Jawbone 2 review (silver)

Turn the headset around and you'll find a rubber earpiece, an optional ear hook, and a tiny white rubber nub that acts as the Voice Activity Sensor. In order for the voice-amplification technology to work, you must wear the headset so that the sensor lies against your cheek, allowing it to detect the vibration of your voice. Unlike the first Jawbone, the ear hook is completely optional. You can choose to wear the headset with or without it, since the earpiece fits more securely in the ear. Aliph also packages a few different size earpiece covers plus different ear hooks for a better fit. As a bonus, some of the ear hooks are made from real leather. We found the fit to be a lot more comfortable than the first--we could wear it very easily, and positioning the voice-activity sensor was easy to do, as well. Since the ear hooks are so flexible and thin, they can also be used when wearing eyeglasses.

Looks and fit aside, the most important reason to get the Jawbone 2 lies in its superior noise-canceling technology. It comes with a dual microphone array that helps to reduce wind noise, a technology that protects your ear against unexpected loud noises, and the aforementioned voice-activity sensor and Noise Assassin technology that helps to amplify your voice and drown out ambient sound. We tested this with the RIM BlackBerry Pearl in a number of environments: in a crowded restaurant, in a car, and outside on a windy day. The results were definitely impressive. Our callers could hear us loud and clear in all the situations. They did report some minor clicking and shuffling in the background, but it wasn't anything significant. In one particularly windy area, our callers didn't even realize we were outside. Similarly, we could hear them without any problems. We then compared the sound quality of the phone without the aid of the headset, and we were surprised to note that the sound quality was much improved with the headset than without.

The Jawbone 2 has a rated talk time of 4 hours and rated standby time of more than eight days. Some other features include voice command support, call waiting support, and a low-battery status indicator. It also comes with a magnetic charging base.