Sennheiser HDB 630: https://geni.us/GC-SennHDB630
Sony WH-1000XM6: https://geni.us/GC-SonyWH1000XM6
Sony WH-1000XM5: https://geni.us/GC-WH-1000XM5
Bose QC Ultra Headphones 2: https://geni.us/GC-BoseQCUltra2HP
So these are the Sennheiser HDB 630, they’re slightly different from the Sennheiser Momentum 4 but I wouldn’t consider them to be the new generation Sennheiser Momentum 5. Nonetheless these are the latest premium ANC Headphones from Sennheiser which boast superior sound quality… but today we’re going to see how they compare to both the Sony WH-1000XM6 and the Sony WH-1000XM5.
Regarding pricing, the sennheiser HDB 630 have a retail price of $500, which is up there and just knowing Sennhesier I do expect these to eventually go on sale by a lot. Where as the Sony WH-1000XM6’s have a retail price of $450 and the Sony WH-1000XM5 have a retail price of $400, and both of these headphones like to go on sale from time to time as well. So if you want to pick any of these headphones up they’ll be linked down below or you can always press on the YouTube shopping button, and if you want to further support the channel then you can always watch some of the related videos in the description below.
So first we have to talk about these cases, now the HDB 630 have a similar case to the Sennheiser momentum 4, which is a problem cause even though these headphones have good active noise cancelation and a super long battery life, for me it is hard to justify traveling with these headphones cause their case is just so big. And the same thing can be said about the Sony WH-1000XM5, they have amazing active noise cancelation, but their case is pretty big. Where as with the Sony WH-1000XM6, thankfully these headphones went back to a collapsible design, so their case is smaller and its slightly thinner as well. So if you’re planning on traveling a lot with your headphones, then right off the bat I would recommend the Sony WH-1000XM6.
But with the cases out of the way lets talk about the headphones themselves, and when it comes to build quality, I would say that the HDB 630 have slightly better build quality than the XM6’s but not by much. Now all of these ear cups pivot and swivel a good amount, so all of these headphones are going t rest very naturally on your head, and all of these headbands glide out… however I do have to point out that the XM5’s feel the least premium here cause when their headband glides in and out, there’s a lot of wiggle room, which doesn’t inspire confidence. Where as with the XM6, this one has tighter tolerances… and then there’s the HDB 630 which feels sturdy, but I do have to point out these these arms are plastic… they look like metal, but they aren’t. And then when we move up the headband, the top of the HDB 630 is wrapped in leatherette which has a nice grain to it, so they feel more premium and underneath they have padded silicon. Where as with both of Sony’s headphones their headbands are also wrapped in leatherette, but their leatherette doesn’t have the same grain to it.
Now when it comes to fit, all of these headphones are big head approved, however, the HDB 630 do have a slightly firmer fit to them compared to both of Sony’s headphones. But something that is very different on all three of these headphones are their headbands. The headband on the XM5 is very thin and it has very little padding, so for me hot spots can be an issue. Where as with the XM6’s this headband is wider and it has more padding so hot spots are less of an issue. And then there’s the HDB 630 who’s padding is a little stiffer, so these can create a hot spot on the top of your head quicker than the XM6.
Now when it comes to the ear pads on these headphones, the ear pads on the HDB 630 are the most spacious here, so if you have very large ears or ears that stick out a lot, then you’ll might want to go with these. Now the Ear pads on the XM6 are also pretty spacious, but just not as spacious. And then there are the XM5’s which have a large diameter, but they are pretty shallow, so these can press down on your ears which gets uncomfortable after awhile. However, since both of Sony’s headphones have less surface area coming in contact with your skin, these ear pads stay cooler for longer, where as the HDB 630 can heat up quicker cause they have more padding coming in contact with your skin.
But then there’s also their weight, now the HDB 630 weigh in at 310 grams… which is okay… cause most premium ANC headphones weigh in between 280 and 300 grams… but for comparison sake, the Sony XM6’s weigh in at 254 grams, and the Sony XM5 weigh in at 250 grams, so with both of Sony’s headphones, they’re less noticeable on your head when you’re walking around with them on cause you don’t feel them shifting around as much, and they’re easier to forget that you’re wearing them when you’re sitting at your desk, laying in bed or flying with these headphones.
And also, we need to talk about the over looks of these headphones, with the HDB 630, these ear cups stick out a lot, so they give you a mega man effect. Where as with the XM6’s these look much sleeker by comparison. Cause with the XM5’s these do give you a bit of a halo affect. But overall, I do think the HDB 630 have slightly better build quality than the Sony XM6… but regardless I do feel the XM6’s are more comfortable than the HDB 630 cause they are lighter, their ear cups stay a little cooler for a little longer, they look sleeker and they have a smaller case which is more conviente for traveling.
