Headphones

If you’ve tried to find headphones as a person with smaller ears, you may have noticed that reviews don’t focus on size very much. Unless the headphones are so heavy that there are memes about installing a pulley system above a desk, or the article is about headphones for people assigned female at birth, this doesn’t get mentioned. I guess I should review my headphones, being that I have a collection now. One day the perfect headphones will exist.

So here are the reasons for my pile of headphones.

• I have misophonia. If I hear certain sounds, my brain starts screaming at me that WE NEED TO GET AWAY FROM THIS SOUND NOW RIGHT NOW. Chewing sounds are a common trigger, along with sniffling, snoring, and other mouth sounds. If noise cancelling doesn’t work on a sound, I *really* notice.
• My partner snores at a truly impressive volume. Hearing protection doesn’t work. The best hearing protection reduces noise by about 30dB. People can snore at over 80 dB, which means wearing the sort of hearing protection used at airports reduces the sound to the level of a conversation – still distracting. I need masking noise and earplugs at the same time. Headphones need to be comfortable enough to sleep in, and I’m a side sleeper so that makes things difficult.
• My ears are small. If a pair of earbuds comes with a selection of tips I just grab the smallest ones.
• Over-ear headphones are usually too big.

• I play music as a hobby and when I played trumpet, the band would sometimes tune to a note I played. Take *that*, woodwinds. I don’t call myself an audiophile, because among other things, whippersnappers, I remember radio and TV with terrible reception. Sound quality is nice, but I prefer reviews that say “Opera doesn’t sound terrible” or “Good for oontzy music” which is how I’ll go about it. I don’t need to be able to hear a pika sneeze in the middle of waves of dissonance on a concept album by a German pop group posing as an Icelandic rodentcore band.
• In the Before Times I used to travel a lot. Remember when battery life really mattered? Travel also meant lots of screaming children. Tiny humans are just expressing what we all feel when we’re stuffed in a tube hurtling towards another time zone, but I know my limits. I once forgot to pack headphones for a flight to Orlando and I don’t want to talk about it.

Hear One

O, Doppler Labs, beautiful nerds, gone too soon.

The Hear One truly wireless buds were almost perfect. They had noise cancelling for specific environments, controlled with an app. They could help you hear voices in noisy environments. Music sounded good on them. They were pretty comfortable.

Noise cancelling doesn’t work so well for human voices. White noise is the only way you’re not going to hear screaming tiny humans. They had white noise you could play over other sounds!

Sadly this magic only lasted between 2-3 hours. The charging case is fiddly. They were expensive.

Bose allegedly stole some of their tech, and the company went out of business. You can still get a pair, but the app is only available for Android and there’s no support.

If only they had put these on a neckband to fit a bigger battery. We need more consumer technology that doubles as accessibility tech.

Price: Ebay and such for EUR 150 or so.

• 

Sony WH-900N

The good:

• They’re green!
• They’re good for oontzy music or classical!
• They have good active noise cancelling.
• There’s Bluetooth or a 3.5mm aux cable for when the battery runs out in the middle of your commute.
• Being able to skip tracks, pause, and control volume by swiping on your right ear is nice.
• Over 8 hours of battery life.
• Useful for when you don’t want to talk to people in public and earbuds are too subtle. They also come in a bright aposematism red.

The bad:

• They’re too damned big and I took them apart to make the headband smaller. This irks me. I don’t want sparkly headphones. I don’t want pink ones. I just want headphones that fit my head and don’t hurt.

I still recommend Sony headphones. I like it when there’s an audio cable as backup.

Price: Older model, so around EUR 150 to 180

Bose QC30

These are Bluetooth-only neckband earbuds with active noise cancelling.

The good:

• Bose knows active noise cancelling.
• The audio quality is good. I wouldn’t buy these just for music, but they aren’t unbearably muddy or tinny.
• The tips sit lightly in my ear. These are some of the best for long-term wear.
• Good battery life.

