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Sony MDR-DS5100 Dolby Infared Wireless Advanced Headphone System (Silver)

Average customer rating:

No static, good sound, comfortable, but weak bass and poor surround
Not bad, but quite pricey!
Great for movies, not so hot for music
AWESOME sound

Sony MDR-DS5100 Dolby Infared Wireless Advanced Headphone System (Silver)

Manufacturer: Sony
ProductGroup: CE
Binding: Electronics

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Accessories:

Sony Battery
Monster Cable MB 4-DCRC Ultra-High Capacity Digital Camera Power Pack
Memorex 700MB/80-Minute 52x CD-R Media (100-Pack Spindle)
KHypermedia 80-Minute/700 MB 48x Blank CD-Rs (200-Pack Spindle)
Sony PC-234S Audio Plug Adaptor

Product Features:

5.1ch Digital surround headphone system, Processor + Headphone
The Dolby signals are encoded into the infrared wireless signal and decoded by the headphones for an astonishingly realistic 3-Dimensional sound
Based on psychoacoustic perceptual science associated with Head Related Transfer Functions (HTRFs)
Based on the way that parts of your head obstruct sound, the sound is angled so that your brain perceives that sound is coming from the front, rear, sides and between - creating the sound field of a perfect listening room - with stereo headphones
Optical Digital input

ASIN: B00006IS52

Customer Reviews:

No static, good sound, comfortable, but weak bass and poor surround.......2006-01-20

The most important thing by far for wireless headphones is comfort, and these really excel in the comfort department. I can wear them for hours and not feel like I want to take them off. The comfort seems to be from three factors: 1. They are relatively light weight, 2. They have a wide foam pad that rests on your head around the ear, not on the ear, and 3. They don't clamp down on your head too tight, just tight enough to stay on. The only comfort issue is that they are big and bulky enough that you can't lay the side of your head on a pillow with them on like you can with in-ear headphones. Seriously, don't buy uncomfortable wireless headphones no matter how great they seem otherwise.

I have very high standards for sound quality as a person who builds my own high end speakers, and I can definitely say there are headphones that sound better, including my wired MDR-V6 headphones. The main problem is that the bass is weak. From midrange up to treble the sound is very good, and most people would be very satisfied with it, including myself.

But the reception is great... as long as any part of the headphones has line of sight to the receiver there's no cutouts or static anywhere in the living room. Of course as soon as you leave the room the IR signal cuts out.

The surround processing is not very good. Just like most DSP modes on receivers, it makes for tinny distorted sound. Maybe it does steer the sound somewhat but the overall degradation isn't worth it. I leave the headphones in Music (non-surround) mode even for surround sources because it gives a cleaner sound.

I live in a condo, and even though I have higher quality speakers, I find myself usually using these headphones for movies and TV because it's just so cool to be able to listen loud enough that you can hear all the dialog all the time with no concern about annoying the neighbors. Listening through the speakers I'm always turning the volume down during explosions or crashes and turning the volume up during quiet dialog. With these headphones you don't have to do that so you are more immersed.

Most people seem to think the surround processing on these is pretty much state of the art and yet I think it's useless. So my suggestion would be to not buy headphones for surround processing. Just find a pair of comfortable headphones that have decent sound quality and you'll be set. Since these headphones cost so much due to the surround processing, they are probably not a great value.

The other minor complaint I have is that there is no way to turn the base station on or off remotely... it's the only device I have to actually get up and walk over to turn on.

After a few years of use, mine are developing a problem where the sound cuts off if I leave my DVR on pause for a long time. This used to happen just a few percent of the time but now it's starting to happen almost half the time that I do a long pause. The problem seems to be in the base unit; unplugging the toslink and switching the base on and off restores the sound. I'm in the market for a new set of wireless headphones. I'm considering getting another set of these used to replace the base unit, and that way I'll have two sets of headphones so my girlfriend and I can listen together late at night without waking others up.

Not bad, but quite pricey!.......2004-02-07

I picked these headphones up in Hong Kong back in 1999 for a decent price. Like the other reviewer, I had very high expectations going into this, and I will say they were not completely met.

I purchased this set so I could watch TV and movies without disturbing my sweetie :). She goes to sleep an hour or two before I do, so these have been a g-dsend for our relationship.

