You can definitely get "good"[1] sound quality + noise cancelling, but for me at least most decent non noise cancelling headphones sound noticeably better than my Sony XM4s, even at much lower price points. I'm fine with this though, because I use my XM4s when I need to focus without being distracted by background noise and they do an amazing job at that.

(There's also the issue of bluetooth signal not being as good as wired, and the DAC/Amplification needing to be built into the headphones but I don't think that's having as much of an impact on the overall sound signature - it hasn't been my experience when using bluetooth adapters on some other headphones, and using the XM4s wired).

[1] Obviously peoples subjective idea of "good" vs "great" vary wildly, I'm just sharing my subjective opinion on things.

I have the Jabra Elite 85h's and have the same exact problem on OS X from time to time. (I really like them otherwise, though!) I'm not entirely sure what it is.