is much better and the volume increases significantly, though, the overall sound quality is still not as good as the standard iPod earbuds, which is still a disappointment

These headphones should be purchased for their excellent portability, reasonable price and decent noise canceling ability (as whole) versus their sound quality or noise canceling performance as compared to higher-end alternatives. If you can afford the more expensive models and are not concerned with size or portability, I would recommend against buying these headphones.

Pros:
*For the money, these headphones perform well and the noise-canceling feature is better than not having one at all.
*The sound quality is good, when you have the noise-canceling feature turned on.
*They are a reasonable, and more portable, alternative to the much-bulkier high-end models.

Cons:
*The sound quality should be better with or without the noise-canceling feature on
*The noise-canceling control box is bulky and the built-in neck strap is cumbersome and annoying. They could have done without the strap.
*If the earbuds do not fit perfectly in your ear, the sound quality and noise-canceling function are severely diminished.