Great sound can be affordable – Review Geek

Are these the most impressive headphones you can buy? No, but they’re affordable, sound pretty good, and offer plenty of active noise cancellation for flights.

When you’re looking for a pair of headphones with ANC or active noise-cancelling technology, you’ll see plenty of expensive options. So, with OneOdio’s refreshing $80 price tag attached to the A10 Hybrid ANC headphones, you might be wondering: Is it too good to be true? Fortunately, it is not!

I’m not going to lie and say you’d be disappointed if you dropped $200 to $500, or potentially much more depending on the brand, on a premium pair of ANC headphones. With headphones and earphones, you get what you pay for. Spending more money usually means better drivers and noise-cancelling microphones, and therefore a better listening experience overall. But it is possible to invest in a cheap pair of ANC headphones that deliver on their promises and sound pretty good – OneOdio’s A10 Hybrid ANC Headphones are proof of that.

specs

design and construction

Like many modern headphones, OneOdio’s A10 Hybrid ANC headphones can be folded compactly to fit inside a case, which is included by the way. Where the ear cups fold over, the junctions are reinforced metal, which is good for longevity as the junctions are always the first piece to break on a pair of headphones.

Then the headband is adjustable, but unfortunately it was too big for my head and there is no way to adjust it a size lower. They fit my head pretty well when sitting, but if I leaned over, or shook my head slightly to test, they would slip off. There’s a chance they’ll fit a little better with some thicker aftermarket pads, but since the slack seems to be coming from the headband, I’m hopeless.

Regardless of whether the thicker ear pads would help secure the headphones on my head, I’ll probably replace them anyway. The ear pads that come with OneOdio’s A10 headphones are soft, but they feel too thin to be comfortable for very long periods of time. Also, when my husband tried them on, he said the pads were touching the tips of his ears. I figure that since I apparently have a small head, I also have small ears, and my ears fit completely inside the cushion.

On the left ear, you’ll find a USB-C charging port and the ANC button that toggles between ANC on, ANC off, and transparency mode. Then, on the right ear, there’s a 3.5mm aux jack, a volume up button, a volume down button, and a raised, textured button between the volume buttons. This textured button is the multi-purpose button that allows you to play or pause a song, answer or reject a phone call, double press for assistant help, long press to pair with your smartphone, and more.

sound quality

For an $80 pair of headphones, I was impressed with the excellent sound quality of all the songs I chose to try out. As an upgrade to what’s inside, there are 40mm dynamic drivers with Hi-Res Audio and a 20Hz to 40kHz frequency range.

My current go-to songs when testing any audio product are Times lost by The Weeknd nothing is safe by clipping, and Time by Hans Zimmer, and yes, this is from Inception. I played the first two songs at 40% volume and the last song at 50% volume. For the most part, the headphones picked up all the small, specialized elements of each song, but not everything was always as balanced as I would have liked.

Times lost it was able to capture the higher notes of her voice and most of the mids and lows, though the lower notes did get a bit muddy, especially with so many high and mid frequencies for the headphones to focus on. In clipping. nothing is safe, the high notes of the piano appear clear at the beginning with a pleasant reverberation, but something is missing in the bass. When the ups and downs in nothing is safe They’re supposed to be blended, which is to say, in fantastic speakers, the bass pretty much disappears and the treble takes over.

in the beginning of Time by Hans Zimmer, there are some pretty low notes that are barely audible or not audible at all with faulty headphones. Fortunately, OneOdio’s A10 Hybrid ANC headphones are able to create an atmospheric experience with the beginning of the song, and I can clearly hear the rhythm and melody. The construction of the song sounds great, but as soon as the song hits the treble and crescendos, the low notes are completely lost.

So if you want a pair of headphones that can handle the deepest notes and you love listening to bass-heavy music, the A10 Hybrid ANC headphones might not be the right choice for you. But I think most people who normally listen to music with a decent mix of bass, mids, and highs would be satisfied with these headphones.

Active noise cancellation

OneOdio’s A10 Hybrid Headphones are equipped with dual feedback and dual feedback ANC microphones that can block up to 95% of low- and mid-frequency backgrounds, such as those you’d hear from car engines in traffic, on airplanes or your home’s AC system. That said, these are budget ANC headphones and can’t block out as much noise as premium ANC headphones, especially if no music is playing while you’re wearing them.

I played a movie at full volume on the TV in front of me and then asked my husband to speak to me at a normal volume and a slightly raised volume, all to test how blocky these headphones were. It’s important to note that physically putting the headphones over your ears does provide some element of noise blocking, and that’s essentially what you experience when ANC mode is off. I switched to ANC On without playing music, and then to ANC Off, noticing only a slight difference between the two. With transparency mode, both my husband’s and TV’s dialogues were super clear.

Although I tried the situations above, ANC headphones are known to be the best at blocking out low and mid frequencies. My husband talking, a movie playing in the background, music playing through the speakers – these are all typically high-frequency sounds, and headphones are not well equipped to cancel these sounds.

With this in mind, I wanted to give the headphones a chance to shine and test how well they could work on a plane. Since I don’t have any flights planned in the near future, the best I could do was make a pink noise video on YouTube. I only had the pink noise video playing at 30% volume on my laptop, but man, did it feel louder. Going through all three modes, I could clearly tell a difference between ANC On and the other modes.

Transparency mode lets through the loudest crackling sounds in pink noise video, while ANC Off blocks out what the headphones physically block out and lets through low drone sounds. Then ANC On blocks out that lower drone sound and only lets through the static sound that’s probably somewhere between a mid to high frequency. While still in ANC mode on, I played a song and could barely hear the pink noise. I could noticeably hear the pink noise in ANC mode off, but playing music and the physical ear cushions definitely helped to mute it.

Battery duration

Because the ANC technology isn’t as powerful as the technology found inside more premium on-ear headphones, OneOdio’s A10 earphones can hold a charge for quite some time. If you only have Bluetooth turned on, you can get up to 45 hours of use. Or, with just ANC enabled, you can get up to 50 hours of use. If both Bluetooth and ANC are on, the battery life drops to 35 hours, but that’s still a long time!

When the headphones are connected to your smartphone via Bluetooth, you can head over to your Bluetooth devices to see how much battery the A10 Hybrid has left. After playing music for over an hour, experimenting with all the features of the headphones, the remaining battery life never went above 90%. If you’re ever short on time and somehow drain the OneOdio A10 earbuds’ battery, a 5-minute charge gives you about two hours of listening.

Verdict: A solid pair of budget ANC headphones

If you’re looking for the best of the best with ANC technology, you won’t find it with OneOdio’s A10 Hybrid ANC Headphones. If you know what to go in for, and that you may need to find thicker replacement pads, I think most people will be happy with this purchase. All of my songs sounded fantastic, the dialogue on my shows was crisp, and the battery life is amazing. Overall, I was very impressed with this inexpensive and unassuming pair of ANC headphones.