I have these coupled together with my Shure headphones and I can tell you audio quality is average.

In-ear phones like Etymotic's ER6 and Shure's E4C go deep into the ear canal11 to block pretty much12 all outside noise—plus they sound great (a cheaper alternative is Sony's MDR-EX71).

The two Shures have gained quite a reputation among headphone enthusiast, and indeed they are good headphones.