This is my review of the new Lindy BNX-100 noise cancelling headphones that were announced last week. They are very good, building on the previous model, the BNX-60, they have a couple of very cool features, not least having twin Bluetooth pairing (awesome) and an auto pause function (absolutely stupendous!).

Wireless Headphones

These Lindy BNX-100 headphones have noise cancelling and advanced aptX® 5.0 Bluetooth technology, they go comfortably over the ear with a nice closed back leather feel cup that consumes the whole ear (well mine anyway). In the cups there is a Lindy red pad with a huge L or R to signify which way round they go. This is a great feature for me.

Lindy BNX-100 Quality

Overall the headphones have a good leather feel to the back of the cups and the headband is very comfortable indeed. The faux leather cup is thick and comfortable, and the net noise attenuation is terrific with noise cancelling on. They look good too, with no undue overlarge logos, just an understated model number in grey on black which is great. The BNX-60s reviewed last year are still here and I’m still using them often in the garden and they have worn very well all things considered, indicating longevity from Lindy products.

I’ve had good battery life so far, I ran the headphones in, wired, with a headphone amplifier and they were still going in the morning after a good 12/14 hours (with ANC on deliberately) so the advertised 15-hour life is going to be there. Since then I’ve charged them up and they still seem to be going after a lot of hours listening.

Features

Active Noise Cancelling and Audio Pass Through

The active noise cancelling removes, apparently, 95% of external noise, and it does. Through a new feature, at the touch of a button on the left ear pad is ‘Audio Pass-Through’, enabling the headphones to switch to ‘open backed’ mode seamlessly. There is a new battery level indicator on the left ear pad which is very useful.

Auto Pause

My favourite feature on the Lindy BNX-100 headphones is ‘Auto Pause’ which pauses the playback automatically when you take them off, be that music or a podcast. It is genius and ridiculously childish when you realise how it works!

Twin Bluetooth Pairing

Another new feature is twin pairing. The BNX-100’s can be paired with two devices simultaneously for uninterrupted audio switching. This will allow the user to listen to music on one device and then switch to take calls on another.

The BNX-100 headphones come with a hard carry case for portability, along with a mesh pouch containing a Micro USB charging cable, 3.5mm audio cable for wired connections, a ¼” stereo plug adapter and dual-plug flight adapter for in-flight entertainment compatibility.

Rechargable

The BNX-100 headphones have the usual easy to use integrated microphone and controls for hands free calls. Importantly the  100s are rechargeable with a provided USB A-B cable.

Performance

My review system has been mainly my Pixel 2 smartphone and I’ve been Bluetooth twinning this with a Dell XPS laptop running Tidal desktop. For fun I was also using Bluetooth with a Pioneer XDP-100R with Tidal Masters downloads although there was no discernible increase in performance.

I’m very partial to the older BNX-60s, they had an early advantage with their slightly more compact design and of course familiarity. I mainly use them for garden type work and the noise cancelling helps with noisy machine work, like mitre saws and lawn mowers. However, the 100s are fine performers and are certainly more comfortable and they have their two aces to play, twin Bluetooth and Auto Pause.

Twin Bluetooth (and range)

I’ve been wandering around with Tidal on my laptop in a different room, making a cup of tea in the kitchen and connection is perfect, really impressive. I’ve been able to contrive a call on the mobile whilst connected to the laptop as well, it is excellent and very useful indeed, indeed it is almost as good as Auto Pause, but not quite because…..

Auto Pause and Pass Through

I really love this feature, particularly if you are listening to a podcast and someone is talking to you, you can just whip the ‘phones off and not lose your place in the podcast, love it.

Of course, there is the option, particularly if you are just listening to music, where precision in listening is less of an issue, of using the pass-through button.  It is great, just a quick flick on the left ear button to activate and then the same to resume, the music is minimally in the background. Genius.

Auto Pause has worked for on my phone with all of my Apps including BBC Sounds, Tidal and the Podcast Addict App.

Active Noise Cancellation (ANC)

With a flick of a switch noise cancellation is on. The four LED indicator dots give you a rough indication of power availability (my phone also tells me the battery level anyway) before they settle on a single one to remind you cancellation is on. There is a minimal background hiss, when nothing is playing but it is barely noticeable.  I personally prefer the ANC ‘on’ in general listening with these 100s as I think it sounds a bit fuller and clearer, others may not agree. Battery life in the book says 15 hours but I seem to have been using these for ages and I have two indicators still on!

Sound Performance

The key issue then, after all the twin Bluetoothing and mucking around with podcast playback by pulling the headphones off, is how do they sound?

I’m listening to the wonderful ‘Astral Weeks’ by Van Morrison at the moment for my staccato 1001 Albums journey. I really like the sound of these headphones. The resolution is good, the cymbals in ‘Madame George’ switching between ears is very nice indeed.

There is rounded soft bass in Coldplay’s “Everglow” and it is apparent that Lindy have looked at the bass and responded to the market. But I’m finding the bass line very controlled indeed; ‘2049’ from Blade Runner slaps around a bit, but I want that, and it is not over bearing in anyway.

As I say, resolution is very good and switching to the amazing ‘Ode’ by Nils Frahm is a very enjoyable experience indeed. Channel separation seems to be good to me which is always good.

Overall

They are certainly worth a … listen and I would recommend them over the Bose options out there

I think these Lindy BNX-100s have added to the range and improved on the 60s. Though physically bigger and more expensive they are more comfortable, for sure, and the features they offer cover off the added expense.  They are certainly worth a pre-purchase listen and I would recommend them over the Bose options out there.

The Lindy BNX-100 headphones are available in the UK now priced at £119.99 and can be purchased from www.lindy.co.uk and Amazon.co.uk, or from www.lindy.ie for customers in Eire.