arnout

Overall Rating
 4 of 5

Value Rating
 5 of 5

Used product for
More than 1 year

Price Paid:  $0.00

Summary:
I have lived with these headphones for over 9 years.
Frankly I never compared them to any other pair, I just used them for everyting, music, movie and tv, and in all those year I never considered buying anything better.
After 9 years the pleather came off the ear cushions, which had a negative effect on the bass, a too lean bass for most music and I went to look for a new pair.

In retrospect the sound is and was pretty good for the money ($50).
After this pair I got the Audio Technica ATH-A500's and although the A500's are clearly better in every aspect, I never felt I had missed something with the Sony's nor did I feel that all of the sudden the Sony's sounded poor in comparison with the clearly superior A500's.

The CD270's are/were very well tonally balanced headphones, with a respectable bass, solid soundstage and slighlty rolled-off highs.
And they are very sturdy as well, apart from the pleather (which came off after 9 years) I never had to replace a cable or anything else.

Price Paid:  $45.00

Summary:
These ones are closed headphones and that is also what they sound like. Not that I do not like closed headphones but these ones are really coffins. They lack a lot of what brings some kind fresh air to music in general and dynamic music in special. Well, in detail:
They just can't reproduce all that what is inside good (recorded) music! For example when you expect music to be explosive and blasting you away you will just get some average sounding basses which are not really differentiated. It is just SOME bass there - not powerful, not too deep and somehow indefined.
Then you will hear well balanced mids. Yes, really, that is what they like and can reproduce: mids in all imaginable variations - not extraordinary but adequate for this piece of plastic.
Further up the frequencies you will notice (maybe not at once, but you will!) a falloff of high percussioned sounds and similar high frequencies. That made me curious and I tested them with a computer-generated sine-waves from 10 kHz up to the end of what I can actually recognize at low general volume (i.e. about 18 Khz left and right). And to everyones great surprise (sic!) they did not perform far above 14.5 kHz. They just cut off there!
And so, apart from their inability to be powerful dynamic they lack that brilliance that one should expect if you imagine that the chassis are only a few millimetres next to your ears and there is nothing that could possibly alter or block it.
To sum it up - for the given price they are maybe not as bad as I described them. It is just the fact that I love music and these headphones are really killing too much of it for that I could recommend them. If you just want a cheap pair headphones then go on and buy them! In any other case - think about spending a few bucks more and give these sennheisers, that I'm just listening to, a try! You won't regret it!

Strengths:
honestly cheap, comfortable and won't make you really unhappy

Weaknesses:
honestly cheap; won't bring you any nearer to music than you could expect for that price

Similar Products Used:
not really used, but tested several sennheiser, sony and koss + really cheap ones; and right now a brand new pair of sennheiser hd-580

Price Paid:  $60.00 from sony store

Summary:
This headphone is my work headphone and is very neutral
headphone. Very good for listening to music, that does not
require alot of base. Mids and defined enough to enjoy and
smooth enough that bad tracks sound little better.
This is by no means a studio monitor, but excellent
listening headphone.
I tried headphones in range of 50 -600$ CDN.
This one is MOST comfortable. For that I would recommend
this headphone set as headphones for work in office.
They are closed, super comfortable, cheap and make music
sound awfully good for the office environment.
I paid somewhere ~ 80$CDN for these, excellent overall deal.
Oh and these are excellent fit with glasses. I have 200$
pair of dj1003s from Ministy of Sound for monitors, and
this one is by far more comfortable. I had to get contacts,
just to use other headphones.
Sony makes utter crap sometimes, but this is one of the exceptions.

Strengths:
Clean sounding, well rounded ... !!! COMFORTABLE !!!

Weaknesses:
Lowest bass is not defined

Similar Products Used:
Ministry of Sound

Summary:
I have been using the Sony MDR-CD270 for over 1.5 years. I have never liked listening thru headphones. I only listen them when I have to. Previously I had bad experiences with the Koss and the Senheiser. The Koss was extraordinarily heavy, uncomfortable and most important: had mediocre sound quality. The Senheisers were the lowest-fi headphones I have used regardless of price. My son doesn't use them even with the computer. The cheap Philips headphones were each different, some offering very good sound for the price, but generally lacking power bandwidth especially at the bass, that is overloading with bass at high listening levels.

Since I am not a great fan of headphone listening, I would probably never plan to buy a very expensive headphone, especially after listening to the MDR-CD270!

For a start, the MDR-CD270 is quite lightweight for its size, and is very comfortable. Though they are a closed-back design they don't give you that being isolated feeling. Its very easy to determine which side is left or right (even in dark), very much unlike most witlessly designed Senheisers. It has a straight and over 3.5 meter (about 12 feet) long cable. Its plug is of good quality and looks like gold plated. The adapter at the plug end is screw-on type, rather than push-fit. This is good as it doesn't get off unintentionally.

Its sound is the greatest surprise. When I switch off my Yamaha NS1000M monitor speakers (which I believe are the greatest speakers on this planet in the price range up to and in many instances probably more than $10000) and put them on, I have found out that they are the only headphones I can stand.

The taste of its sound is like a well cooked dinner. You know, just the right amount of everything, the correct ingredients. The bass is very very good, though not in the same league as subwoofers. The mids and hi's are transparent enough and very clean. And most important tonal balance is very good.

If you value headphone listening very much, and plan to do at least half of your music listening thru headphones, go ahead and venture to pursue your quest of finding better phones. But you'll have to spend a great deal more than the price of MDR-CD270 to excel it.

On the other hand, if you are like me, these are the phones to buy. They are good enough and represent an unbelievably good value.

Similar Products Used:
Koss Pro4AA, Sennheiser HD445, several cheap Philips headphones

Price Paid:  $60.00 from Future Shop

Summary:
I'd like to revise my previous review. In the past year I've learned vast amounts about high end headphones, and am going to purchase some Grado SR325 headphones. These old Sonys have done me well for now, however. Their sound is good, but they just don't go loud enough, and the bass isn't deep or rich enough for my tastes. The value is excellent, however.

Strengths:
Price. I, however, got ripped off. And they're really comfortable. Nice sound, except the low end.

Weaknesses:
Bass is SERIOUSLY lacking. Thin latexy type material is falling off the pads, after 2.5 years of HEAVY use.

Similar Products Used:
Other cheap sony headphones.