Hi there @wallabies
I’ve tried the Bose Quiet Comfort and the Sennheiser – my husband prefers all Sennheiser products and that’s what we use for our web conference headsets (we are both work-from-home types—he spends all day on Skype, I am frequently on corporate web conferences or provide remote demos from my laptop). As far as sound quality – I find both just fine. Really – I’ve read all the Amazon reviews about Bose being to bass heavy..blah blah blah—I honestly can’t hear an appreciable difference. (Maybe I’m partially deaf after all those years of rock concerts..)
However, for noise canceling and for travel and portability I recently bought Sony MDR NC13 – headphones – In-ear ear-bud, Binaural. They aren’t expensive, and they do a great job making the airplane noises go away (and b/c they’re in-ear buds it helps keep down airplane noise even when I can’t have them powered on at take off/landing). They’re under $40 at most stores and the sound quality is great.
I use them for my Kindle Fire (to watch TV shows or listen to music as I read) and my iPhone (they do have a microphone, so you can take calls) – and because they are easy to tote in my purse I never bring the Bose QC with me on trips anymore unless it’s a long haul trans-Pacific flight. It’s just not worth the extra bulk in my carry-on, y’know?
Also, these take a AAA battery – easy to replace.. and despite months of use I have yet to replace the battery. (With my other noise canceling on-ear headsets this was a much bigger hassle and batteries didn’t last as long.)
Also, with the Sony buds they work (for listening to music, etc) without the noise canceling turned on—-so even if the battery does go out and you don’t have a new battery handy you aren’t unable to listen to your devices.