Insignia Bluetooth Wireless Headphones with USB Bluetooth adapter

CNET editors' review

• CNET editors' rating: 3.0 stars Good
  Detailed editors' rating
  Design : 6.0
  Features : 7.0
  Performance : 7.0
  Overall score: 6.9 (3.0 stars)

• Reviewed by:
  David Carnoy
• Edited by:
  John P. Falcone
• Reviewed on: 05/01/2008

With Bluetooth finally becoming the de facto standard for wireless audio, it seems as if nearly every manufacturer is releasing some sort of Bluetooth-compatible speaker system or headphones. Add Best Buy's Insignia brand to the latter list. The product is officially known as the "Insignia Bluetooth Wireless Behind-the-Head Headphones," and comes in two nearly identical versions: The $70 NS-BTHDST includes a USB Bluetooth dongle (for using as a PC headset), and the $50 NS-BTHDP omits it from the package. The Insignia headphones don't do much to distinguish themselves from the rest of the pack, but they're fairly affordable and offer reasonable sound and comfort quality.

One of the more common forms these types of headphones take is an around-the-back-of-the neck design. This Insignia goes with padded earpieces that completely cover your ears and make you look pretty dorky. You can't fine-tune the fit (the neckband is a fixed length and nonadjustable), but they do fit pretty snuggly and securely.

The headphones' rechargeable battery, which gives you about 10 hours of usage, is housed in the right earpiece. You juice up the battery with a standard mini-USB cable. The right earpiece also houses buttons that control volume and the track up/down functions. A single button on the same earpiece activates the headphones and puts them into pairing mode. That same button is also used to answer and end calls--yes, these headphones also double as a headset for your Bluetooth cell phone--shut off the headphones' power, and toggle play and pause when listening to music. One small gripe we had was that the buttons were a little stiff and just not all that tactile.

As far Bluetooth compatibility goes, these headphones boast Bluetooth 2.0 with the A2DP profile. We didn't have any trouble pairing them with any device that claimed to be stereo Bluetooth-enabled. (Older Bluetooth 1.0 and 1.1 phones should still be able to use the Insignia as monaural phone headsets, but only A2DP-enabled devices will stream higher quality stereo audio.)

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Recent user reviews

• Average user rating: 3.5 stars out of 10 reviews
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• 3.0 stars

  "This Is a good deal, Sound quality can be improved"

  by k9turrent on November 20, 2009

• 4.0 stars

  1 out of 1 people found this helpful

  "Better than some of the higher end devices"

  by MobiusMOAB on May 30, 2009

• 5.0 stars

  0 out of 1 people found this helpful

  "cheap Bluetooth devices here"

  by onthesource on December 12, 2008

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