VALCO noise cancelling headphones - an amateur review

Right at the start, the most important observation about these headphones based on my own experience:

“The few weaknesses you can dig out of these headphones are ultimately beaten by the sound reproduction of these miracle gadgets, which is personally the best I've ever heard so far. The clarity of the sound is in a class of its own at this price.”

I've always liked the way VALCO talks about what they're doing, and that's why I decided to join the mailing list back in the day. The biggest thing in VALCO's messages this autumn was very obviously some miracle-working headphones, which apparently were the follow-up to the company's Sorsa noise cancelling headphones.

I'd been thinking about getting the Sorsa+ headphones for a long time, but out of sheer laziness I never actually got around to it. Now these mysterious new noise cancelling things were up for grabs somewhere in the bit universe, so I decided to try my luck and see if I could get them among the first.

I did manage to forget the whole deal because of my own stupidity, but luckily on October 3 I got an email saying that on October 4 there would be a small batch of new headphones available.

I knew I had to act fast if I wanted to be among the first to check out these miracle cans, and apparently some gods of market forces were smiling on me that Friday evening, because a miracle happened. I managed to get myself these VALCO noise cancelling headphones among the first batch.

The wait was short, but a long time when you're the one waiting, and after a few days the headphones were in my hands ready for testing. I've now been “testing/listening to” these headphones for about a month, almost every day, and below are some personal observations from the perspective of a complete audio amateur, meaning a normal consumer.

I also own a few other wireless headphones, Plantronics, Samsung, Jabra, Bluedio and a couple of other Chinese miracle boxes, and out of all of these VALCO's noise cancelling headphones are on the bigger side. The size still isn't quite helmet level though, and with these on your head you'll still look like the same gray mass as every other Finn.

One nice detail on these headphones is those VALCO logos pressed into some dark wood. Wonder how those are going to survive a Finnish winter. The fit is in the comfortably comfy category. Once you get them sitting nicely on your own lumpy head, you only really start noticing they exist after a few hours.

It's worth spending a bit of time on the fit, because I at least noticed that the headband starts pressing on my head if the headphones aren't at the right angle. This isn't something you need to think about with lighter headphones, but then again VALCOs are a bit heavier, 244 grams according to my letter scale. That's the same as having a bag of Panda licorice on your head, if that's your thing.

There aren't many bits and bobs on these headphones. They all feel like something made by a Chinese factory robot. Nothing luxurious, but also not disposable junk either. Maybe these headphones are made in the same area as my other China-headphones, and the buttons in my older headphones have handled use just fine without falling apart.

In purely imaginary terms, the feel is plasticky when you're fiddling with these buttons. On the right side there are three buttons: at the top volume up (also next track), in the middle on/off (also pairing and pause), and at the bottom volume down (also previous track). On top of that, the right side also has a 3.5 mm headphone jack.

On the left side there's only one (miracle) button, meaning the on/off switch for active sound control (free translation), and a micro-USB port for charging. ANC, active noise control, is of course THE thing these headphones are sold to us consumers with. These absolutely are noise cancelling headphones, and next we'll get to that and the sound quality in general.

When you switch these headphones on, that familiar female voice from distant lands tells you the power is on, power on! Personally, hearing that voice was a bit of a letdown for me, because I'd already heard that phrase in other cheap headphones, to the point of disappointment and boredom. From VALCO I would have hoped for a little surprise here. Judging by the company's whole style, you could have expected something like, we're on, damn it. Maybe that's an idea for the next headphones?

When you switch the headphones off, some faraway lady's voice goes, power off! Boring. Pairing and connected are the same phrases you get in a lot of other headphones too, and while this may sound like completely unnecessary nitpicking, having the other voice prompts said differently would have made these SUPER VALCOs for me. But like I said, maybe that's an idea for the next headphones, and in the grand scheme of things it's a small one.

Like I mentioned right at the start, I'm a complete amateur when it comes to interpreting and judging sound. That's why I fully believe VALCO's sound wizard who shows up in the company's promo materials, and the Chinese audio engineers, when they say these are really good-sounding headphones for the price. Based on my own experience, though, I can tell you this.

