These headphones left me in two minds. On the one hand, they sound marvellous, offering an extremely open, spacious, yet weighty sound, without ever sounding overblown like so many other headphones trying to boost their bass. They are also extremely comfortable and make you realise electronic noise cancelling headphones really aren't necessary when the seal provided by the Shure buds is so good. On the down side (and it is a rather big problem) the cable design is extremely weak. The cable sheathing on my first pair split close to the plug, but thanks to Shure's guarantee I was promtly sent a replacement pair. Unfortunately the same thing happened to the second pair within what I thought would have been the second pair's guarantee period, only to find the replacements carry no guarantee! I would have given these 5 stars, but the issue with the cables reduces them to 3.