I'm going to go long here, hoping it may help a fellow music lover with fairly severe hearing deficiencies. I am 71, and have music playing probably 4 to 8 hrs a day on average. I always strive for quality in sound over features and even ease of use. I am super pleased with my Nothing Ear Buds. IF YOU SUFFER FROM FAIRLY SEVERE HEARING LOSS and have to wear hearing aids just to function as I do, AND: demand great Accurate sound, not just decent sound when listening to music, you should try these buds. So many positives. NOTE: I don't care about noise cancelling. Just an added plus. My hearing is about 30% to 50% accurate on live conversation and lyrics in music without hearing aids, probably 60% to 80% with hearing aids. Listening to music, (which I do daily for hours); with these buds I hear probably 85 to 95+% of lyrics correctly when streaming. I am amazed. AND the sound quality is incredible. Tiny details on light percussion, string instruments, mandalins...etc are crystal clear. But they can rock too. Softer music is more difficult to reproduce accurately IMO. I own quality hearing aids, have a main stereo valued at $15,000+, incorporating a Soundcraftsman EQ 2215R, (used in many studios), and a DBX-3BX, both of which improve clarity and fine tune sound to your personal preference. And I actually hear lyrics and instruments more clearly through these buds than my stereo. These work for me due to the the incredible clarity produced using the included flexible EQ, which is sooooo easy to customize. I guess it's kind of a hybrid EQ in that i believe it combines functions of both Graphic and Parametric EQs. Crazy versatility. Without the EQ, I probably hear 50% of lyrics correctly with these, and that wouldn't be enough for me to keep these. Not a fault of the buds, it's how severe my hearing loss is. It just amazes me that they can compensate for my poor hearing. I have a bluetooth adaptor that allows any wired headphones to be hooked up as bluetooth. I use it with a pair of Sennheiser HD 650 cans and EQs loaded on my tablet and phone, and these buds sound every bit as clear as the Sennheisers. The only slight sound advantage for the Sennheisers is they are OPEN over the ear cans, so they produce a little bit wider soundstage. But i don't believe any buds can replicate that. At least, not at this price. And the Sennheisers and Bluetooth adaptor combined cost me more than 4 times the price of these buds. TESTING I have a few songs I listen to when adjusting my systems. I only needed to hear one test song to realize how incredible these buds are....Lou Reed's, "Walk on the Wild Side" from the Transformer album. His vocals are so clear, I can actually hear a little more tiny fluctuation in his voice, (maybe due to breathing???) than on my home stereo. The upright bass notes come out totally clear and separate; not masked by the base drum, which itself, has varied intensity. Some of the base drum notes are softer, while others are more emphasized and the difference is perfectly clear. the subtle string instruments are clear and slightly more forward than on my home stereo, ( which could be partially due to how I have my Soundcraftsman EQ dialed in). I was not expecting such a 3 dimensional sound, nor did I expect such "space" between individual instruments. Nothing is lost in the background, a testament to both the overall design & performance of the buds combined with the EQ. In summary, these buds are one of my top couple of "music" investments in the last 5 years and EXCEED all of my expectations. If you've avoided buds out of fear you can't fine tune them enough to overcome your hearing deficincies, like me, these might be your answer. My only regret is that I didn't purchase them sooner.
