The Sennheiser HD1 Wireless Headphones with Active Noise Cancellation are the best over-ear headphones we’ve owned with one minor flaw. Maybe two, depending on your head size.
But before we get to that we need a little bit of backstory and discuss our previous headphones, the Sennheiser Momentum (1.0).
Backstory – Our First Sennheiser Purchase
We purchased the Sennheiser Momentum (1.0) Wired On-Ear Headphones a few years ago and loved the sound quality but hated two things: the cord and the on-ear headphones.
The sound quality was truly amazing. We’re not audiophiles by any means but going from Apple earbuds to a quality pair of headphones was definitely worth the cost.
Bluetooth Headphones – Ready to cut the cord?
However, we kept running over the cord with our computer chair. Actually it was our daughter who kept rolling over the cord but she claims, “nu-uh! it wasn’t me!”.
I remember talking to a Best Buy employee ~15 years ago about these new Bluetooth stereo floor speakers and he didn’t recommend them because, at the time, Bluetooth wasn’t able to fully handle the amount of data present in music and the cost of the speakers wasn’t worth the poor sound quality just to save a few wires.
Bluetooth technology has come a long way since then so I figured it was time to cut the cord. Because if I didn’t, my daughter would literally do it for me.
On-Ear Headphones – Do not use for extended periods
The other thing we hated about the Momentum headphones was the on-ear feel. We’re sure there are other on-ear headphones that are wearable for hours at a time but the Sennheiser Momentum (1.0) was NOT in that group.
We wear glasses when we’re in front of the computer and after an hour or two the headphones would push our ears into our glasses and into our head. These headphones were definitely not made for the vision-impaired.
Now, on to the real review…
Sennheiser HD1 Wireless Headphones
We knew it was time to upgrade to noise-cancelling over-the-ear headphones once our daughter started watching YouTube videos of bored moms opening up kids toys with that never-ending crinkling of plastic wrappers.
We really liked the sound quality of our old headphones but definitely needed something over-the-ear this time to accommodate our glasses.
Sound Quality
There’s not much more we can say about the sound quality — we think it’s the tops. Audiophiles are free to disagree. All we know is that it’s better than what we had so that equals “best” in our book.
The noise cancellation is excellent too. It cancels out all the bad noise while still allowing you to hear if someone is telling you that it’s time for dinner.
Call Quality
We’ve only used it a couple times for phone calls but the call quality is good and people seem to be able to hear us fine thanks to the microphones that are used to help with noise cancellation.
We did have some trouble with the connection when our Dyson Pure Hot + Cool Link HP02 Wi-Fi Enabled Air Purifier was running it would interfere with the Bluetooth call to our iPhone. Not sure why. Our Plantronics Voyager Legend Bluetooth headset doesn’t have that issue. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Comfort
Like we’ve already mentioned, over-the-ear headphones are the way to go especially if you wear glasses. They are comfortable, they don’t get “hot” like some earphones, and they completely cover your ear for better noise cancellation.
Battery Life
Since these are Bluetooth headphones they need to be charged – regularly. In fact, when you put them down for the day/evening you should just automatically turn them off and plug them in to your charger.
We’re not sure if we keep leaving them unplugged or if they just drain faster than we expect but a few times that we went to use them they were nearly dead.
Luckily there’s a pleasant voice that tells you to recharge them so you’re not going crazy trying to figure out if they are dead or just won’t connect to your Bluetooth.
Controls
The controls are fine but they are hard to remember. There are only a couple buttons on the headset but we can never remember the command to tell us how much battery life is left (triple-click the volume button).
Or the procedure to pair the headset with a new device (see below). We always look it up online and have to sit through a useless video intro before learning that all you have to do to pair it with a new device is turn it off, wait a second or two, and then hold the power button down for about 8 seconds.
Here are the official instructions from Sennheiser’s website. Be sure to turn the headphones OFF first:
Press the power button and keep it pressed until you hear the voice prompts “power on” and “pairing” and the LED flashes blue and red. The headphones are in pairing mode.
One or Two Minor Flaws
There are only two things that we don’t like about these headphones.
Flaw Number One
I have a big head and these headphones stick out from your head pretty far — about 2-3 inches. So when I wear these headphones my head seems even more gigantic. I considered getting a second pair for work but decided against the taunting from my coworkers.
Flaw Number Two
I can’t pronounce or remember how to spell the company’s name.
Thankfully, when I type, “seinhauser” or “senheiser” or “senhauser” into Google they know exactly what I mean.
Conclusion
The Seinhauser Senheiser Sennheiser HD1 Wireless Headphones with Active Noise Cancellation technology are worth the money if you can remember how to search for them.
Oh look! We have a nice link directly to the product on Amazon for you. How thoughtful!
They are a bit expensive so if the HD1 is out of your price range you can check out our review of the best headphones for under $50.
But the quality is amazing, they are comfortable, there’s no cord for your dog to chew on or your daughter to run over with your office chair. And they look good as long as you don’t have a big head.