But now lets talk about tech specs, now both of Sony’s headphones have an advertised battery life of 30 hours with their ANC turned on, which is good and it is a little above average. But with the HDB 630, these have an advertised battery life of 60 hours with their ANC turned on, which is super impressive and with all of these headphones you can always extend their battery life by using them with their ANC turned off.
And all of these headphones charge via a USB C port as they should. But only the HDB 630 will also allow you to use its USB C port as a wired connection. Making them a good option for gaming. Where as with both of Sony’s headphones, their USB C ports are strictly used for charging. But with all of these headphones they can still be used with an audio jack connection cause and they all come included with an audio jack cable… and they can all be used passively, which I feel is good either for people who plan on flying with their headphones or for content creators.
And when it comes to bluetooth connectivity, all of these headphones can be connected to any two bluetooth devices at the same, making them a great option for any power user out there that likes to hot swap between lets say your PC and iPhone… and latency is not an issue for any of these headphones so you can use them to watch videos with on your phone. And when it comes to audio codecs, all of these headphones have support for SBC and AAC, but Sony’s headphones have support for LDAC which is Sony’s in house high res audio codec and the HDB 630 have support for APTX’s multiple audio codecs. However, in order to use any of these higher quality audio codecs you do have to be an android user cause iPhones top out at AAC, which I feel is fine.
However, something that make the HDB 630 special here is that they do come included with a USB C dongle, so you can plug this into any of your devices and you’re going to be able to use APTX… however don’t expect your audio to sound magically better cause you’re using this USB C dongle. I feel that with the dongle, your audio just gets a little louder. And you don’t need to use this dongle to connect your HDB 630 to your phone or laptop, it has its own built in bluetooth. Personally I feel that this USB C dongle is just a gimmick, and anyone that’s telling you that your music is going to sound automatically better is either lying to you or to themselves.
But now lets talk about actually lisnteing to music with these headphones. And well, I feel that the Sennheiser HDB 630 sound like an improved version of the Sony 1000XM6’s but with more resonance and kick in their bass. Ever since the Sony 1000XM5’s came out, sony has been trying to improve the instrument separation on their headphones… So both the XM5 and XM6 sound more open than Sony’s mid tier and older headphones. But what the XM5 and XM6 have been lacking is resonance in their bass. Where as with the HDB 630, these also have great instrument separation and they have very good detail in the highs, but with these, they also have a little more resonance in their bass. So I think all of these headphones are going to be people pleasers for the most part, but with the HDB 630, I feel that these have a little more resonance in their bass, and the highs are a little crisper. But besides that, the XM6 do a great job of keeping up with the HDB 630.
Now when it comes to your media controls, all of these headphones are using touchpads, however I do feel that the touch pad on the HDB 630 is a little more sensitive than the touchpad found on Sony’s headphones. But nonetheless with all od these touch pads you can tap to play or pause, swipe front or back to skip through your music, or you can swipe up or down to adjust your volume. However, something that makes the HDB 630 stand out here is that you can pinch and zoom to adjust your active noise cancelation settings. Which is pretty neat, but Sony’s headphones do have a physical button for that.
And with all of these headphones, they have wear sensors, so they will automacitlly pause your music when you take them off and they’ll start playing your music again when you put them back on, now personally I don’t really care for wear sensors on my headphones, so thankfully you can turn them off, but they are there if you want them.
But now lets talk about the active noise cancellation on these headphones. Now the ANC on the Sennheiser Momentum 4’s has always been very good and technically the HDB 630 block out a little more noise… however both of Sony’s headphones still block out more noise than the Sennheiser HDB 630, but so that you can see for yourself, we’re going to jump into an ANC test.
ANC Test
So like you may have just seen, both of Sony’s headphones are blocking out noticeably more noise than the HDB 630, but what really makes Sony’s headphones stand out here is that these headphones have built in atmospheric pressure sensors, so at cruising altitude, the ANC on both of Sony’s headphones is going to calibrate it self to compensate for the different pressure… but more importantly, both the Sony XM5 and XM6 are going to block out even more noise than the HDB 630 while at cursing altitude. And this isn’t marketing fluff, we have already tested these atmospishic pressure sensors in Sony’s headphones and we have compared them to multiple headphones, and we have found that Sony’s headphones with atmospheric pressure sensors do perform much better at crusing altitude compared to its competitors.
So simply put, both the Sony 1000XM6 and Sony 1000XM5 block out more noise than the HDB 630 while at ground level… and if you’re planning on flying a lot with your headphones and if active noise cancelation is very important to you, then you do want to go with Sony;s headphones cause thanks to their atmospheric pressure sensors, they will have better performance at cruising altitude compared to the HDB 630, and yes, the Sony 1000XM6’s do manage to block out noticeably more noise than the Sony 1000XM5 which is very impressive.