The technology behind this product is incredible.. They are truly digital wireless headphones, employing a unique infrared transmitter base with four receivers (one for each ear front and back) on the headphones. It appears as though it only needs one of these receivers within site of the base at any given time. Range is decent and far beyond what you might expect out of an optical wireless product. Even more impressive is the ability of the headphones to work with a reflection! I'm able to step outside the room and pick up a signal without a direct line of sight to the base (it bounces off the wall!)

In standard stereo mode they are a darn good set of headphones. Good range of sound and I believe they also employ some noise cancelling technologies.

Surround mode is another story.. Running dolby surround from a non-digital source sounds terrible and murky. Almost sounds like listening to music in a tin bucket :). DVD movies in 5.1 surround aren't bad, but still no replacement for a real home theater system. I still hear a bit of that digital tinnyness when employing digital 'dolby virtual mode.'

There are a number of virtual surround modes, including standard stereo mode for CD's, music, and other analog sources.

The unit has two input choices - standard analog RCA ports and an optical Sony toslink port. Make sure your DVD player has an optical output for Dolby Digital. Most do, but when I bought these back in '99 I had to buy a $100 coax to optical adapter to get up and running.

I'm impressed with these headphones, but the price might make many of you think twice. I'm sure I could have prevented disturbing my sweetie for much less than 400+ dollars :).

Great for movies, not so hot for music.......2003-11-11

At my house, my wife isn't into music. To be more accurate, she believes that music is noise. That noise shouldn't be loud (which means louder than, say, the dishwasher). Therefore music shouldn't be loud enough to create a reasonable listening experience.

Rather than listening to a continual stream of complaining, or having to wait for her to go out; I have tried several different sets of headphones over the last several years. Most have been awful beyond belief. I've currently I have a set of Sennheiser HD590 which are okay.

Of late, I've gotten into 5.1 concert recordings. A great example is Eric Clapton's "One More Car, One More Rider" DVD. Listening to this in DTS is great. Even my 2 year old asks to listen to this DVD (he loves to plays air guitar with Eric).

However, even the best 2 channel headphones don't recreate the 5.1 experience of Eric Clapton's DVD (or any other good concert DVD's that I have either). So when I ran across the Sony MDR-DS5100 and thought I had found a solution to my problem. Even though the Sony MDR-DS5100 headphones themselves are 2 channel, the wireless transmitter base takes in digital input and uses DSP effects to recreate a 5.1 experience. The reviews I found where universally good. So I figured, what the heck, I can always return them.

Boy were my expectations too high. This babies totally mangled the experience of concert DVD's. Even the two channel experience was better than this. None of the settings on the headphone control did anything but change how badly the sound was mangled.

I was getting ready to pack them up and take them back, when I tried listening to a DVD movie with a decent 5.1 sound track. It turns out these headphones are pretty good for listening to DVD movies.

Since my wife also considers movie soundtracks to be noise (all she does when we go to a theater is complain about how loud it is), these headphones might solve a different problem for me.

I don't know if I'll keep them yet, but here is what I've observed:

Pros:

1) My Sony receiver silences the speakers when headphones are plugged in, but not the subwoofer (what was Sony thinking??). Using these headphones with the digital out on my receiver solves this mildly annoying problem.

2) The headphones don't sound bad for movies, but don't try them on concert DVDs. You will be sadly disappointed.

3) They are definitely reasonable wireless headphones. I previously owned an older set of Sennheiser RF wireless headphones which were awful (small proprietary batteries, RF drift which require retuning every few minutes, and marginal sound quality). The Sony MDR-DS5100 aren't bad headphones, at least when compared to other wireless headphones I've tried.

4) They have good power management and use standard AA batteries which mean all those rechargeable batteries that I keep around for my digital camera can be used here too.

Cons:
1) Price
2) 5.1 Concert DVD soundtracks are mangled beyond belief
3) Price (it's worth mentioning that again). You could buy a couple of sets of Sennheiser HD590 for the price of one of these babies.

AWESOME sound.......2003-10-17

I can't believe how good these sound! it is really like seating at the movies.. Note that the digital input is TOSLINK (optical) so your source will need to have this kind or ouput (or get a Coaxial-Optical adapter, just as I did). Trust me, you won't believe your ears!

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Electronics