I recently bought the SE110s as a replacement for my BOSE over the ear sound canceling headphones that broke (cheapo plastic didn’t last even though they were always in their case and handled carefully). Although I was initially frustrated with the sound, I learned from reading that I wasn’t using them right. The secret is to compress the foam and insert them into the ear and hold while they expanded back to make a snug fit. Once you figure this out, the sounds is incredible. For me, the fact that they are small and simple to carry around, plus are only 1/4 the price of the BOSE headphones, I am very pleased.

Pros Warm sound Effective isolation Wide variety of eartips Cheap (relatively) Cons Lacks dimension Sound not balanced Can’t fit everyone These are my first pair of canalphones, and they do not dissapoint. The first challenge on opening the package is finding the right tip for you. Fortunately, the small foam tips nearly fit. I can’t really blame Shure for not including freak of nature sized tips, I suppose I’d have to go to custom molded ones to get a fantastic fit. But regardless, once the foam expanded again, noise isolation was very excellent. Testing a variety of music, I found that dance, techno, hip hop is where these phones really shine. The warm slant really works to their benefit. When playing rock and acoustic, it didn’t detract from them. But when I place on the Brandenburg Concerti, something fascinating happened. It exposed their lack of spacial dimension, and balanced sound. So, if you listen to more modern music, these will work quite well. But, if you need a balanced, monitor-like sound, these are probably not for you.

These are very excellent. Yes they fit tight in your ears but if you want a excellent sounding set of buds what do you expect? I travel alot and like the heavy cords as they are less likely to break if snagged. They are also small which is excellent, I clip my Ipod shuffle to my shirt pocket and they just reach my ears-perfect! I don’t know the negative comments regarding having to loop the wires over the ears, I let them hang with no problem. There is also an extension if they are to be used with a stereo or computer. A nice case for us travelers and extra foam buds was also a nice suprise, in small they couldn’t be better. I bought a pair of Bose over the ear headphones prior to these and the sound quality of the buds is as excellent as the Bose.