Home iPadia iPad Accessories ,,,,,With the Wave Sound 3 model, the American startup PAWW has a very ambitious goal: to bring the active noise cancellation system (called in jargon NC, “noise canceling”) to the masses, with headphones below the psychological threshold of the 100 Euro.
In fact, this technology, made famous by Bose, we had seen it on equally famous brands such as Sony and Bowers & Wilkins but evidently times are changing, even if the difference with the top brands is still visible.
PAWW Wave Sound 3, the review
Out of the box
Once the package is opened, surprises are not long in coming: the PAWW Wave Sound 3 are a pair of supra-aural headphones made for the most part in metal with black plastic cover, even if some pure metal inserts let themselves be seen.
Inside the package there are the cables (audio and charging with microUSB), a jack adapter and the convenient case to store them in the suitcase.
The headphones are a bit heavy even if they wear well thanks mainly to the softness of the pads in the pavilions and the coverage of the upper headband.
The two pavilions show, on the outside, the controls for playback and volume (right) and the physical switch for activating the Noise Canceling circuit (left).
Just below the charging connector, the two operating LEDs (one general and one for the NC): we did not understand if the NC circuit turns off together with the headphones or not, since the LED of the latter remains on even when headphones off.
The headphones can be closed on themselves to enter the bag and take up less space with easy movements and a final click that identifies the correct position. The pavilions can be rotated almost 180 ° with respect to the axis to better adapt to the shape of the head.
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Original design
The design of these headphones is a bit particular: the lines are very clear and the metal inserts lean towards an aggressive and original design. Once you turn on a voice in the headphones certifies the status: the pairing is quite easy, we tested them with an iPhone 8, with a 27 ″ 5K iMac and with a Haier U55H7000 TV without problems.
However, the use of the buttons left us perplexed: the power button is the same as the shutdown and pairing button, but before each shutdown the headphones disconnect from the source (with voice prompt) and then turn off completely, which is not it involves no contraindications but that puzzles the first two times. Likely to be a small software bug but nothing alarming.
The activation and deactivation of the NC mode is done via a physical switch and the click, in the headphones, is all too audible, a softer button would have been better.
The buttons for the playback and volume control are well placed, large and comfortable: in front of the TV everything becomes very comfortable.
Strangely, a beep in the headphones warns the user of the change of song and volume, a function which, as far as we have understood, cannot be deactivated.
Music and Noise Canceling
Musically speaking the PAWW Wave Sound 3 behaved quite well: we did not detect any particular excellences but they reproduced all the songs we fed them without problems, with a slight muffling in the already high frequencies when the NC circuit is on.
This is perhaps also due to the lack of a specific codec for transmission via Bluetooth, a choice that seems to us to be dictated by economic reasons but which would have made quality more important.
This factor is very noticeable in songs like Nothing compares 2U by Sinead O'Connors, Orinoco Flow by Enya and Queen's Bohemian Rhapsody in Remastered 2011 edition, while it is less noticeable on more pop songs like Axel F – Beverly Hills Cop Soundtrack by Harold Faltermeyer or Elton John's Rocket Man but all things considered we think the result is in line with the price range these headphones are positioned at.
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As for listening to the movies, everything improves: we enjoyed watching several episodes of Castle on Amazon Prime Video, as well as Blue Bloods and the Solo films, a Star Wars Story (which did not convince us very much) and the excellent Io c'e, funny Italian comedy with the talented Edoardo Leo and Giuseppe Battiston.
The response to some iPhone video games is also good, a factor not essential for this type of headphones but still useful.
As for the noise cancellation, the attenuation is not total indeed, there is a cut on the stronger frequencies in the lower ones and more mitigated in the higher ones. Silence is not reached but much of the work is still present and for most users it is a more than positive result.
Typically if a car passes by, you do not hear, you hear (far) instead the bus passing by, you can distinguish the words and hear the keys on the keyboard, you cannot hear the colleague moving in the chair and in a mitigated way when dig into the drawer.
Final remarks
The final judgment for the PAWW Wave Sound 3 is good for several reasons: a robust construction and excellent for travel combine a noise cancellation circuit very advantageous when traveling but also useful in the office and at home (if you have children).
Of course, there would be something to improve from the software point of view and the presence of a codec such as aptX would have to be rethought, while for the choices on design and construction details we leave the judgment to the readers, although aware that obviously headphones with reduction of the active noise there are many better than this, but at this price (almost science fiction until a year ago) none.
Pro : • Soft and comfortable • Active noise cancellation system
Against: • A specific codec is missing • The hardware switch for the NC offers a little rough operation
Price: 79.99 Euro
The PAWW Wave Sound 3 headphones are available in Italy as far as we know only through Amazon.it both in white and black, at the price of 79.99 euros.
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