I forgot to post my review here, so I'm cutting and pasting most of what I wrote elsewhere. Just a quick review.
I had the BT-860 for about two weeks. Fortunately, I received these from Nuforce a few days before going on a business trip. So I had the opportunity to use these on the road, in the subway, on a plane, walking around the city, and at home. A good mix of listening environments.
Bluetooth
First of all, these are the first pair of bluetooth headphones that I've had the opportunity to use. I've heard horror stories about the connections with bluetooth headphones. I am glad to say that this was not the case with the BT-860's. Scanned for bluetooth devices on my Sony Xperia Android, and it picked up the BT-860 right away. Never had a connection drop. Turned off bluetooth, BT-860 disconnected. Turned on bluetooth, BT-860 connected right away. Next, I disconnected the BT-860 from the Android, scanned for bluetooth devices on my laptop, and it connected right away. You can't have the BT-860 connected to two devices at the same time, but you can have it registered on more than one device at a time. The connection was very stable. While walking around the city, riding the subway or airplane, I never had a problem with the bluetooth connection. At home, while connected to the laptop, I walked away about 15ft from the laptop and still had a solid connection. I did not really test the distant limit though. It was just chance that I walked that far away from it. Regarding the bluetooth portion of these headphones, it's top notch!
Sound Quality
I must note that the Sennheiser PX-100's have been my choice of portable headphones for a decade now. I've purchased other portable headphones, but the PX-100 always came out on top. Currently, the PX-100 II is my choice of portable headphones. So my review of the sound quality of the BT-860 is more or so a comparison against the Sennheiser PX-100 II. The BT-860's sound quality is good, but it did leave me wanting more. I did let the BT-860 burn-in with pink noise and heavy music for over a 100 hours before ever trying them on. All files tested were MP3 192VBR LAME. I choose not to test with flac files because these headphones are designed for portable use, and not all devices will play flac files. I particularly don't care for playing FLAC on a portable device.
First, the source device DOES matter. I'm not talking about MP3 vs lossless. I mean the source of the unit. I thought that the bluetooth connection would not make a difference, but it does. When connected to the Android, the max volume that I could obtain was "just loud enough". At that time I thought the unit inside the headphone was too weak to play loud. However, when connected to the laptop, I had to turn the volume down to 50% because it was too loud. I had mixed feelings on the sound quality of the BT-860's.
Bass.
This was the unit's weakest area. It was very lacking in bass. For hip-hop, dance, type music, these headphones just didn't cut it. I did try playing with the Android's EQ (PowerAmp), but the bass was just not present enough. However, that is not to say that the bass that WAS present was bad. When playing jazz or R&B or classical type music, though the bass was not very present, it was nicely controlled. Natural sounding and precise. There was never bass deep enough to "feel" it. Compared to the PX-100 II, the BT-860 had nothing in bass to compete against it. However, the overall tone of the BT-860 made the PX-100 II sound dark. The original PX-100's were in fact a bit dark, but I never considered the PX-100 II dark. Again, compared to the BT-860, the PX-100 II did appear as a dark set of headphones.
Mids
The mids had a nice balance to them, smooth, present. However, I find that the soundstage, that mostly comes from the mids, was very small. In music that had a large soundstage with the PX-100 II, the BT-860's had almost done in comparison.
Highs
This is were the BT-860 excel and suffer. There were songs that I listened to (ranging from all types of music) that I was hearing parts of the song that I never had noticed before. Listening to snare drums sounded very clear and realistic. But then cymbols played with too much frill and sounded overbearing. Music with brass instrument were a pleasure to listen to. Trumpets would play wonderfully... until it would hit a high C note... and then it actually sounded bad. Listening to certain female voices often sounded too bright. But listening to a male voice with a high pitch voice (like Ne-yo) sounded just the way it should. That's why I say that the highs are where these headphones excel and suffer. It's a hit or miss on this.
Comfort
This was the best aspect of these headphones. Extremely comfortable to wear even for long periods of time. It is a solid grip, but not too tight. I fell asleep on the airplane listening to music, and when I woke up, my ears did not hurt at all from the padded earpads. Though I do fine the PX-100 II to be comfortable, the BT-860 are definitely much more comfortable. It is not as portable though as these headphones do not fold up. The manual mentions that it folds up, but I do not see how it is possible since it is a solid piece of a rubber material. If you're looking for a bluetooth pair of headphones that have a good solid sound and comfort, I would recommend these. However, I would not say that these are of audiophile quality. For the price, I am sticking to my Sennheiser PX-100 II.
I actually returned the BT-860.
