Koss QZ-77 Active Noise Reduction Ear Plug System

Things I liked about these earplugs: (1) They look cheap. And I don't want to be mugged. (2) Contrary to what other people stated in their reviews, I found the noise cancellation pretty good. I was traveling right beside the plane jets and when I turned the noise cancellation on (without even turning on my ipod), the hiss of the jets would nearly die out. (3) The passive noise reduction is pretty good too. I forgot to buy batteries and was using it without the noise cancellation in the subways and I say it was worth it. (4) the sound quality is decent. But don't expect that any amount of money you expend on earplugs is going to buy you bose-like bass. Bad things: (1) They go deep into the ear canal. I can't wear them for too long. In the beginning it is not uncomfortable. The rubber in the earplugs is soft enough. But after like three hours I want to take them off. All in all, I think this is a good option for noise-cancelling earplugs, even without taking price into consideration. But don't expect any earplugs to compare to $500 bose earphones.

Works as intended.

Headphones with great potential, but several flaws that bring it down. I had to return 1st set because right speaker was not working. 2nd set works fine, but cables on this set are not the most resiliant and considering they carry additional wires for the noise cancelling microphones it's expectable they won't last. Noise cancelation capability is actually quite good, giving you only slight hiss and making noisy flight very bearable. Advantage I appreciate is they don't make your ears hot like the noise cancelling sets sitting outside around your ears. However they do get uncomfortable after several hours. I'm used to wear Koss Plug without any problems for many hours at a time, but these QZ77 still get uncomfortable much sooner. Unlike the Plug these headphones also sit partially on your head/ear with the plastic, not just on the foam plug, so they transfer vibrations from walking, giving unpleasant bass at every step. Last negative is poor insulation from induction noise caused by data transfers on your phone. At first I thought cable is already getting broken, but when in flight mode, sound from my phone became crystal clear. These headphones will pick-up noise during heavy data transfers on the phone.

Wow...so many problems, where to start? First, the item is bulky and the cord is too short for the huge unit to fit in a side pants pocket. Second, the "active noise reduction" actually just increases the volume a tiny bit; it does not reduce outside noise AT ALL. The cheap rubber fittings are difficult to insert in your ear, and don't seal very well which greatly reduces the passive noise reduction. Also, the sound quality is on par with $3 disposable headphones. It is muffled and just BAD. My advice: pay a little bit more for good-sounding earbuds, and definitely don't opt for the "active noise reduction" when buying earbuds, as it is worthless, requires batteries, and is very bulky.

I have had a few active noise cancellation headphones in the past, all over-the-ear type. They were satisfactory, providing a considerable reduction in machinery noise. I also owned a few ear-buds with passive noise-reduction, and those work great (including Koss "spark-plug" in-ear phones). I was looking for the ones that would combine both methods, as I think that has the potential to produce a very good overall noise-blocking result, so I had big expectations of these. What I got is a classic case of "you get what you pay for". To be fair: sound quality is very good for the price (far exceeds anything you get from a stock earbuds). Comfort is mediocre. Passive noise reduction was OK, but not great. Active noise cancellation simply doesn't exist in this model. At all! This is not a total loss though: the active noise cancellation unit doubles as an amplifier/volume controller, and given a fair performance in passive noise reduction, they can still be used (given the low price, of course). Overall I have to recommend against buyng this model.