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- Average user rating: 2.5 stars out of 41 reviews Back to product review
- My rating: 0 stars
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9 out of 10 people found this review helpful
4.0 stars
"Still Assessing - Some good and some bad"
Pros: A nice size, good outgoing sound quality
Cons: still having fitting issues, not loud enough for me, spare charging cables are too expensive
Summary: I have am a somewhat outdated blue tooth headset user, that is I tried almost everything that was readily available in mid 2005 (I bought and took back every bluetooth headset that I could find in my local retailers), found that I really liked the bluespoon ax2. I bought and proceeded to break 4 of them in short order so much to my dismay. As a side note the bluespoon, they worked great for me but they were totally breakable, my last one died after a single fall to the floor. My next foray into bluetooth tech in mid 2006 with a Motorola H700 that I liked a lot (and still like - a solid performer and IT TURNS OFF EASILY). Spilled coffee on the H700 and replaced it with a Motorola H500 because I was still a bit skittish with fragile looking headsets and the H500 was inexpensive and durable looking. Couldn't stand the H500 for too long (it didn't turn off easily and was thus hard to carry, poor sound quality for me) and I was back to an H700 that lasted me until now (more than a year on this last one, the best I have done yet). All of this to say that I have never used the original jawbone or any of the currently hot and high end bluetooth headsets that are on the market but I am a longtime user that is lost without one. I am a bit nervous plopping down $130 for a new and as yet untested headset but I am giving it a try.
This is my first Jawbone and it is of course the New Jawbone (Wouldn't Jawbone II have been better - a search for "new jawbone" gives a lot of ebay hits for "new" rather than "used" jawbones) and I am sill in the love hate phase.
I have large ears and can't seem to get the darn thing to fit both comfortably and with good sound quality. It really needs the ability to go louder for those of us who can't get the earpeice to set correctly in our ear canals. Yes, I have been at this long enough to know to try all possible combinations and I have even attempted to go without the earloop in pursuit of the best fit. I do also have a beard and the cheek sensor seems to be able to reach my cheek without difficulty for any of you bearded men out there who are wondering. I have not given up yet but if this proves unfixable I will be returning it to my AT&T (oops now it's the New at&t) store.
The outgoing audio is seems good overall but I am still having trouble assessing that as well as some people have more trouble understanding me in relatively quiet environments than I had with my plain old H700. In loud environments others are able to hear me fairly well BUT I can't always hear them, defeating the intend.
My final gripe is that they have used a proprietary plug for the charger and if I want a second charger for the car I need to buy a $30 cable plus a usb to auto charging adapter (I have one of those but that is beside the point). Why not a mini USB plug, I have tons of mini usb chargers and they are not that big even as board mounted solder on modules, I have had enough headaches re-soldering them on busted devices to know this for certain.
So here is my summery:
-Overall decent quality outgoing sound that would be great if I could hear the darn thing on my end. The jury is still out for me on this point.
-Poor fitting, for me at the least. It needs better rubber earpeice options that are able to give a better seal OR have the ability to go louder.
-Magnetic charger cable is neat but I would rather have a mini usb plug for compatibility (maybe an inexpensive, short, mini usb to magnetic new jawbone adapter would be nice).
-Nicely put together, nice size and great packaging.
-Seems to be Beard Computable.
-Please add an easy to use OFF SWITCH to the New New Jawbone (that would be Jawbone III for the rest of us).
My final advice, buy one locally (an at&t store for next couple of months) if you want to try it but keep everything to be able to take it back if it is not up to par for you.
Where to buy
Aliph Jawbone 2 (silver):
$49.99 - $62.99
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$49.99 | Yes |
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$49.99 | Yes |
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Amazon.com Marketplace
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$62.99 | Yes |
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