For years now I've been testing various wireless headphones and speakers in stores by playing Rush's Tom Sawyer. I also put VALCO's noise cancelling headphones through this familiar "test track" via Spotify, and to put it briefly, right after the song started I knew I'd bought good headphones.

I'll leave the fancy low, mid and high frequency descriptions to the professionals and just say that Tom Sawyer sounded fucking great on these headphones! After I'd spent long enough cackling and congratulating myself on a good purchase, I completely remembered one tiny detail: these headphones have noise cancelling!

Well, let's try that too, I thought. Usually noise cancelling kind of "lowers" and "muffles" the sound quality anyway, so I wasn't expecting much from this feature. But nope. The noise cancelling wasn't extra "noise" mixed into the sound at all, the feeling was actually pretty weird. Did the sound on these headphones just get better?

This is definitely a matter of opinion, but I'd probably describe the feeling like this: when you switch on the noise cancelling, it feels like the headphones get sucked just a little tighter around your ears. At the same time, the sound becomes more intense, and I guess at least the bass gets a bit more emphasis. Who knows. The people who know, know.

One small note about how the noise cancelling works: it doesn't switch off when you turn the headphones off with the power button, so it's worth keeping that in mind if you don't want to waste battery while the headphones are resting. Remember to turn off the noise cancelling with its own button too.

Anyway, I've now listened to all kinds of music across the board, and everything sounds equally good! One "bad" thing about these headphones is that you really don't feel like taking them off once you start listening. Whether that's a good or bad thing, everyone can probably figure out for themselves.

There's more than enough volume here. Depending on the audio source, codec and player, you can squeeze more than enough "abuse" out of these headphones for every tiny bone in your ears. Honestly, it's worth considering whether you really want to blast these at full volume all the time, because the volume is that intense.

If you're an Android user, I also recommend downloading the Boom app from the Play Store, because it takes Spotify and, among other things, music stored on your phone to a completely different level compared to the regular Spotify app (this isn't a paid promo, just a recommendation based on experience). 

The Bluetooth range of the headphones is a bit of a question mark for me. Like with all current wireless technologies, a bit of cutting out can happen here and there from time to time. That's also the case with these headphones, and at least with my pair there's already clear drop-out at a distance of 5 meters if there's one concrete wall in between (apartment building) [Editor's note: the November batch has a better antenna. Regards, Valco].

I also couldn't get the TV, noise cancelling headphones, PS4 combo to work the way I wanted, where I was trying to connect the noise cancelling headphones to the TV as an audio output via Bluetooth. The presence of the PlayStation's Bluetooth controller seriously messed up the audio signal and the sound became crackly and choppy. Connected to a laptop, the sound is just as great as with a phone, and for example gaming is properly awesome.

Like I said at the start, I'm completely of the opinion that these are, without question, the best Bluetooth headphones I've owned so far in terms of sound quality, and that's why they were a really good purchase for me, because I bought them primarily for listening to music.

Recommended by a regular person off the street like me, I hope VALCO's noise cancelling headphones and the company do well now and in the future.

Behind the kind of humor that's on my wavelength, and reading between the lines, you can tell that the entrepreneurs at VALCO are dedicated professionals when it comes to their products, and they've now created the kind of product that an ordinary Joe like me, who's been around since the reign of Kalevi Sorsa, is very happy to recommend.

4.11.19 Jarno Laine, Helsinki

VALCO noise cancelling headphones

Plus

• EVERYTHING RELATED TO SOUND. CLARITY!
• Can the noise cancelling function really be this good?
• Comfortable on the head even during long use
• Finnish innovation and entrepreneurship with the right kind of attitude
• The battery just keeps going and going
• Simple enough to survive heavy use (don't use them while swimming)
• Oh right, and according to the person on the other end, the voice is really clear when talking through the hands-free.

”Minus”

• Bluetooth signal range and resistance to interference?
• Annoying notification sound in the headphones' operation (power on!) for fuck's sake!
• The noise cancelling function doesn't turn off automatically when you power them down. So you have to remember to switch it off yourself.