A30 Aviation Headset

A30 user here, I originally wore Lightspeed Sierras back in the cessna days. But eventually I had to buy A30s when I started flying the diamond as a CFI, for some reason my Sierras would cause a nasty echo anytime I transmitted on the radio in that plane. I have since kept using the A30s in the EJet and they've been great, they're super lightweight which is amazing on the longer duty days. Also no one at my airline goes 'topless' in cruise so no issues with having to have one earphone on and the other dangling off. I also really like the feature that lets you change the level of noise canceling. I like to keep it on medium while on the ground, then flip it to high after takeoff.

No you can get multiple options for the cable. Opt for the xlr since it’s powered by the plane not batteries. Everything is better. The a30 is alot more money, less comfortable, has worse sound quality, and worse noise cancellation. The “features” like being able to reduce anr and tapping the earcup to hear through, are useless, borderline annoying features. I bought the a30 as an upgrade to my 12 year old a20 and immediately realized it was a downgrade and returned them. I then got proflights. They werent comfortable on me at all and the anr sucked compared to the a20 but i was willing to take some hits if they were alot smaller in my bag. But the ear tips were super hard to keep in my ears. I got ear molds and they actually made the anr and overall sound quality worse by so much that i just sold the headset and threw the ear molds out. I bought a DC pro x2 as a backup headset which i do really like, but its a little fatiguing to wear for 4 hour flights, so i refurbished my a20 and use them most of the time. If you can find an a20 new or slightly used you will get at least a decade out of it, and then maybe more after a cheap repair if its still supported by then.

A30s are great. I only ever had issues with the headset being loose on the head was when I was wearing it with one ear cup off. 

Man, no love for DC's. I have both a Bose A30 and DC OneX, and the DC has better sound, and is more comfortable for 2+ hour trips.

A30s are superior IMO

So while I generally agree that you should use rated protection (aka: not ANC) for your ears, I take some issue with this style of comment, and there's a few in this thread. Noise cancelling isn't tricking or fooling you - it's literally reducing the amplitude of the sound waves near your ear - they are less powerful. A pair of over the ear, closed back, ANC headphones will do a very good job isolating you from noise. And in situations that are loud but not quite exceeding OSHAs 85db avg over 8 hours level - I'd really recommend wearing a pair as a comfortable noise reduction strategy. Your hearing will thank you. \--- They aren't rated for it, though. So keep real hearing protection around and use that for the louder work.

Again, this is a misunderstanding of how interference works. I guess here's a good argument for people who don't understand the science - This product actually exists! ANC is widely used in aviation as hearing protection: [https://www.bose.com/c/aviation-headsets](https://www.bose.com/c/aviation-headsets) Here's the relevant tagline directly from the product page: \--- You’ll get those benefits and more with Bose flight headsets and aviation headphones which feature active noise reduction (ANR) to provide hearing protection without muffling important sounds and communication. The Bose Bluetooth® aviation headsets function as ANR headsets and are TSO (Technical Standard Order) certified by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). \--- Personally, I wouldn't pay $1200 for a pair of them, but if you want it, you can get it.

Closer than the "physics teacher" bro, but still a bit wrong. Power from sound follows an inverse square law, so distance from source matters a lot. ANC isn't trying to cancel out the entire source sound (impossible, as an aside, unless the sources are at identical locations, in which case the wave just never existed in the first place). It's just trying to reduce amplitude at the users' ears, and those are generally a decent distance (ex: even a couple feet is a LOT) from the source sound. So the ANC waves are trying to match the power "at the ear" of the source sound, and because power loss is squared, this is almost always much, much lower than the original sound. Headphones can output plenty of power to do that (see all the advice and warnings about not listening to headphones at max volume... they're plenty powerful because they're CLOSE to your ears).

Dual plug for most general aviation. I have these, worth every cent!

It's worth every penny. Great noise cancellation and incredible sound clarity. I thought I couldn't understand ATC my first few lessons using the school's headset but once I picked up the A30s, it was night and day.

Yep, you'll notice the noise cancellation difference and the clarity in the voice. I thought I was bad at listening. It was the headset.