[ad_1]
Speaker 1: Back in 2022, Sony’s W 1000 X Mark Fives got CNET Editors Choice Award and have been up there with some of the best premium consumer headphones. That’s cute, but with Bose releasing the Quiet Comfort Ultras, is it time to put the X and fives out to pasture when it comes to these headphones? There is a clear winner more on that later, but first, let’s see how these headphones stack up against each other in a bunch of user [00:00:30] critical categories. Looking at design, and both of these headphones have definitely gone down different paths. The Xon fives are lightweight and the blend of synthetic leather and plastic. While the QC ultras are equally lightweight, but use real leather along with aluminum and plastic, the aluminum yolk is cold to the touch and offers a premium feel. Just be sure not to pinch your fingers on that hinge.
Speaker 1: The XM fives while not as premium feeling, have a more rugged nature to them. They’re built real sturdy and offer more flex in the QC [00:01:00] Ultra. When it comes to padding, it feels like the QC Ultra is firmer but also tighter around your ears. While the XM five leave a little bit more room. In the short term, I think the XM five softer cups are more comfortable, but the QC Ultra is firmer Pads will probably stand the test of time a little better. When it comes to the headbands, there’s definitely less padding on the Exon five. It’s a iCal headband offers less surface area on your head compared to the QC Ultra, which covers your head a little bit more and has extra squishiness in the padding, [00:01:30] which I think will help with longer listening sessions. Overall, the wearing experience for me is pretty comparable when it comes to comfort, but if pushed, I’ll probably have to side with the X and fives just for that softer padding and how the housing doesn’t clamp on my ears nearly as much as the quiet comfort ultras. But your mileage may vary. Take my wife for example.
Speaker 2: Wife. Yes,
Speaker 1: Don’t do that. [00:02:00] Okay. Listen, I’ve given you both of these headphones to try on.
Speaker 2: Yes.
Speaker 1: Which do you find more comfortable?
Speaker 2: Absolutely. The bows.
Speaker 1: Why is that?
Speaker 2: They seem to have a smaller headland part so that when they go on my head, they don’t slide really far down so they’re really comfortable in exactly where I want them to be
Speaker 1: And why And these so comfortable?
Speaker 2: Well, these must just have a longer headband and don’t go as tight around this section so that when I put them on, they sit [00:02:30] so low on my head and they’re putting all this pressure on my jaw that after not even one song I’m starting to notice and it just feels like when you clench your jaw.
Speaker 1: Wow.
Speaker 1: So yeah, I guess head size is a real factor for comfort. My melon found the XM fives extremely comfortable, whereas my Mrs. Minuscule cranium begged to differ. Another key difference between the two is how they fold away. The XM fives has a single hinge with a swivel rocket to allow the headphones to fold flat. While the QC Ultra’s dual [00:03:00] hinge allows you to fold flat and up making them a little more portable and nothing demonstrates this point more than the respective carry case. The XM five case is so big, you’ll be hard pressed to fit inside a laptop bag, which isn’t the case, pun intended. With the QC Ultra, the fact that the entire footprint of the QC Ultra case fits within the XM five case should say it all really. So the portability points definitely go to the QC Ultra. Now moving on to the most subjective part of this comparison, [00:03:30] sound quality and yes, you’ll be happy to know that both these headphones offer premium sound, which should be a given considering their premium price tag.
Speaker 1: The XM five sound is very accurate, very warm. You get a lot of detail and clarity from those 14 millimeter drivers. The QC ultrasound in my opinion, is a little better than the XM five. They have the same drivers as their predecessor headphone 700, but it’s new Qualcomm chip set does a lot of the heavy lifting to improve on that Bose signature sound. It [00:04:00] ups the detail and clarity with slightly more defined base, and I do love me some base. Both of these headphones have a companion app where you can adjust EQ settings. So if there’s a particular type of sound you like, you’ll more than likely be able to recreate with either. For a base test, I used dead press’s hip hop, and cranked both EQs base to the Max. Dexon fives handled it well for the most part, but near the end at the climatic low end reverb section, I did notice that the headphones distorted a bit.
Speaker 1: I had no such problems with QC [00:04:30] Ultra. The prolonged reverb was handled brilliantly with the base staying tight and accurate with a satisfying low end rumble. In terms of controls, both use a mixture of touch gestures and physical buttons. The XM fives lean more on touch controls, although it does have a couple of buttons for power pairing and mode switching. BS playback controls are more traditional with a single press to play. Pause your music double press to skip track triple press to skip back a track and the volume being handled [00:05:00] by a touch strip on the right cup. Meanwhile, the XM fives double tap the right cup to pause and play. Swipe forward to skip forward, swipe back to skip back and swipe up and down. To control the volume on the surface, the XM five controls seem more intuitive, but because it’s different from the traditional style the QC Ultra uses, I did find myself actually using the wrong gestures from time to time when I first got started using the XM fives.
