A teenage family member took one look at the Turtle Beach Noise Canceling Headphones and said, "What? That can't work—but I want it to work!" Indeed, the idea of earbuds that would filter out background noise without having to be crammed into your ear canals is inviting, and at a sub-$50 price, it's downright seductive. Unfortunately, he was right.

The Turtle Beach earbuds look conventional, with a chrome body and thin foam over the diaphragm, but each bud has a small microphone to sense outside noise. A belt-clip module powered by a single triple-A battery subtracts the environmental noise from the signal sent to the earbuds, resulting in diminished background noise. At least that's the theory. In practice, however, noise leaks around the foam covers, rendering the canceling signals ineffective. Furthermore, the electronics add a small amount of hiss.

We tested the basic noise reduction with our labs' sound-level meter, which was coupled to a silicone rubber ear molded from a live ear. We used a roaring exhaust fan as a source of noise similar to the kind you'd encounter in an airplane. Maintaining a fixed position relative to the fan, we measured the sound level with the ear open, with the Turtle Beach earbuds in place but switched off, with the earbuds switched on, with in-canal earbuds, and with two kinds of earplugs. We also tested conventional earbuds.

The noise-canceling effect was only 2 dB, which is essentially imperceptible. The passive sound-blocking effect was the same as conventional earbuds, about 5 dB. The rubber earplugs we used are the kind we wear when using power tools, and it's interesting that the Apple ear-canal buds, while certainly not the best of this type of earbud, are just as effective in blocking noise. So perhaps we'll add some music to our woodworking and metalworking, and protect our hearing at the same time.

We experimented with other kinds of noise, with various types of music, and were never able to get the noise cancellation to a perceptible level. The Turtle Beach earbuds were average sonically, commendably flat until about 7 kHz, when their frequency response fell off sharply, as it usually does in earbuds at this point in the sound spectrum. The fall-off was somewhat more pronounced than most, however. The noise-canceling circuitry did not affect the frequency response.

We appreciate the effort to make low-cost, high-comfort earbuds, but given their performance, we would have a hard time recommending the Turtle Beach Noise Canceling Headphones. With some additional engineering, they might cancel enough noise to make them worthwhile. We would recommend the Sony MDR-NC10 or MDR-NC11 in-canal buds for active noise canceling, or the superb Etymotic ER-6 or Shure E3c passive in-canal buds.

Benchmark Tests
Click here to view the Turtle Beach Noise Canceling Headphones benchmark test results