Dad's Review - (AVOID) Bose Quiet Comfort 25

Latest Update:

I brought my defective headphone to Bose Service Center at Greenhills, Metro Manila.

It took them a couple of minutes to diagnose that the left speaker was indeed damaged. They don't repair headphones accoding to them. Instead they offered me a trade-in deal; they'd give me 25% discount for a new QC25, from the original price of 20,000 pesos I can have a new unit for 15,000 pesos.

I bought my unit in December 2015 and used it during my monthly travel to my worksite in Africa and during our overseas trip with the family. I have used this unit for less than 2 months if you count the actual number of hours I enjoyed this headphone; it's 20,000 pesos flushed in the drain, to say it bluntly.


Thus, we can expect that the new Bose QC35 is definitely priced higher than QC25 in Philippines.

Hahaha.. you can have discount your discount. I am not gonna buy another Bose brand, ever!

I ended up with SONY 1000XM3 - according to several known tech reviews on the net it is 2018 best noise cancelling headphone, better that Bose's QC35! I got it from Egghead Shop at Robinson Galleria and it is one peso cheaper than the price of QC25; it costs me 19,999 pesos at 6 months 0% installment.

I am back in Africa with my 1000XM3. I am gonna prepare a review of this awesome headphone.



Update as of October 2018:


A couple of months back, while traveling and on-duty in Africa, the left speaker suddenly went pfft! I thought it was only a cable problem but it wasn't. So I had no choice but to revert back to my Walkman's earbuds.

I couldn't help but wonder why an expensive and global brand headphone would suddenly stop working even if it is used sparingly. I used it only while on flight to minimize plane's engine noise; I need a noise canceling headphone so as to be able to sleep in a long haul flight too.

I decided to check Bose QC 25 on Amazon's review; I might be able to have an idea why this problem happened. Sadly, it seemed that it was a design flaw. See link below:

Amazon.com/Bose-QuietComfort reviews

Because of this, I have to bade goodbye to BOSE brand. I am now planning to purchase SONY 1000XM3 Noise Cancelling Headphone.

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When my Blaupunkt Noise Cancelling headphone went kaput due to broken plastic frame after several years of rigorous use I decided to purchase one of the best noise cancelling headphones in the market at that time.

I chose Bose Quiet Comfort 25 over the ear headphone due to good reviews by several known tech blogs; I didn't regret my decision until a few months back.

Enclosure

Folded headphone

Upon connecting my new Bose headphone to my ever dependable Sony Walkman, immediately I realized this headphone is a class of its own. When I played some of my “Rock favorites” I noticed several musical instruments being played which I never heard before using my previous (Sony, Philips and Blaupunkt) headphones. It was a momentous event for any music lovers to hear his favorite songs crystal clear and with added bass though I can say that other Bose headphone models can give stronger bass minus the noise cancelling function; I tested various Bose headphones at their Trinoma show room. Moreover, my Bose performs better than Emirates Airlines business class noise cancelling headphone.

One main drawback is the lack of rechargeable battery. Nonetheless, a single AAA battery would  last for around 20 hours of continuous use. Enough to last for round trip between Manila and my job site somewhere in Africa; you can still use the headset even if the battery run out of juice but degradation of audio output is noticeable.

For a frequent traveller like me, I am working in a monthly rotational basis, I need a good headphone with noise cancelling function to suppress the plane's engine noise especially during long haul flight. This function can easily determine whether I would have a good sleep during a 12 hour flight. With Bose headphone, I must admit that its noise suppression or cancelling function is better than my previous Blaupunkt headphone and my Sony Walkman’s earphone with built-in noise cancelling though I must admit that I haven’t tried other known headphone brands with noise cancelling function.

Quiet Comfort 25 comes with a hardened pouch which is great especially during travelling. It was pretty convenient to just throw the pouch to your luggage or bag. It also comes with an adaptor for airplane’s dual audio connector.

I bought my Bose headphone from Bose outlet in Trinoma Mall in December 2015 as Christmas gift to myself. It costs 20,000 pesos or around 400$. To be honest, the local price was quite expensive compared to its price abroad.

After more than a year of blissful use I started to notice small cracks appearing on both right and left cushions. The soft leather like material started disintegrating and even clinging to my ears after each use. Lately, both of its foam pads came out from their faux leather enclosure. This is the first time I have encountered such incident in all of my previous headphones.

Both foam pads came out

Looks frightening isn't it?

I complained to Bose Service Center at Greenhills, Metro Manila. The service guy told me to bring out the headphone from its pouch from time to time to prevent this problem from occurring again. He added that my Bose headphone was manufactured in a cold country thus when used for long period of time in a tropics country like Philippines it is expected to deteriorate. Okay, how about Bose replacement cushions being sold in UK and US? Those are cold countries aren’t they?

Come on guys! Even those Chinese made headphones that can be bought at CD-R King for a song didn’t manifest this kind of problem for short period of time. In fact, if I'd count the number of hours I have used this headphone, it won’t reach one full month since as I have mentioned earlier I am using this headphone while travelling only.

Anyway, since the headphone is still functional I decided to purchase a new pair of cushion for 1,900 PHP or around 37 $. The damaged cushions were replaced in a couple of minutes.

Hence, next time I’ll encounter the same problem perhaps I’ll try to purchase another good but cheaper headphone instead of constantly paying 37$ for replacement cushions.