Edifier W830NB Noise Cancelling Wireless Headphone Review

[crappypanther]

Ugreen looks better

 

[kyuu]

I hope yours turn on because ragged treble FR seems inconsequential compared to...

Based on zeropoint's contribution, I think Amir was pressing the wrong button.

 

[SuicideSquid]

It's almost worse seeing something get so close to the mark and then whiff in one area so badly.

Great distortion numbers, great features, great price, great fr through most of the audible spectru... OH MY GOD WHAT IS HAPPENING FROM 3khz UP!!??

 

[Timcognito]

These are $60 on Amazon, not sure which is better

'1More Sonoflow NC Headphone Review'

Mar 12, 2023

This is a review, listening tests, EQ an detailed measurements of 1More Sonoflow Noise Cancelling Bluetooth headphones. It is on kind loan from a member and costs US $99 although goes on sale for $79.

The look and feel of the unit belies its low cost. The plastic seems stout and good quality. Pad feels soft and I like the nice large channel indicators in the red inserts. An app comes with lets you control the unit although I found the buttons very intuitive as well -- unlike many others I have tested.

Alas, the cups are just a bit too small to fully cover my ears so I can't...

• amirm
• Replies: 165
• Forum: Headphone & IEM Reviews & Discussions

• 

 

[Curupira]

That chaotic treble response merits searching for peaks using a tone generator, which unfortunately is something I'd consider very advanced in EQ. Too advanced for most people that they target. Hopefully it doesn't sound peaky to more layman's ear or even at all, as I've heard plenty of trained listeners liking Edifier's budget offerings.

 

[SuicideSquid]

These are $60 on Amazon, not sure which is better

'1More Sonoflow NC Headphone Review'

Mar 12, 2023

This is a review, listening tests, EQ an detailed measurements of 1More Sonoflow Noise Cancelling Bluetooth headphones. It is on kind loan from a member and costs US $99 although goes on sale for $79.

The look and feel of the unit belies its low cost. The plastic seems stout and good quality. Pad feels soft and I like the nice large channel indicators in the red inserts. An app comes with lets you control the unit although I found the buttons very intuitive as well -- unlike many others I have tested.

Alas, the cups are just a bit too small to fully cover my ears so I can't...

• amirm
• Replies: 165
• Forum: Headphone & IEM Reviews & Discussions

• 

I'd take the edifier 10 times out of 10 over these. Even if you're just using rough tone controls, turning the treble down 3-4dB overall (rather than trying to EQ out peaks) should leave this with maybe not amazing treble performance, but "good enough", and they're *way* better in every other respect.

 

[amirm]

These are $60 on Amazon, not sure which is better

Reading my review now, I have to say the Edifier is much better as far as tonality than the 1Moore. I think I was very impressed with the price of that headphone. Now that we have seen more products in this price category, my review of that would be much more negative if it were done today. My apologies for not being consistent enough in this regard.

 

[Timcognito]

Thanks for the quick responses. I guess time is moving on for transducers of all sizes. What was great a few years back is now what is expected for both quality and price. Not much of a HP listener so your advice is much appreciated.

 

[anphex]

Can someone TL;DR why this is considered a poor option by the community?
I’m genuinely curious.


Facts:

• Price: $70
• Tuning: Pretty good Harman target compliance (better than many in the price range)
• Design: Simple, clean, and elegant
• Distortion: Respectable—again, better than several competitors

So… what's the problem?


Is there another set at this price that checks all these boxes? If so, please name it.

 

[kyuu]

Can someone TL;DR why this is considered a poor option by the community?
I’m genuinely curious.

Facts:

• Price: $70
• Tuning: Pretty good Harman target compliance (better than many in the price range)
• Design: Simple, clean, and elegant
• Distortion: Respectable—again, better than several competitors

So… what's the problem?


Is there another set at this price that checks all these boxes? If so, please name it.

I'm thinking a lot of people are reacting to Amir's commentary more than the measurements themselves. Amir had issues with turning the headphones on for wireless use, which caused concern as to the reliability. However, this was likely due to a misunderstanding of the manual (Amir has yet to confirm if his unit turns on when pressing the correct button). Amir also stated himself that he would compare these favorably to others in the price category that he has reviewed previously, but his standards have sort of changed over time where now he's more critical than he was.

Unfortunate as many probably won't come back to see that these actually probably rate as a very good set of powered headphones for the price, particularly if you can apply EQ to the treble region, but such is life. The review still did net Edifier at least one sale.

 

[RHO]

I'm thinking a lot of people are reacting to Amir's commentary more than the measurements themselves. Amir had issues with turning the headphones on for wireless use, which caused concern as to the reliability. However, this was likely due to a misunderstanding of the manual (Amir has yet to confirm if his unit turns on when pressing the correct button). Amir also stated himself that he would compare these favorably to others in the price category that he has reviewed previously, but his standards have sort of changed over time where now he's more critical than he was.

