While these headphones are decent for bass heavy music their harsh, bloated mid range makes instrumental music difficult to listen to.

TDK's ST-200 headphones won't blow your mind with their sound quality, but they offer an affordable upgrade from your stock ear buds and are nicely designed as well.

TDK's NC-200 noise-cancelling headphones are a decent product let down by poor design. The sound, while distorted in parts, will be fine for most, but the uncomfortable cups make wearing them for long periods painful.

The TDK ST-PR400 won't be for everybody. Their DJ design means one thing; lots of bass, and as such they aren't suited to all styles of music; however, dance and electronica fans may find what they're looking for here.

While not dethroning Bose as the kings of active noise cancelling headphones, Philips' SHN9500 offers a good alternative by combining both good quality audio with impressive noise cancelling.

A solid entry into the noise cancelling headphones space, Panasonic's RP-HC500s offer good value for money, although those willing to pay a premium should look towards high end IEMs for better sound quality.

An excellent choice of noise canceling headphones for the budget conscious.

The QuietComfort 3 headphones offer exceptional noise cancelling, and while they may not provide the best sound quality on the market, they are extremely appealing for frequent travelers.

A wonderful sounding headphone at a competitive price but is let down by a poor design that makes it hard to wear over long periods of time.

If they were $150 cheaper they would be a very reasonable choice but as it stands the TriPorts are a little too expensive and suffer from over-emphatic bass.

If you have the money to spend and audio quality is important to you, The Quiet Comfort 2 are the best noise cancelling headphones we have seen and are well worth their price tag.

The Philips SBC-HN110 headphones are too lightweight and their noise attenuation of just 10dB is not enough to really deal with unwanted sounds.