Review of Sony WF 1000XMF

I'm sure WF100XMF is on everybody's shortlist when they're looking for new earbuds.  As of this review, the earbuds cost £249 on Amazon.

Right off the bat, I would say the WF100XMF offers one of the best active noise cancellations and it completely removes transport noises.  It also has, on paper one of the longest battery life.  However, its software and comfort leave much to be desired.

One thing I don't like about the headphone is that you have to choose the function of the left and right earbud. You can't customize the gesture. By default, it's the right ear control music playback and Google assistant while the left controls noise cancellation levels and pass-through mode. As you notice, this means if you want to adjust the volume, you have to change one of the default configurations. If you switch the left ear's shortcuts, you lose the ability to turn off noise cancellation on demand and the ability to have a pass-through mode (hold to turn off noise cancellation and turn down media volume).

This is somewhat mitigated by the speak to chat mode, which detects your voice and kills media audio, and turns off noise cancellation. You can also set it up so that the app detects your location and turn off noise canceling when you arrive at that location. The app can also detect the movement and set the headphone into "sitting, walking, running, or commuting" mode. However, if you're on the bus, it will occasionally return to sitting mode when the bus pulls into a bus stop. This can be a bit distracting if you have set up sitting mode to have noise cancellation turned off. The GPS mode switch is a bit glitchy at times as it detected that I'm at a place a good few distances from my place. For example, I have set up the headphone to turn off noise cancellation when I'm at the local bus station but it detects that I'm at the bus stop when I'm at the other side of the city, 0.3 miles from the bus station. The chat to talk can be a bit sensitive also. It thinks I'm talking when I'm just coughing.

This headphone comes with native Google Assitant.

However, this Google assistant is unavailable unless you assign a "playback" shortcut to one of the two earbuds.  This feature is nothing to sing and dance about.  it's just as good as the Google Assistant on your phone.

That said, the audio of the headphone sounds OK. It doesn't have that deep bass but the music comes in nice and clear. You can customize the sound using the inbuilt equalizer. The foam head tip does its job keeping outside noise out.

Now we come with my biggest complaint about the headphone. Comfort. For me, the headphone is a bit uncomfortable. The hard flat part of the headphone causes pain in my ear as I move my head around. Only completely removing the headset from my ear removes this pain. Also, I found out that the foam tip comes off the headphones and remains in the ear! Not exactly great when you're nowhere near a first aid kit. I have this happen once when I was in town and to my chagrin, nobody in town had a tweezer in their first aid kit.

In summary, the head bud has:

• Great active noise cancellation
• Good audio quality
• Excellent battery
• Low comfort
• Not easily customizable software
• Earbud shortcuts can be a bit rigid.

Review: MJYUN In Ear Wireless Earbuds with Charging Case, Bluetooth Headphones for iPhone Samsung Android Phones (White)

Disclaimer: This product was provided by MJYUN in exchange for an unbiased review.

Today I'm reviewing the MJYUN In Ear Earbuds, which cost £23.99 on Amazon at the time of writing this review.

Pros

• Compact
• Works as expected
• Long cable
• Built-in battery charger
• Easy paring
• Fits comfortably in the ear
• Drowns out surrounding sounds
• Small size

Cons:

• Sound quality a bit tinny
• Not easy to adjust the volume
• Case and earbud a bit slippery so easy to get lost

In the box you get:

• 2x earbuds
• 1x charging case
• USB charging cable
• 2x manuals
• 1x spare eartips

First, off the bat, there is no denying that the product is very Apple-like.  Whether that's a good thing is up to you.  However, unlike the Apple Airpods, there is no dangling bit at the end; the entire unit fit entirely in the ear.  The product is lightweight and portable, and the earbuds are surprisingly comfortable.  The earbuds fit snugly in the ear and stay in place despite moving my head around.

The product is easy to use.  You press and hold the large button on both devices to turn it on.  To pair the device, as with other Bluetooth devices, you go to your phone's Bluetooth settings and select the device named MJYUN M1.

The control works rather well but leaves much to be desired.  For example, it doesn't have a way to control the volume.  To do that you have to take out your phone and adjust the volume there.  However, you can easily pause the music or hang up calls with a single tap.  A double tap is needed to go to the next song.

It also has a charging case like the Airpods, which is also sturdy and light and can easily fit into a pocket.  The product automatically powers off when you put it back into the case.  The case has a magnet that guides the earbuds into place.  The case charges via USB-C which is rather nice.  According to the product page, the case has a 500 mAH battery and is able to charge the product 3-4 times to full charge.

For an earbud, the audio quality is rather mediocre.  The bass is missing and, compared to other earbuds, the sound is rather tinny.  Also, the sound crackles at high volume.

I used the product during my commute and it pleasingly drowns out the surrounding sound.  Despite that, I find it struggling to overcome the noise of the surrounding.  I also think that due to the design of the device, there is no pass through to let you hear the surrounding like the way more expensive Bose QuietControl (QC) 30 or the Bose QuietComfort 20i.  Therefore, you have to remove the device if you want to hear your surrounding, where its size becomes a drawback.  You can easily lose the product by dropping it.  The slipperiness of the case and the earbuds due to the smooth surface made the problem worse. Also, sometimes its a bit fiddly to get them out of the charging case.


During my use, I find that it was easy to get the two buds to disconnect from each other, and it happened twice to me.  To fix it, you have to turn off the device and then restart it.  Despite the relatively easy procedure to re-pair the two buds, it was annoying to find the two buds had disconnected from each other.  In addition, the first set I got from MJYUN had a defect where the right earbud would not switch on.  I got a replacement device from MJYUN, which thankfully didn't have the defect. 

The manual that came with the product is rather sparse but contains troubleshooting steps for common problems.  One quirk I found was that Bluetooth was misspelled as "Blueteeth."  I suspect that this might be due to a translation error.

Would I recommend this device?  Maybe.  With phone manufacturer's adversity to include headphone jacks, the only way to listen to music without using dongles is to use Bluetooth headphones.   However, you can still use your existing headphones using a Bluetooth receiver like the Mpow Bluetooth Transmitter Receiver.