I bought these just before getting on an 11-hour plane ride to California from Seoul. Unfortunately, they don’t include the AAA battery needed for the noise canceling functionality, but they were handy for the plane ride none-the-less.

Why were they useful on the plane still? Well, the NC6 headphones retained some noise-blocking functionality even though they are open cans. They also included an airline adaptor which was useful for the in-flight movies once I discovered that bit-torrenting the TV Series Lost wasn’t a great choice for viewing during a flight.

The sound quality is decent, certainly not as good bass as I’d like. On the plane I watched the movies “Mad Detective” and “Three Kings”, both of which sounded good on these ‘phones. My main complaint would be with the noise-canceling functionality: it can give me a headache if I use it with anything that doesn’t have constant noise (music, movies, etc). So, for example, listening to This American Life at work with the MDR-NC6’s gives me a headache after an hour or two due to the white noise produced when the noise canceling functionality is enabled.

Also note that these headphones do not fit the iPhone (Edge) by default, for that you’ll need some kind of vile adapter.

Overall, I’d say they have good enough sound quality, and are definitely worth an airport purchase. Office workers may enjoy the MDR-NC6’s especially for their ability to quickly toggle between hearing everything around you and what you’re listening to, to noise-cancellation mode where you can focus on your work, with the switch on the right earpiece.

If you want some other recommendations, check out David Pogue’s recent video review of some similar sets, or the text version of his article.

Score: 3/5 Alien Skulls