But then there’s the ambient mode on these headphones, now all of these ambient modes sound fairly natural, you can adjust how much noise these headphones let in and all of these microphones arrays do a great job of blocking out wind noise when walking out doors. Now these ambient modes don’t sound as natural as the ambient mode found on the AirPods Max, but regardless they’re all good. However I do feel that the XM6’s sound the most natural here. And also, Sony’s ambient mode does have a few other features to it. for starters both of these sony headphones have Speak to chat which works like this.
Speak to chat demo
But personally, I’m not a really big fan of speak to chat because it is very easy to accidentally active it. If you’re talking to yourself very quietly that can activate it, if you’re singing along to your music, that can activate it, if you start laughing that can active it, and on rare occasions loud enough outside noises can activate it. So that’s why I don’t use it.
Personally, I still prefer to use quick attention on these headphones cause its a lot more intentional. When you fully cover the touch pad on these headphones they’re going to lower the volume of your music and pump in all of the ambient sound around you like this.
Quick attention demo
And then when you let go, the headphones will go back to normal. Now like I said, I prefer quick attention cause its a lot more intentional. And this feature is extremely useful especially when you’re flying with these headphones. But I still feel that sony should change it so that when you have this touchpad covered for 5 seconds or more, they should lock themselves in this state so that you can let go, cause keeping your arm up can get uncomfortable and awkward after awhile. And this is something that they can change through a software update.
However, if properly set up, the HDB 630 can also have a conversation mode like the Sony’s and its actually better cause you can double tap and still have both of your hands free, and when you double tap on the touchpad again, they’ll go back to normal. And overall, I really like when headphones have this type of feature cause its super useful for when you’re flying with your headphones, and strongly enough Sennheiser is able to execute this feature better than Sony.
Mic HDB 630 Quiet
But finally here’s the microphone test, and overall, the microphone on all of these headphones is good enough to take phone calls with while in a quiet room, and the mic on the HDB 630 sounds the same as the Momentum 4.
Mic XM6 Quiet
Where as the mic on the Sony XM6, this mic is still good enough to take phone calls with while in a quiet room, but I feel that this mic is a down grade from the Sony XM5.
Mic XM5 Quiet
Now while in a quiet room, the mic on both the Sony 1000XM5 and Sony 1000XM6 sound fairly similar, but keep in mind that the XM5’s have 4 beam forming mics where as the XM6 have 6 beam forming mics.
Mic XM5 road noise
But what really makes the Sony 1000XM5’s stand out here is that these headphones do a much better job of dealing with noise pollution, cause this mic is doing a much better job of reducing this road noise, because for comparison sake, if we were to switch over to my lapel microphone, you’re going to clearly hear all of this road noise, but if we were to switch back over to the Sony 1000XM5’s it is reduced with minimal interference on my voice.
Mix XM6 road noise
Where as with the Sony 1000XM6, which are newer and these have 6 beam forming mics versus 4, there’s a lot more interference going on with my voice.
Mic HDB 630 road noise
Where as with the HDB 630, you can hear a little bit of road noise in the back ground, but more importantly there’s less interference with my voice and I feel that this mic is more usable than the mic found on the Sony XM6.
Mic HDB 630 Chatter
And when it comes to blocking out chatter, the HDB 630 are trying to reduce this noise pollution and you can still understand me.
Mic XM6 Chatter
Where as with the Sony XM6’s these are trying to reduce this chatter, but they are interfering with my voice a lot, making it a lot harder to understand me.
Mic XM5 chatter
Where as with the older Sony 1000XM5’s, these are doing a much better job of reducing all of this chatter with much less interference going on with my voice. Cause again for comparison sake, if we were to switch over to my lapel microphone you’re going to clearly hear all of this chatter, but if we were to switch back over to the Sony 1000XM5’s it is severely reduced. So overall, the Sony 1000XM5’s actually have a much better performing microphone for phone calls than these two newer headphones.
But with all of that being said, the Sennehsier HDB 630 have some differences over the Momentum 4’s, they have better detail in the mids and highs and they seem to have better sound pressure. They also block out a little more noise than the Momentum 4, but I feel that the difference is negligible. Now the big difference with the HDB 630 over the Momentum 4 is that they come included with a USB Dongle for “SUPIROR SOUND QUALITY” and with the the Dongle, yeah they get a little louder. But this dongle isn’t going to magically improve your audio quality, and if you use this dongle and you think that its a night and day difference, you’re lying to yourself. Overall I still prefer the Momentum 4’s over the HDB 630 cause these give you more kick and resonance in your bass. And if you’re trying to choose between the Sennheiser HDB 630 and either of Sony’s headphones… then both the XM6 and the XM5 are going to block out a lot more noise… making them better options if ANC is super important to you. However, the XM6’s are the best headphones to travel with here cause they block out the most amount of noise, they fit more comfortably and they have a smaller case. And when it comes to sound quality, they sound almost as good as the HDB 630. Their highs might not be as crips and their bass might not resonate as much… but I feel the Sony XM6 give you a better overall package.