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Harman Kardon FLY ANC Headphones -- REVIEW
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Jun 22, 2024
We live in a noisy world, but with the Harman Kardon FLY ANC Headphones, you'll be startled at how much of that ambient sound you can cut out, while listening to your favorite music. Audio fan Dave Taylor auditions the FLY ANC headphones and finds that there's really a lot to like about these Bluetooth headphones (with hardwire option) that feature 30 hours of battery life, Harman 40mm drivers and a big, lush soundstage. Check them out at: https://www.HarmanAudio.com/ Check out Dave's Q&A Web site at: https://www.AskDaveTaylor.com/ #harman #harmankardon #flyanc #anc #headphones #askdavetaylor
View Transcript
0:00
ANC headphones from Harmon Cardin. Let's check these out
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Dave Taylor here and I'm checking out these. These are the Harmon Cardin Fly ANC headphones, and they're pretty sweet
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They're powered by 40-millimeter drivers that give you 16 to 22,000 Hertz frequency response
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and 100 decibels of sensitivity. They actually do more sound than my ears can perceive
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That's how it goes. 32 oms when you use them in wired mode
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And in fact, let's go ahead and open up the hard case because it comes with a couple of different wires
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that are interesting. One of which is, as you would expect, the 3.5 millimeter wire so you can use these in wired mode
0:46
even if the battery is completely dead. They'll work. There is a charger
0:50
It charges with micro USB. Kind of going to give you a point off on that one there, Harmon
0:55
Need a better connector. But it also comes with a little airplane adapt
0:59
I haven't seen these on airplanes for a while, but it is pretty useful to have one
1:04
And of course, the hard case is actually a pretty nice size. Generally, I'm not a fan of these, but this one's pretty small, so it's not too horrible
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So powered by Bluetooth 4.2, and I've got to tell you, the rumor is that Harmon has a new generation of this device coming out soon
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So that's probably why this is still on 4.2. They work perfectly well
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They sound really good. They give you good range, but it's 4.2
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There's no AAC. There's no APTX. So it's just using the regular built-in audio codex for Bluetooth
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So the next gen, I expect, we'll probably upgrade those. It does have advanced ANC, and I want to say the active noise canceling on this is excellent
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I have used these in very noisy environments, and it just takes away the vast majority of that ambient sound
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and let you really focus on whatever it is you want to listen to, whether it's
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music, whether it's a podcast, or whether you just want to keep them silent and just use that
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ANC to lower that ambient noise, these work really well. I was very impressed with these, and I listened
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to a lot of headphones. So actual true leather headband, not a fan, kind of wish they'd use something
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synthetic. I know some people disagree with me. That's okay. They use aluminum on the ear caps
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And battery life wise, it's 30 hours without ANC, 20 hours with ANC
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And if you really desperate to give it a boost 15 minutes of charge will give you another two and a half hours of listening So if you on a super long plane flight then that will help you get through it But honestly if you on a plane flight that more than 20 hours
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you might want to go in the other direction and find that it's a faster flight. But of course
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ANC rocks on airplanes. I can't even imagine being on an airplane without ANC equipment of some sort
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because that low rumble of the jets and the wines of the turbines and all of that, all of that goes
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goes away. It's just such a different experience. It's really quite pleasant. Now, it also comes
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with software that you pair, and of course on your source device, you pair it, and then the software
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gives you the ability to do some management of things, including being able to add a headphone
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assistance. So they have support for voice assistance, but here's what's kind of confusing
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It's support for Google Assistant or Amazon Alexa, but it doesn't actually support Siri
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you have the iPhone version of the program. Not sure what that's about. Getting the assistant
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setup is an extremely non-trivial exercise. You'll probably have to visit their website to get
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it all set up properly. But I can't show you the app. So this is the Google iPhone. Google iPhone
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Wow. No. This is the Google Pixel 6 Pro brand new. And I already have it paired with my Harmon
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Cardin headphones. And I already have the app on here. So let me get this thing recording
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And let's see, screen recording. Here we go. So I will launch the app
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And let's make sure my headphones are on. They are. And so the app is a fairly rudimentary tool
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Let's go back to the home screen. So you can see it shows you battery status
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I have 100%. And ANC, it's off. If I tap ANC, now it's turned on
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And on the bottom, I can actually tap on a little arrow and then I have four EQ settings
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I can do my own custom if I want, but I can choose jazz or vocal or bass
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I find that they have a pretty decent amount of bass already, so you don't really need to do much boosting
