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Headphones for Travel

HeadRoom was born on the road. (Our illustrious CEO used to fly around the world fixing scanning electron microscopes.) We know that being amongst the “Jet Set” is far from glamorous -- traveling is mostly a real grind. We’ve been working very hard for the past fifteen years to make the routine more bearable by innovating superb portable audio solutions to take high-end sound anywhere your head chooses to roam!

Noise Cancelling Headphones

The first and most crucial step for great portable audio is to get rid of all the ambient noise in the environment around you. Almost everybody these days is aware of the Bose "noise-canceling" headphones. We think those cans are just okay. We also sell a few noise-canceling headsets made by Germany's Sennheiser: the PXC300, PXC250 and PXC150 and the excellent audiophile-oriented PXC350 and the high-end PXC450 with 'Talk-Through' feature and improved noise-canceling ability. These are all nicely ergonomic, lightweight noise-canceling headphones and are somewhat better-sounding than the Bose products, but there is no big pressing reason to throw out the Bose to just pick up a mildly better-sounding noise-canceling headset. The REAL reason to throw out the Bose, or any other noise-canceling headset you might own, is to get much more thorough noise-blocking / isolation and WAY better sound quality from a portable 'sealed/closed' headphone or, especially, from a high-end ear canal headphone (ECH).

Noise-canceling headphones typically provide only about minus 10dB of isolation, principally in the lower frequencies between 100Hz and 2000Hz. Unfortunately, they don’t get rid of as much higher-pitched external noise as standard full-sized "passive" sealed/closed headphones, which usually provide an equal minus -10dB of attenuation BUT across a much broader sound spectrum than the "active" noise-canceling design. Further, noise-canceling or even 'sealed' headphones can’t approach the nearly-total isolation possible with in-ear canal headphones/ECHs (not to be confused with lowly 'earbud' designs!) which typically attenuate outside noise by at least minus 20-30dB or more! Additionally, with both these sealed and ECH types, it is possible to add dedicated portable headphone amplification to dramatically improve the quality of the sound getting into your head.

Affordable Sealed and Ear Canal Headphone Solutions

Like we said, sealing yourself away from the noisy environment is job one when on the road, and keeping costs down means headphones that work well without requiring an amp. The little AKG K26P, is not only inexpensive and a solidly sealed design, but it sounds strong straight out of just about any player device. If you’re looking for a satisfying listen on a budget that will keep the noisy world at bay, these are they! Moving up in cost the Beyerdynamic DT 231 Galactic, Sennheiser HD 212 Pro, AKG K81DJ, and HD 280 Pro are all terrific sealed/closed headphones under that magic $100 mark.

As previously mentioned, the other way to get a nearly TOTAL ambient noise seal is with a pair of ear canal headphones. ECHs provide a tremendous seal against external noise; you will have absolutely no idea what the stewardess is talking about or even that there's a crazy banshee-ing kid two rows back. A lot of people distrust the idea of sticking something into their ear canal, and we understand the apprehension, but for most people ear canal headphones are actually reasonably comfortable to wear. We do have a number of varying options for ECH eartip sleeves, and when you are getting this much awesome sound quality inside your head, you’re probably not going to mind that acclimation curve too much! The lowest cost quality ECH is the Jays J-Jays earphones available in white and black. We prefer the more expensive D-Jays model and the Shure SE210 for most entry-level, non-audiophile portable listening applications.

Portable Headphone Amps

To step up into higher-fidelity traveling audio, you’ll definitely have to buy a portable headphone amp. Some of the more expensive headphones mentioned here are well worth the investment in an amp, and once you spend over $100-$150 you likely won’t get your full money’s worth out of your headphones without a headphone amplifier. The first step in HeadRoom headphone amplification is our Mobile Line. Think about these little amps when spending $200 or less on your cans. Remember that a Total BitHead, with good headphones and WinDVD with Dolby Headphone player software, will turn your laptop computer into a personal home theater in the sky. And the Total AirHead will give your iPod or other hard-drive player device the tight bass and ultra-clean highs you’re missing without a headphone amp.

Full-sized sealed headphones in this mid-priced category include the HD 280 Pro mentioned above (this is a great headphone that belongs in this category because it sounds good to many different types of listeners at a killer price); the beyerdynamic DT250-80 with a lovely treble clarity and slightly warm musical presentation; and the smooth-sounding & cleanly extended Sennheiser HD 25-II which is a terrifically punchy-sounding little headphone, sized just about right for travel featuring a lightweight, stable 'split' headband and built to withstand some pretty serious road-trip action.

Once again, ECHs are really the best way to go for frequent travelers, and the mid-price range has now become filled with some great choices: Hot on the scene are the Shure SE310, Etymotic ER-4P, and the Jays Q-Jays earphones. ECHs in this price range are amongst the best audio transducers you can buy for the money given their price-to-performance ratio. They are typically the equal of the best of the full-sized cans at similar pricepoints. A Total AirHead or Total BitHead will drive ECHs effortlessly -- even on the amp's 'low-gain' setting -- but the additional investment in one of our higher-end portable amplifiers (like the HeadRoom Portable Micro Amp) will give you upscale sound quality equal to an average audiophile’s home rig. We know that’s a little hard to believe; if we don’t deliver, PLEASE exercise your HeadRoom 30-day satisfaction guarantee. But we are truly not kidding: ECHs and a digital source through our Micro or Desktop Amp units sound so darn good you’ll be looking for excuses to hop a connector flight to Butte just for the tunes.

