Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

Let me start off by saying that I work in broadcasting (radio) and I am an avid collector of headphones and earbuds. I've used expensive and the cheap, and by and large, aside from death and taxes, what I've found to be pretty much an absolute is that Sony makes fantastic products. Period. My professional studio monitor headphones are Sony's (MDR-7506's) and they are pretty much the industry standard. I've used Power Beats earbuds (which are the ONLY things by beats that I will actually endorse) and I've used fairly cheap Phillips earbuds and been remarkably surprised at their quality vs actual cost. I currently have 2 pairs of Sony earbuds, one pair was relatively inexpensive ($29.99) and provide great quality and audio as well as being great for use on my cell phone for calls. I've owned several noise cancelling earbuds (my personal fav being a Phillips pair that were rather impressive considering how little they cost). However, I have discovered after initially jumping on the Noise Cancelling bandwagon how they simply are not worth the additional cost unless you really do travel a lot on planes (which is why they were created in the first place). Noise Cancellation does NOT make the audio sound better. AT ALL. Let me say that again for those considering buying some: they do NOT make music sound ANY better. ALL they do is help isolate the music when you have a lot of ambient background noise surrounding you (such as on an airplane). Some are better at it than others (see anything with "Bose") but Phillips actually makes some good ones too. All things considered though, you can buy expensive and great sounding earbuds (such as the Power Beats or Bose, Klipsch, Sennheiser etc) or you can get JUST as great audio quality without breaking the bank and buy something like the Sony MDRXB50AP Extra Bass earbuds. It took very little time wearing these to determine they gave me Power Beats audio quality for less than HALF the cost. They were great at noise isolation (not noise cancelling) and boosting the audio levels on my mp3 player by a pretty hefty amount over even my regular Sony earbuds--which was very gratifying considering some of the songs I have were recorded at pretty weak levels. They impressively gave a boost to the bass, which I expected, but also were great at the mid's and highs as well--which I did Not expect. I was going to mention how I wish the cords were flat, when it hit me that they ARE flat, just very narrow. Basically this means they won't tangle like many of the cords on earbuds available today. They still CAN tangle, just not as easily. A nice touch by Sony, and for someone who has dealt with tangled cords like I have, I was VERY happy to see this feature. It'll make a difference for you whether you realize it or not. Long story short, if you want exceptional audio quality with added bass (but not TOO much), great highs AND lows with punchy mid's too--look NO further than these. As I mentioned above, they give you truly incredible sound at less than HALF the cost of some other brands which we all know well enough. In other words, why pay more?