The bad:

• The damned power button. We hates it, precious. I have to dig a nail into it in order to get it to work.

• The cord from the neckband to the ear is short, so the earpieces get pulled out of my ear, especially if it’s cold and I’m wearing a scarf that pulls the cords in a bit and shortens them. Wearing the neckband over my winter clothes just results in dropping the whole business.
• Falls out of my ear while sleeping.

Overall I still recommend them.

Price: Around EUR 180

QuietOn

No.

OK, OK, I should explain a bit. These were advertised as being good for snoring. They do not block out snoring. I even tested them with a recording of someone snoring at a level lower than a jet engine and they didn’t cancel out much at all. They work about as well as non-electronic earplugs. There’s some noise cancelling but not as much as other earbuds that play music. You gain battery life, allegedly 20 hours, but for what?

They are supposed to be good for side-sleepers. They aren’t.

I could forgive this if the super early-bird price was much lower. If gentle whooshing sounds in your ear are worth $150 or more, you do you.

RHA T20 Wireless

SCOTTISH ENGINEERS WHA HAE!!!

I bought much cheaper earbuds from RHA years ago. They broke, and I got new ones with no fuss, so when someone posted on Reddit that these fancy Bluetooth were good for side-sleepers, I ordered them.

The good:

• Black on black. Excellent for listening to bands from Glasgow while crying. They go with The Cure.

• They’re low profile in the ears. They fit in my ears! I was hesitant about the in-ear-monitor style but they’re comfortable. They’re comfortable to wear while sleeping on your side if your ears aren’t too sensitive.
• The power button sticks out so you can press it! Someone alert Bose that this is possible! THE POWER BUTTON STICKS OOT, THE EAR BIT DISNAE! YES! (Imagine Billy Connolly shouting this. Now you know what my internal voice sounds like when writing about technology)

• They do block a lot of noise, especially if you use the foam tips. They come with a lot of tips.
• The sound is good. They come with tiny filter bits to switch out if you want more oontz, are content in the middle, or want something better for vocals.
• Good battery life.
• USB-C charging, très moderne!
• The bag for all the bits and bobs is a reasonable size. Getting it all in isn’t a game of Tetris.
• The blog is delightful: https://www.rha-audio.com/blog
• They come with a 3.5mm audio cord for when the battery runs out, rather if it does – they haven’t run out of battery while I’ve used them.

The bad, though not really:

• Switching between wired and wired is fiddly. You have to disconnect the in-your-ear bits by wedging a fingernail in between them and the ear hook and pushing. This is a standard IEM thing and it does get easier.
• The cord is long and prone to tangling. I’m not bothered, since cords can be wrapped and it’s actually nice to have a longer cord attached to the phone next to the bed when you’re piping pink noise into your ear.

Price: EUR 229

AfterShokz Trekz Titanium Mini

Here’s the plan: I use the bone conduction headphones to pipe pink noise to my ears, use the included earplugs or my Loop earplugs, and maybe I won’t hear the snoring.

If you don’t expect good sound you won’t be disappointed. I can imagine using these to listen to podcasts or audiobooks while walking, or old recordings of jazz while working so coworkers can get your attention. The sound quality changes when you put earplugs in. It’s SCIENCE! Fun!

Good on the company for making a mini version! They come in grey and black, or grey and pink. THAT’S ALL I ASK. SAME TECH, SLIGHTLY SMALLER. NOT PINK. If you like pink then yes, things should come in pink. Just not the default for not-cis-dudes, please. Make pink headphones for men! Pink for anyone who wants pink! Just give me alternatives.

They do press on my ears and hurt, which is disappointing, so I haven’t tried sleeping in them. Wearing a beanie with the brim tucked in between the headphones and my ear works, but for sleeping in warmer weather this won’t be ideal. Time to get out the Sugru or the knitting needles and figure something out.

They’re supposed to have 6 hours of battery life but I can’t keep them on that long.

Price: older model, EUR 80