That brings up the issue of audio sources for the airplane. The iPod has changed everything, of course... It and its brethren portable hard-drive Mp3 players from iRiver, Creative, Archos, Rio, HP, Dell, etc, etc., are wonderful ways to listen to music on a plane. They work well with their audio line-out (or the 'headphone-output' at near full volume) into our Airhead/Bithead and both player & amp will nicely fit into the Gigabag. The only slightly larger-sized but WAY better-performing HeadRoom Portable Micro Amp should be used with the stunningly slick HeadRoom MicroBag travel system containing the handy Micro Strap and Micro Bag.

If you're a serious audiophile looking for the best of the best in portable audio, be sure to read our Mobile Audiophile article, which concentrates on obtaining the best sound on the road!

Sources with a Digital Outputs: The Endangered Species

The real high-end of portable audio these days, however, is to somehow locate a player with digital-audio outputs (optical line-out preferably!) and pump it into the digital-to-analog converters (DAC) of our Portable Micro Amp with DAC option or Portable Desktop Amp. Many of the older-model DAT, minidisk, MP3 hard-drive, and high-end portable CD players had digital-outs in the past; do be careful though as many of these players de-activate the digital output while running on batteries. The hard-drive player with the optical-out most lusted after is likely the various iRiver IHP-140, IHP-120, and IHP-110 models -- which all have unfortunately been discontinued by the manufacturer some time ago. They can occasionally still be found on auction websites or online stores from time to time if you are lucky. We hope that eventually hard-drive audio player manufacturers will either put digital-outs back on their devices, but more likely (and just as good!) is if they'll use the USB-host capability to provide interconnectivity to an external sound device. Until then, the solution for getting a true digital output is with a laptop computer through the USB, or from the optical digital-out of a portable DVD/CD player.

Portable DVD players are everywhere these days and have become fairly inexpensive. We recommend a variety of products from Coby which can be had for under $200, but the killer view is had on the Panasonic players, which come in between $200 and $500. The great thing about portable DVD players is that you’ll not only be able to watch movies but the majority of them play most flavors of encoded CDs from RedBook to ripped & burned MP3 discs. You simply can’t imagine how eargasmically good music & movies on the road are when you feed a digital signal into a HeadRoom amp's DAC stage.

How to Carry it All?

All this yadda yadda about hardware is making me dizzy!.... How do you keep it all under control? Along with our lovely HeadRoom amps, we also make right here in Montana a bunch of snazzy (and highly useful!) HeadRoom travel bags perfect for all the various amps + Mp3/iPod combos; It's the perfect solution to tie up all your loose audio ends while on the road! We've already mentioned our GigaBag for the Total AirHead and Total BitHead amps, constituting our smallest portable audio system available... smaller than a paperback book and weighing in at less than two pounds.

The Micro Strap lets you put your hard-disk Mp3 player or iPod on a very handy tilting platform that is totally secure. Lay it flat and slip it into the MicroBag when you hit the road. When jamming, kick it up on its stand to read the happy music scrolling by on the player's display.

Sealed Headphones

Big 'sealed' headphones can probably never quite get to the sound quality level that 'open-back' designs offer; they tend to be either a bit bright or too boomy and fall a little far to either side of perfectly right. However, there are nevertheless some quite good full-size audiophile-oriented sealed/closed headphones available.

On the bright and 'airy' side of things, the AKG K271 Studio is a solid performer. The 271S is very well-detailed in the mids/highs, albeit slightly lean in the bottom-end for big bass lovers. The deal breaker for a few may be the non-foldable, rather bulky size or the deep-well leather earpads on the k271. Sealed headphones tend to be warm (it’s the nature of the beast) but some listeners may heat up a bit less with the fabric material earpads available on other sealed headphone models. On the sonically "warmer" side of neutral (where the groovy jammin' bassheads live!) you’ll find the beyerdynamic DT 250-80, the Ultrasone DJ1. Either of these cans will deliver quite good audio detail resolution and tight-sounding musical textures. Want something as close to right down the middle of sonic neutrality as you can get? We’ll mention the Sennheiser HD280 Pro yet again which, although perhaps a bit too warm-sounding for some, we still think is as good a sealed headphone as we’ve heard priced anywhere near $100 bucks, and the amazingly inexpensive, broadly utilitarian Sennheiser HD205. Yes, Virginia, when used with a good headphone amp, these inexpensive little cans are sonically ALMOST on par with the others at this entry-level!

Ear Canal Headphones: The Last Best Thing

Of course, we’ve saved the best for last. High-end ECHs are simply among the best audio transducers available at ANY price. The sonic detail resolution across the entire frequency range on these tiny earphones is truly amazing and provides superbly accurate, world-class music reproduction. The audiologist-customized Ultimate Ears UE10 and Ultimate Ears UE11 and also the 'universal-fit' [no audiologist needed] Shure SE530 ECHs are like connecting the speaker wires directly to the audio sensory wetware inside your head. The hectic world suddenly goes away and the music appears perfectly formed within your sound mind... Yeah, you’ll cry when you pay the cash for them, but your tears will be dribbling over a big giant grin once you hear them!

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