Are you stressed out at your job? Do your jaw muscles stay clenched and your neck pain after you get home? Do your neighbors make too much noise when you are trying to rest? Would you just like some peace and quiet to unwind? Then pull up a chair and rest your feet for a spell and maybe get a hot cup of java, you’re going find out how to use your Android handheld or tablet in a new way.
Noise cancellation has been making the rounds on the Android forums of late especially since Apple is advertising it as part of its newer iPhone and iOS apps for its iPads. Android in order to compete will have to catch up. After doing a lot of searching and head scratching about 100 apps can be found that in one form or another perform noise cancelling. Here are three of the best of the lot for you to download and try to see which works best for your handheld or tablet.
Relax Melodies: Sleep and Yoga: http://www.ipnossoft.com/
This may not at first sound like a noise cancellation app but if you look closer and try it, you find it actually works quite well perhaps it is an unintended feature. Sound Cancellation is a way reducing the ambient noise around you. Like the White Noise of falling rain during a storm washes out any other sound around you. This app performs the same function by using a selection 46 specially chosen sounds and music. Using what has been termed the Mozart Effect it can by its gentle rhythms not only drown out any unwanted sounds but also induces a relaxed state of alertness by getting your brain to resonate at the Alpha Brain wave level.
White Noise Lite: http://www.facebook.com/tmsoft
This uses White Noise to blanket the area around your phone or other Android based machine with a buffer zone of white noise. However, it has additional sounds that you may find more pleasing and calming like:
- Airplane Travel
- Beach Waves Crashing
- Chimes Chiming
- Crickets Chirping
- Extreme Rain Pouring
- Grandfather Clock
- Oscillating Fan
- Thunderstorm
- Train Ride
- White Noise
The purchasable full-blown version has 40+ sounds and it also provides for the downloading of additional sounds. This app has appeared in the Washington Post and on Dr. OZ.
Sleep and Noise Sounds (SNS): http://sleepandnoisesounds.com/
Recommended by Dr. OZ as well this app also uses white noise to blot out unwanted interruptions like neighbors fighting and police sirens. However this has a few sounds that just might make it your favorite as it uses Pink Noise a cousin of White Noise but many find preferable to same unvarying amplitude that White Noise produces.
- Pink Noise
- Brown Noise
- White Noise
- Heart Beat
- Forest
- Ocean Waves
- Vacuum
- Nature Trail
- Ticking Clock
- Kettle Boiling
- Airplane Mid flight
- Electric Fan
- Blowing Wind
- Cat Purring
- Urban Ambulance
- Calm Rainfall
All of these apps are free, which lets you try them and then decide which one gives you the best performance on your handheld. I think that these apps are the best of the breed out there with thousands of happy users. If you are at your desk at lunch or after you come home after a stressed out day at the office you now have an easy and unique way to decompress and regain your peace of mind and even get a good night’s sleep to boot.
None of these are noise canceling. Noise overlay at best.