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So I tend to leave things flat. And then on the gear icon, you can get to setting up one of your voice assistants if you're so inclined
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and there's some product help you can get right inside the app. I like that
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And most importantly perhaps it can show you the firmware version so it actually the app can check to see what running on the headphones and updated is needed So that pretty much everything you can do If you tap on the headphone button you can then add other Harmon Cardin devices if you happen to have those
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And that's, I think, our full demo. Let me turn this off. That did not turn it off
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There we go. That turned it off. And there's a lot to like about these
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They are small and compact, and they're a little bit tight, so they tend to do a really good job of isolating you from all the ambient noise around you, which of course that plus ANC works really well together
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They are adjustable, and they swivel, and you can fold them up and put them in the case
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And all of the meaningful buttons are all on the right hand ear
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I'm going to give you two photos, and you're going to be able to see. So the leftmost button is power on off
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Then we have volume up, a multi-function button, volume down, and the 3.5 millimeter jack
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And then on the other side, you have a Bluetooth button and an ANC button, which lets you pair with additional Bluetooth devices and or turn on or off your ANC as you desire
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Now, on the left side, there's not much going on. micro USB for charging but the left earpiece has a built-in button that when you
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have your voice assistant paired you can just tap or touch it and then you can
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talk to your voice assistant and that's a pretty slick actually it's a really
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easy way to say something like what time is it or answer phone call so it gives the
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headphones a lot more functionality if you can get your voice assistant paired
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with it in terms of latency if you want to watch a movie or something I had
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no issues whatsoever. I haven't really had any latency issues with audio gear for a long time
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So maybe you don't even need to mention that anymore. It has a built-in microphone. You can use
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these for phone calls or for Zoom calls or something. And you sound pretty good. I mean
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the reality is, is that this is a long way from where your voice is. So there is inherently
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some challenge there, but it sounds pretty decent, actually. So these are definitely entirely
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functional for that. Personally, I don't like having my ears totally covered while I'm on a phone call
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So that feedback mechanism for audio is a little weird, so I'm not going to be on a long call
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But if I just need to answer and say yeah I on my way I be there in 15 minutes see you soon bye Something like that this is totally fine for that Which brings us to the sound and I got to say Harmon has a great track record of creating great audio gear and this is
8:00
definitely more of the same this has a really nice sound signature to it there's a
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little bit of bass just enough that when you're listening to music I was listening
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to Janet Jackson and boy it was just like ready to make me dance it was sounded
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really good and that was with the EQ turned off right Big sound stage, lots of accuracy to the reproduction
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But again, it's a little bit bass heavy, which a lot of people really like with their headphones
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Turn off your ANC, some of that base goes away. So it gets a little bit brighter
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but mostly probably you're gonna be using the ANC, so that's really what we should talk about
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I like these. These give me really nice sound reproduction. They're very comfortable, tiny bit tight
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but that's okay. Really good ANC means that putting all these together make these great for on the road or in the office
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Or if you're working from home and you have a noisy environment, these are rock stars
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These are really great. They're small. They're simple, easy to carry. Really, the only thing left to talk about is the price
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But before we get to the price, I'm going to ask if you could give me some feedback
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Go ahead and subscribe if you like this. Give me a comment, thumbs up
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Let me know what you wish I would have covered. whatever, let me know. You know, they are, I'll tell you one more thing
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9.9 ounces or 281 grams, so they're also super light. I mean, there's not much you won't like about these
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So, solid option. These are the Harmon Cardin Fly ANC headphones, and they're 24995 at harmanaudio.com
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I have a feeling that that price might vary all over the place
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if you dig around on the internet. So I would definitely look at some other options too
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before you settle on a purchase price. And if they do come out with a new generation of these
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which they obviously will do eventually, then these will definitely lower in price
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and that's going to be a heck of a deal. So really solid ANC, really nice sound reproduction
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Heck, I'm going back to Janet. So I'll have to catch you in my next video
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