Review: Bose Quiet Comfort 3 Acoustic Noise Cancelling headphones

For many, Bose represents small, cube-shaped speakers that offer a matrimonial compromise when it comes to home entertainment in the living room.

However, like any respectable audio company, Bose also has a range of headphones. The Quiet Comfort 3 (QC3) 'noise cancelling' headphones reduce outside noise by using some clever technology in the headphone itself.

In practice, it works brilliantly. In our office, the whirr of the air-conditioning system simply disappeared, while at 30,000ft, the drone of our plane's engines faded dramatically. Creating this cleaner signal means music is more detailed and volume levels don't need to be at ear-drum cracking levels to hear any definition.

Although slightly bass-heavy, sound quality is very good and audio from our iPod, portable DVD player and in-flight entertainment unit sounded great.

The QC3 headphones are sleeker, lighter and slimmer than their predecessors, which means no more pointing from strangers shouting "80s throwback".

The QC3s need power to operate the noise-cancelling technology so Bose supplies two rechargeable batteries and international charging plugs. A full charge from the mains takes about two hours and offers around 20 hours of audio juice.

However, in a drawing-board decision that defies logic, the Bose developers only allow sound to pass through the QC3s when switched on. This means that if the battery runs out and no spare is to hand, you're without music.

On more than one occasion we forgot to switch the power off, leaving us sans-sound and gloomy-faced for our morning commute.

The other sticking point is the price. At a whopping £275 many people will not be able to justify buying the QC3s, especially considering other noise-cancelling headphones do a similar, albeit less elegant, job for less than half the price.

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Sony MDR-NC50
Overall: A quality set of noise-cancellation headphones, but the bulky design won't suit commuters
Rating: 4
Price: £110