Creative Aurvana X-Fi Noise-Canceling Headphones

Noise-Canceling Headphones Make You Want to Say "Hear This!"

Creative's luxe fancyphones let you toggle surround and noise canceling effects on or off, but the big deal is a button that actually sweetens sounds. The Aurvanas sport a proprietary technology, called X-Fi Xtreme Fidelity, to enhance the audio from music, movies, and games. This is essentially trademarked digital signal processing, similar to DSP effects in computer sound cards and stereo receivers. But X-Fi Xtreme is different because it's, um, extreme to the max. Okay, it's marketing, but the DSP actually works rather well, particularly on analog instruments: Moogs actually sounded like Moogs, rather than a synthesizer. The effect was especially noticeable on mp3s and other compressed files; less so on lossless. Of course, all that jazz doesn't exactly come for a song.

WIRED Full, rich sonic performance. Superb noise canceling thwarted ambient sounds, even when the music stops. Hard shell carrying case protects phones from drunken post-club smashing. Lookout, Frodo! 3-D effects do a great job of simulating surround sound. Memory foam ear cups comfier than Jell-O beanbag floating in a sea of pudding.

TIRED Expensive! Two seconds of silence when switching on effects. Surround effect more like echo chamber when listening to acoustic or acappella music.

• Home Audio Components: Headphones
• Manufacturer: Creative
• Price: $300