Cross-posting this, 90% ANC HP content so skip if that's not important to you:
I'm going to compare the Sony's, the bose, the wireless P7s, and the PSBs. for those that think I can't compare them, just watch me : ) One time I even drank red wine with fish.
Imma just get this outa the way: Sony are the best ANC headphones.
I'm not going to get into all the comfort and features as that's already out there and Bose wins comfort, sony wins features ... what I will say is the margin that that Bose win on comfort is pretty small, with the margin the Sony's win a features pretty large - one big factor in why the Sony's are the best ANC headphones.
But ... there are a few things that could sway that declaration for some people, so let's dig in ...
BLUETOOTH
P7s are lightening connect. Sonys are delayed about a 1s, Bose are bit behind that. Overall the Bose are just more finicky to connect across my devices (2015 MBP, android tablets and phones (N7, N6, 5x), and iPad), although the Bose didn't annoy me as much as when I first tried them. I have an EMF-dense environment and range is not great with any of the 3, although the Sonys did best with the P7s and Bose trailing equally. Of the 3 BT headsets, the Sonys easily win.
ACTIVE NOISE CANCELING
Here are the tested scenarios:
* Loud vacuum
* Loud lobby, lots of voices
* Clinking of a coffee cups, silverware, general jingles
* Aircraft flying overhead -- close
* Sirens going by, very very loud sirens
* City traffic noise (trucks, horns, motors, etc)
* City background noise
* Monster air purifier
* Pool party sounds (kids yelling, adult murmuring)
* Loud TV
* Quiet room
The Sony Crackle
Yup the crackle is there ... BUT. it's so slight and faint and artifact-y and you can only hear it in a quiet room. It would never be anything I wouldn't buy them over and I can see why Sony released the with this. Yes it's there but ... really? This is problem? I suppose I can see some people being annoyed if they want perfect in a silent or near silent room (i.e., steady background noise that's cancelled and nothing playing). If that's your top use-case, get the Bose. Otherwise you'll never hear it and I'd forget it was there, so for me it's a non-factor. If this was the kind of thing that bothered me I'd probably have killed myself by now anyway.
The Low Frequencies
Yup, Sony is better than Bose. Not omg-bose-just-pooped-their-pants better though. Just a stitch better. With both, they really cancel out "whoosh" and white noise and any hums, thrums, or low booms. Great stuff. Places where you really notice are internal/external aircraft engine noise, diesel truck sounds, the low register of a TV, and general background noise. It takes it down by roughly 70% overall.
This is quite noticeable in comparing the Sonys/QCs to the PSBs and the P7s. The PSB ANC is a joke comparatively, taking down overall noise by about 5-10% at the most, but making them still worse than the P7s with passive noise blocking.
Slight win for Sony, but firmly in the who-really-gives-a-shiit category
The High Frequencies
Mostly all headphones were the same here with the PSBs still trailing by quite a bit since they don't have good passive isolation ... meaning they're all pretty ineffective. But let's dig into that a bit ... for things like ambulance sirens the P7s were as good as either of the ANC leaders and that was similar with piercing kid screams, airplane engine whine, vacuum whine.
Adult voices is where things got interesting. First off, you can still hear them, so let's get that out of the way. BUT. The Sonys were better here ... not by much and both the Sony's and QC35s helped by about 40-50%. Now if I read what I just wrote my gut reaction would be NO THEY DON'T! but I really really did some A/B/C testing here: The P7s do their normal cutting things down across the board, although they appear to cut highs more, but I think that's only because they're letting in lows - I'd look into that more if I wasn't lazy, but I am intellectually curious about that. Anyway, with voices, when you switch from the P7s to either of ANC-leads you immediately lose the low frequencies of the voices. I never noticed this as brightly before, but it definitely helps with voices in general ... and that's where I"m getting my 50% from. Yes you can still hear them, but with the ANC-leads, many of the frequencies disappear and that helps overall. Ok, so between the Sonys and the QC35s, the Sonys do this better although it took me few minutes of switching to determine it was definitely there - the problem was, once I noticed it I couldn't un-notice it so I'm giving the win firmly to the Sonys but, again, if you're looking for magic voice blockers these are all giant losers; they help though.
SOUND QUALITY
I lack the skills (and maybe ear) to do a sound deconstruction of the sort seen here so I'm going to keep this quite short based on other reviews including mine:
* Loud and not Proud. The QC35s get loud, but not oh-I'm-jammin-now loud, just why-is-that-old-man-talking-so-loud loud. The Sonys get both louder, and better louder. If I wanted to jam out I'd definitely pick the Sonys for volume over the QC35s.
* Is anybody there? The QC35s still have that distant sound to me ... it's kinda like candle light in a dark room: yes you can add more candles (volume) but it's still candle light. The Sonys don't have this, so it's a firm win for the Sonys on "distant sounding".
* It's all about the bass. I'd have to give it to the QC35s here, but it's a pyrrhic victory because of that distant thing. The Sonys don't have the punch but as far as I'm concerned they both kinda suck and would both be in the you'll-get-used-to-it-eventually camp. But win for the Bose I guess.
Oh feck it. Look, I think they both sound like shiit (Sonys and QC35s), no offense to anyone. That's kinda harsh because, frankly, they Sony's sounded better than the wired PSBs so there's that. While the Sonys are weaker on bass, I liked the overall sound better whether it was jazz, classical, erykah badu, EDM, or show or movies. It's not what I'd say it hugely better, just better.
The P7s.
Oh you magnificent bastards. Remember my light analogy? Well comparatively, the P7s are like overhead fluorescent lights flipping on with strong bass tracks like occasionally having a spotlight flip on - it's little unpleasant but who doesn't like the spotlight? and this is with all the background noise. There are all kinds of details you barely or don't notice on the ANC-leads that make me say wow with the P7s. One of my test was to watch the same scene of a show called Killjoys which is Sci-Fi show with all kinds of sciencey sounds - on the P7s I could hear all kinds of little details that were just not there on any of the others - and then the background hums or booms, whoa, hello. On the ANC-leads just a big yawn.
CONCLUSION
Keeping the P7s, although I don't recommend this for anyone looking for ANC. For me, hearing occasional background noise with great sound is less annoying than constant crappy sound with lowered background noise. It's a completely stupid choice, but the P7s ruined me. I'm still excited to put them on, and they feel great. The others just felt like, oh-I-suppose-I-should-wear-them-now and I'm looking forward to putting on the P7s right now and there's a garbage disposal running that I'm right next to.
I had some angst over it until I thought of it this way: you're on an airplane / in a cafe / in a loud office and you want to listen to a show / some tunes / a tv show; of these 3 sets in front of you (P7, QC35, Sonys) which do you *want* to grab?
P7s every time.
Until then I will happily use the P7 wireless though as wireless trumps wired for me most of the time now even for slightly more pain (dropouts, charging) and not quite as good sound (H6's).