Speaker 1: After a while though, I did find them easier to use than the Bose because I didn’t have to hunt [00:05:30] around for that physical button. When it comes to audio codex, the Xon fives get more options with Sony’s own high definition leck support, along with Apex, which are both used for certain Android devices. iOS users will have to make do with the more generic AC codec. Bose also offers app text, but with a bunch of Android phone makers not renewing the app text license, it’s going to be hit or miss to know if your phone will actually support high definition. But you can always get high fidelity through the [00:06:00] included OX cable for both headphones. But here lies my biggest bud bear with both of these headphones. Neither of these headphones allow for USB audio despite having AUSB port and even worse for the QC Ultra, they need to be powered on to be used wired while the x and fives can be used passively. I just feel like this is an oversight considering the money BOS and Sony are asking for, especially when the Beach Studio Pro offered this feature for 50 to $80 less onto noise canceling [00:06:30] and both the QC Ultra and the X and fives are absolute class leaders. So to give you a demo of both headphones, noise canceling and transparency mode, I’m going to mic them both up and listen to something on my TV and hopefully the quality will come through. Let’s give it a go.
Speaker 3: Appreciate the ingenuity it takes to develop new technologies, but would once charging, it seems like it’s two step forward. [00:07:00] Hate develop new technology, but with one’s charging, it seems like it’s two steps forward.
Speaker 1: The major feature for Bose this time round is immersive audio, which essentially is the spatial audio feature found on the airport’s max. It takes your music from inside your head and opens it up and feels like it’s more around you. The still mode [00:07:30] keeps the music in front of you, panning your music from ear to ear when you turn your head while the motion mode tracks your head movements to keep you in the center of your music. Sony’s answer to this is 360 audio, which works in the same way. However, it only allows you to use the feature with a select number of streaming services, which is a little bit disappointing, especially for Apple Music and Spotify users as those services aren’t one of them. Both headphones allow you to adjust the level of noise canceling or transparency by creating sound profiles. [00:08:00] But the way these features are implemented are miles apart.
Speaker 1: With the X fives, you can create profiles for different states and locations much like the QC Ultra, but Sony’s method is a little more automated changing profiles depending on what you’re doing. Once you’ve set it up, the QC Ultra’s profiles need to be changed manually, and if you create a bunch, it could end up being a bit tedious cycling between all these profiles by long pressing the media button. It could be cool if a double long press would be able to cycle backwards, so if you had two profiles you liked, [00:08:30] you could just cycle back and forth between the two. And of course, you’ll be happy to know that both of these headphones have multi-point Bluetooth pairing, and at these price points they had better. I found the transition from my phone to my tablet, smooth and seamless on both with minimal delay. Just a quick word on call quality, and both of these headphones do an excellent job canceling out that background noise and callers will have no problems hearing you over any noisy traffic. If I had to nitpick, I might say the XM five sound a little more [00:09:00] processed and the QC ultras more natural. But decide by yourself by listening to Cena OG David car noise test calls.
Speaker 4: I’m standing here in the streets of New York with a lot of cars going by.
Speaker 5: I’m talking to another Dave on the other line. We’re having a conversation right now. What do you think Dave? Can? Is my voice clear and how much background noise are you hearing?
Speaker 4: I’m on a test call here with fellow C Editor John Fone. John, I’m chief
Speaker 5: Of New York City. A lot of traffic [00:09:30] going on behind me, so I’m just going to talk a little bit longer to have you hear my voice with the background noise. Let me know what you think.
Speaker 1: As I said at the top of the video, when it comes to these headphones, there is a clear winner here and that is the consumer. Yes, I know it’s a bit of a cop out, but I truly believe that you can go wrong with either headphone. It’s more about which one fits you better. Both produce class leading, noise canceling, both offer excellent sound quality and core performance, and both are [00:10:00] mighty expensive. However, I would say headphones like this are an investment. I have owned the original QC 35 from 2016, and aside from replacing the air cups and headband, they have stood the test of time. If you take care of these headphones, there’s no reason they won’t last the best part of a decade and beyond making the cost a lot easier to stop. But what camp are you in? Are you a QC Ultra or are you an XM five or maybe a totally different pair of headphones altogether? Put it in the comments and thanks again so much for watching and [00:10:30] I’ll catch you on the next one.
[ad_2]
