[jedberg]

It depends on the headphones. A good set of active or passive noise cancelling headphones will block all the sound even with no music.

I wear my headphones as earplugs on an airplane when I want to sleep, and I can usually keep my volume at 10% of max or less and hear everything crystal clear.

The biggest downside is that my headphones cost $350 and are only available in Europe or Montreal, CA.

[TylerE]

Noise canceling headphones are much more effective on constant noise like an airplane engine than transient noises like speech or phones ringing.

[jedberg]

I guess I just found the magic pair, because with them in I can't even hear my baby cry.

[notyourwork]

Care to tell us what pair/

[jedberg]

http://www.atomicfloyd.com/us/superdarts

But be warned, their customer support is terrible if you don't live in Europe.

[ionised]

That's a lot of money for headphones that are pretty much just going to be plugged into a phone.

They cost more than I paid for my top end AudioTechnica's.

[samastur]

I am also interested in learning which headphones you use and added this comment to signal there's more of us that are interested.

[jedberg]

I tried to reply to you but HN blocked me. See your sibling comment for my response.

[eropple]

Noise-canceling headphones are really hit or miss, though. Like, I can't wear them. They drive me crazy. Ambient noise is not bad. Ambient noise is good! Being in an isolated bubble is the sort of dystopic future-stuff that...ew. No. Do not want.

(For a while I thought things like Coffivity were a good idea to restore the ambient noise I was killing out with perpetual headphones...but then I realized what I was doing to myself, and felt kind of ashamed and embarrassed.)

[wolfgke]

> Noise-canceling headphones are really hit or miss, though. Like, I can't wear them. They drive me crazy. Ambient noise is not bad. Ambient noise is good! Being in an isolated bubble is the sort of dystopic future-stuff that...ew. No. Do not want.

My experience is different. I'm a person who is very sensitive towards noise (even in the classroom writing tests was horror). I personally consider silent environment + good noise canceling headphone (for silencing all the remaining noises that are still there - you are surprised how many there are) as comforting. The static noise that any noise-canceling headphone will produce is the smaller evil here.

For https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=raziel2701

> Noise canceling headphones are much more effective on constant noise like an airplane engine than transient noises like speech or phones ringing.

Also my experience. They decrease the noise of speech and phones rining, but that's it.

[raziel2701]

Noise canceling headphones are for low frequency sounds such as those found in airplanes. They don't work well with conversations phones ringing and laughter.

[jedberg]

With my headphones in I can't hear phones or conversations or my baby crying.

[wirelesskarma]

Even if they're at 10%, the actual volume of your earphones is more dependant on the drivers themselves and the amperage rather than the arbitrary 'volume percentage' on the device you're driving them with.

[jedberg]

That's a fair point, but my point was I don't keep it very loud at all.