Creative Aurvana X-Fi Headphones Review - Intro

The Aurvana X-Fi over-ear headphones are Creative's entry into the world of active noise cancellation. Unlike many competing noise-cancelling headphones, the Aurvana X-Fis allow you to switch the noise cancellation on and off, and will let you listen to music even if your batteries are dead. The Aurvana X-Fis also feature a few filters that change the way your playback sounds. Despite these extra features, the X-Fis manage to be priced at $300, which seems to be the average rate of noise-cancellers these days.

The Creative Aurvana X-Fis, like most noise-cancelling headphones we've tested, didn't have great audio quality. They scored either average or below average on every test but isolation. They actually out-performed all the other active noise-cancellers in terms of the total decibels blocked out over the frequency spectrum. This being said, a good pair of in-ears will still block out more noise than any current active noise-cancelling headphone. The noise cancelling features takes AAA batteries, which carry their own set of pros and cons: they keep costing money, but don't require an outlet or have charge-up down time.

While the X-Fi headphones were initially comfortable, they grew less and less so the longer we wore them. We did like the cord length and the inclusion of an extension. You can connect to a pocketed media player just as easily as a home theater setup. Relative to other noise-cancellers, the X-Fi headphones aren't a bad option, but compared to headphones as a whole, they seem overly expensive for what they do.