Unfortunate as many probably won't come back to see that these actually probably rate as a very good set of powered headphones for the price, particularly if you can apply EQ to the treble region, but such is life. The review still did net Edifier at least one sale.

Well, maybe many don't but I'm still following this topic, hoping @amirm manages to turn on these headphones and use them as intended (wireless). Maybe he could also repeat the measurements in BT mode, if time permits?
I'll revise my vote depending on the results.

 

[Limopard]

Something from the "nothing to write home about" category.

I would be interested how their planars (especially the S5) measure, they look promising but come at a price.

 

[SuicideSquid]

Can someone TL;DR why this is considered a poor option by the community?
I’m genuinely curious.


Facts:

• Price: $70
• Tuning: Pretty good Harman target compliance (better than many in the price range)
• Design: Simple, clean, and elegant
• Distortion: Respectable—again, better than several competitors

So… what's the problem?


Is there another set at this price that checks all these boxes? If so, please name it.

Well a couple people above commented they rated "Poor" because of Amir's problems with getting the wireless to work, apparently not understanding that a sample size of "1" tells you nothing about reliability (and apparently missing the comments suggesting that Amir may simply have been pressing the wrong button). I voted fine. Weird treble response that looks tricky to EQ, but great response below that, great distortion, great price.

 

[RHO]

Well a couple people above commented they rated "Poor" because of Amir's problems with getting the wireless to work, apparently not understanding that a sample size of "1" tells you nothing about reliability (and apparently missing the comments suggesting that Amir may simply have been pressing the wrong button). I voted fine. Weird treble response that looks tricky to EQ, but great response below that, great distortion, great price.

My vote has nothing to do with reliability, but with the fact that Amir was not able to turn the device on. There a big difference. The device could have worked perfectly and died during the test. That would have been a reliability issue. This is a functionality issue.
If Amir misread the manual and updates the review, I will also reconsider my vote. But from the info we have now we can conclude that there's something wrong with the implementation of the power on/off switch, we have a malfunctioning device ... or this is a case of user error.
Certain is that the device was missing its main functionality during the test.
Still hoping this is user error. We'll see.

 

[mlsstl]

I would like to see if the button /BT connect issue was really user error. I have a set of these headphones and can tell you that pushing the "pair" button when the headphones are off accomplishes nothing. However, even if turned off, if you plug the headphones into your PC with a USB cable they will immediately start playing without pressing any buttons to turn them on. I suspect this is what happened but it would be nice to hear it confirmed.

 

[amirm]

FYI I pushed the center of the volume control and it did power on and go into pairing mode. I didn't have time to do more but at least this main issue was pilot error (aided by unusual design).

 

[mlsstl]

I'd agree that many products -- well beyond audio gear -- have buttons, knobs and other controls that are not well identified, along with the product coming with very poor instructions, or often none at all. However, once you get past the learning curve, the frustration settles down and one can enjoy the item.

 

[kyuu]

After living with these headphones for a few days now, I feel like the vote is definitely highly unfair to this product. Functionally, they are terrific. I'm particularly pleased with the ability to connect them to my PC via USB. Shows up as both output and input (microphone) right away and works great. I don't know why this isn't a standard feature amongst these sorts of headphones.

The app is fine. The 4 band EQ is better than nothing, but unfortunately highly limited. In addition to only being able to have a single filter for blocks of the frequency range, the Q of the filter can't be higher than 2. That makes the EQ corrections for the treble region impossible to implement. Luckily, the most impactful EQ filter in the bass region around 60Hz can be implemented no issue.

Out of the box, it sounds fine enough. As stated, EQing out the excess energy in the bass region makes the biggest impact and makes them sound quite good. Implementing the treble corrections via EAPO is worthwhile and takes it to truly excellent territory IMO, but the audible impact of those treble perturbations isn't as large as you might expect looking at the FR graph.

They don't get excessively loud, but that's perfectly fine with me. They get as loud as I could ever actually want headphones to get without worrying about damaging my hearing.

Noise cancellation works great. For my head and ears they are as comfortable as any pair of over-ears have ever been.

All-in-all, for $70 I can't find anything to complain about.

 

[Jimster480]

Are there any better options in the <$100 bracket? I've been using a Bose QC45 at work that I randomly won in a raffle a while back, but I'm continually annoyed by Bluetooth pairing issues, random sound quality issues (due again to flaky Bluetooth I suspect), and I can't find any reliable measurements to use for EQ. I tested just now, and they don't appear to be able to connect via USB as the Edifier can which is a feature I'd greatly appreciate.

After applying the EQ (which I can easily do with Equalizer APO), would you recommend these headphones @amirm? I think the earcups are pretty similar to the Bose QC45, which is fine enough for me.

1More Sonoflow ANC Over ear I think is overall better.

 

[vondy]

Stellar battery life imo, comfortable albeit tight - not many moments where my ears were so hot I had to take it off (and I’ve got pretty warm ears)
Tweaked a bit with the EQs Maiky76 provided and found a satisfying middle ground, now looking for a loudness solution I can use on Windows