A member of the Adidas Originals line, the Sennheiser HD 220 headphones attempt to provide the same quality of sound and convenience as modern earbuds but fall just short on their goal.

The headphones themselves are attractive to view and are among the most comfortable accessories you could hope for — every point at which they come in contact with your head is lavishly cushioned, and they provide the perfect balance between elasticity and support, preventing them from slipping out of position on your head while remaining unobtrusive.

And although they are very comfortable, the headphones feature two important design flaws. First, the cord itself is a soft, flexible rubber all the way down to the jack itself, but is far too long for common use. If it's not kept wound up or tucked into your pocket, it can (and will) easily catch on things as you walk past them.

Second, the earpieces themselves — while very soft and designed to sit flat over your ear — do not provide optimum clarity of sound or block bleeding from your surroundings. If you are using the headphones while riding on the bus, it is quite likely your music player won't be able to match the engine sounds around you, even turned all the way up.

The headphones were tested with an Apple iPhone and through a laptop headphone jack, and with rock (Foo Fighters, Wasting Light), hip-hop (Kanye West, My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy) and techno (Daft Punk, Alive 2007) music, as well as by watching films and conducting voice chats.

They performed admirably during chats and films, easily conducting voice and foley sounds without noticeable loss or distortion. With music, however, the performance began to come apart.

There is a noticeable bass boost in effect, and music that suits such a feature was conducted well — the low end of sound is greatly represented and is well matched to hip-hop music in particular. The other end of the spectrum suffers slightly; high—end treble sounds like cymbals that are more evident in rock music sound thin and weak in the mix, made all the more difficult to hear with noise bleed from your surroundings.

These headphones retail for approximately $100, but depending on your music needs, the price may be unjustified. If you rarely find yourself in noisy areas and enjoy listening to bass—intense offerings like hip-hop or techno, the Sennheiser 220 headphones by Adidas Originals may be the ones for you. However, if such is not the case, don't be so quick to abandon standard earbuds for all your music needs.