I bought the first Bose QC35 II as a gift for my dad at the end of 2017. The active noise cancelling (ANC) was out of expectation and the sound quality good enough as a Bluetooth headset. So I bought a second one for myself and was using it extremely heavily from March 2018 to Jan. 2020 when the right unit is not working anymore.
This post is a two-year review of this product based on my personal experience.
An ANC headset is a highly recommended gadget and almost cannot be get rid of since the first day of using it. It is a useful tool to block out the noise in a metro coach or of the fan noise of a computer/air conditioner. Given my over 5 hours in metro and over 50 hours in front of a computer each week, the headset contributed greatly to my working proficiency. I was wearing it for more than 16 hours per day, so the total working hours of this device should be as equal to average users' four to five years considering my extremely heavy use. For the last six months, I was wearing it all my sleep time. And for about half of the time, I was wearing it as over-the-head earmuffs without playing any music. It is a strong workhorse with reliable quality during its lifespan.
Another unavoidable topic about the Bose QC35 II is its competition against the SONY WH-1000X M3. Very fortunately, I was trying a WH1000X for nearly a week but returned it in the end. Frankly speaking, there are some fields that SONY outcompetes Bose, e.g. sound quality, build quality, and even the ANC level. By looking at the specifications, SONY should be the absolute champion in the market, but actually, the Bose products are better in the features that cannot be measured by numbers, e.g. button feelings, Bluetooth connection stability, and the comfortableness of wearing it. Especially WH-1000X has a mysterious interface response when connecting/disconnecting and switching among devices. The Bose headset is extremely good at connecting to TWO dives at the same time, and I don't have to switch between devices; while the SONY headset even doesn't have a sound signal when connecting/disconnecting, which is barely acceptable.
Last but not the least, the firmware issue. It is interesting to see that the ANC performance is not always at its best level after some versions of firmware installed. Particularly the most criticised 4.5.2 version which was released in mid-2019 but has not been updated since then for half a year. Though similar cases were being reported for years, it is the first time for some YouTube uploaders to use spectrum devices giving objective testing curves. Users were discussing on the Bose Community forum the way to downgrade to some earlier versions but it does not always work possibly due to the hardware version differences (AZ or AE). What's more, compared with the slow movement in updating the firmware, the Bose was extremely quick at deleting any posts about downgrading methods and eliminate the downgrading possibility on the server end. This is very disappointing indeed.
Generally speaking, Bose QC35 II provides the best ANC technology now but the build quality and after-sale service should be improved.
