I received a pair of Sehheiser MM550X cans today and I’m suitably impressed though everything isn’t roses with this system, there’s nothing much to complain about really as I regard the gripes I have as minor irritations to be aware of so as such they will be left to last. The MM550 is a comfortable closed headset which is of a lightweight but sturdy build and can be folded up into a carry case supplied for travelling. As such the user is provided with all manner of adapters for these cans including an adapter for connection to an inflight entertainment system via the use of the supplied cable that turns these cans into a very nice sounding pair of wired cans but the main attraction of the MM550 – apart from its build and travelling versatility – is the Bluetooth component without a doubt. The MM550 come equipped with AptX decoding which is noticeable right away when paired to my Samsung Galaxy S6 and to me the aptX facility is the big sounding feature for these cans. Naturally voic calls can be made and answered from the MM550 using Google Now or similar – SIRI on an iPhone – and the microphones on the MM550 give extremely good definition in phone calls particularly if you’re able to use HD Voice on your phone’s network. I’ve not tried the active noise cancellation feature yet though for a closed set of cans I wonder why you’d need it?. The MM550 also provides a “Talk Through” function, suppose you’re listening to your favourite tracks on a long flight and you wish to hear what’s going on around you, press the “Talk Through” button and you’ll hear! Without removing the cans from your ears. Music sounds wonderful through these cans – whether using the direct cable connection of Bluetooth – but the Bluetooth experience is certainly made more worthwhile given the control you have over your music collection from the MM550 system itself which is provided with track forward and back buttons as well as using the master button as a pause. I haven’t listened to the MM550 for an extended period of time yet though I doubt I’ll encounter any problems with sore ears given the weight of this headset and its luxurious leather padding around the cuffs. So to the couple of bad things about this headset and the first is annoying. The lithium-ion battery can be charged either inside or outside the headset but if you’re charging inside the headset be sure to put your hand over the battery when you remove the USB charging cable or the battery will come too, that’s right, out of the headset itself and that’s a very poor design. The MM550 has direct cable connection however in this mode the headphones are completely passive meaning that they rely on the amplifier of the system they’re wired to for volume and that’s fine in theory and really I have no argument on that score. The problem is if you’re wanting to direct wire them to the headphones output of your Cell Phone or similar thinking that the microphones of the cans and the remote control buttons will work, they certainly will not., as I mentioned at the start of this review a minor gripe though I’m sure Senheiser could improve upon this if they really wanted to. Now is the perfect time to buy the Senheiser MM550 headset as its been discontinued and you should be able to get it for a good price as I did. So why didn’t I go for the replacement model? The replacement model has touch buttons which don’t appeal to me all that much though having said that the newer model does have an IOS and Android App which might be useful.
