Introduction
Wireless around-the-neck-style headphones have been around for the last couple of years. While the extra band may look a little weird at first glance, it does undoubtedly help to keep the wires off your neck. In fact, some people leave their neckbands around their neck all day, because it’s easier to reach down and just put the earbuds back in than to dig around the bag.
The interestingly-named CX 7.00BT we've here follows the Momentum In-Ear Wireless and is Sennheiser’s second neckband-style headphones offering. Compared to the premium Nappa leather finish on the Momentum, the CX 7.00BT sports a simpler plastic finish, but that's probably intended to make it more suitable for more robust use, such as during exercising.
Design and features
The CX 7.00BT's earbuds are very small.
At just 48gThe CX 7.00BT is very light. The plastic neck band feels solid and is flexible enough that it fits easily and feels comfortable around your neck. Having that extra space in the neckband probably allows the manufacturer to shove in a bigger battery, too.
The CX 7.00BT has just four buttons on the left of the neckband –a center button to play/pause your music, a power button that also activates Bluetooth pairing, and volume controls that also let you skip or go back to the previous track. You’ll probably need a bit of trial and error before you're able to use these controls by feel, but they’re there if you need it, so we'll chalk it up as a plus point.
The controls are large enough to hit by feel.
A simple LED indicates the remaining battery life. You can also press once on the power button to activate a voice prompt telling you how the current battery status. Otherwise, the headphones will automatically alert you when the battery level drops to almost 2%.
Unfortunately, there’s precious little technical information given, but Sennheiser says the headphones use dynamic transducers that allow it to have a frequency response of 17Hz - 21kHz. It also uses Bluetooth 4.1 and has Qualcomm apt-X support for better wireless streaming. NFC pairing is also available, and the headphones are able to save up to eight Bluetooth devices in memory for faster pairing.
Charging is done via a port at the front tip.
The headset gets 10 hours of wireless playback on a single charge of just 1.5 hours. Charging is via the micro-USB port in the front end of the neckband, and Sennheiser recommends using an external adapter with an output rating of 500mA or higher if you’re using an external USB power adapter.
Performance findings
In terms of audio, we found the CX7.00BT to be tuned towards the mids and highs, with a slightly dry bass end. For example, on a recording of Spanish Harlem by Rebecca Pidgeon, the headphones did well with Pidgeon’s vocals and with the piano and shakers, rendering them with good naturalness. However, it didn't quite manage to bring out the bass line fully, leaving the piece without its grounding.
It did better on Johnny Frigo’s I Love Paris though. This fast moving piece features heavily in the mids and highs; with dominant violin and saxophone parts that play well to the headphones’ strengths. Switching over to some modern pop in the vein of Bruno Mars’ 24K Magic, we thought the headphones showed that they could do well with pop music too, with clean vocals and a medium-sized sound space. Rock is probably not the best genre for these headphones though. Live and let Die by Guns N Roses features heavy drum work amongst a frenzy of guitars, but the thinny bass from the CX7.00BT meant the piece didn't get us moving like it should have.
Formal test tracks
Moving on to our formal test tracks, we thought the CX7.00BT performed best with the faster moving pieces like Buckethead’s Sail on Soothsayer. This piece also falls mostly in the mids and highs, thus playing to the headphone’s strengths, but we particularly liked how the set was able to flesh out Buckethead’s guitar work.
Hotel California by The Eagles was another piece that impressed from the start, as the CX7.00BT did a great job on the intro and managed to generate just about enough bass on the piece to be felt. The headset also demonstrated good separation between the multitude of instruments and the crowd, so we could pick out each element.
Likewise, Elements of Life by Tiesto was presented well, with a medium sound stage that surrounded you with sound, immersing you in Tiesto’s performance. Overall, it was quite a pleasant experience.
Ending off with Adele’s Melt my Heart to Stone, we felt the headphones turned in a nice warm performance that placed Adele just slightly forward of the backing instruments, which meant her vocals were sometimes slightly overwhelmed by the band in the piece.
MP3 Testing | Score |
Hotel California - The Eagles | 8.5 |
Sail on Soothsayer - Buckethead | 8.5 |
Elements of Life - Tiesto | 8.5 |
Melt My Heart to Stone - Adele | 8.0 |
Conclusion
If you can get used to having an extra band around your neck, the CX7.00BT presents itself as a worthy option for quality audio, especially if you aren't a fan of music with heavy thumping bass. They’re light and comfortable with good battery life to boot. We didn’t find the controls to be the easiest to reach as they’re on the inside of the neckband, but they certainly make basic volume adjustments easier. We didn't miss the Nappa leather finish of the Momentum as the all-plastic finish felt solid enough, and it allowed us to use the headphones with less fear of the elements.
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