russian

Phone Search:

RSS

Samsung Galaxy Note. First Look

Today, large companies, especially corporate giants like Samsung, do not surprise users with extraordinary products...

First look. Sony ST21i Tapioca Microsoft Windows Phone 7: Reasons for Failure First Look at Samsung Galaxy S3 as a 2012 Flagship

Reviews Editorials

Mobile Phones Editorials MP3 Forum

Review of Plantronics Voyager Pro + Вluetooth headset

In the box:

Headset
Car charger
Main charger
USB cable
Exchangeable plugs
Tips
User guide

The owners of Voyager Pro should not worry much as the upgrade to Pro+ is not really essential for them (though you can never be sure). Those who need a headset without marketing sound bite and PR propaganda and require only sound, ergonomics and quality must definitely look at Pro +. I can easily mention it from the very outset. I personally prefer Jawbone Icon, because I am young enough for it. If I were older my choice would be Plantronics Voyager Pro +. The manufacturer takes into account all possible ways of operation and in the box you have a car charger in addition to the main one. It is useful and the adapter has a USB jack to charge different types of equipment. I recharged my iPhone with ease.

Design and construction

The headset is large without any compromise and attempts to make it smaller. The loop is massive, the microphone is long and has metal around it. In other parts of the headset you have plastic of different textures. The loop is decorated with polished plastic, while its interior and connector use hard rubber. The outside of silver color with the brand name on is pretty conspicuous. The microphone is represented by black plastic. This diversity leaves a pleasant aftertaste of a professional device. Even the name sounds serious. It's not for nothing that the company calls it a Pro version and I will try to refrain from sarcasm as engineers aimed at impressive features and parameters, albeit the product is devoid of elegant design. That is why I think that Pro looks fine and the built is decent more or less. Seriously speaking I have not seen a headset as heavy as 18 g for a long time, but it is not that bad.

The gadget is sold in a package of transparent plastic, which is useful and looks nice. You can even use it as a present this way. On a shelf you can see it from a distance. In the box we don't have a cable, which can remember its shape.

How to use the headset

Pro + is easy to carry. It could not be otherwise as a massive loop is firmly fixed around you ear. No matter how wildly you move your head the gadget will stay put. At the same time it doesn't irritate the skin. Courtesy of two joints you can adjust the device to carry on either right or left ear. The light indicator is original. It looks perforated and doesn't attract much attention. The fitting of a speaker is simply shaped as everything has the only goal here – connect quickly, carry for a long time and forget that you have anything on your ear. You cannot feel the weight indeed.

Control

The multifunctional key is not easy to spot on the outside of a speaker. Standard features offered are answer and end calls, switch between the lines, call transfer from headset to phone and microphone deactivation. There are sound alerts (with a pleasant voice in English) in case your battery is running low and so on. On the top we get a volume control buttons, so it is always clear where to press. As the headset is large, you don't have any problems with controls. Everything is easy and close at hand.

Operation time

The manufacturer claims up to 6 hours of talktime and 120 hours on standby, which is not good enough for such a large headset. Charging time is 1.5 hours or twice as much if you use a USB port. In real life the headset offers 5 hours 25 minutes of talktime, which is way too low. You can get much smaller devices with the operation time, which is two times longer. At the same time, we get a standard microUSB jack and you can always recharge Pro in your office or car (there is everything you need in the box).

Phone connection and sound quality

Bluetooth 2.1 with EDR is supported alongside all Plantronics technologies: AudioIQ2 (two microphones, echo suppression, DSP and so on), and WindSmart – steel perforated screens to protect the microphone from wind. Long microphone is finely nestled near you mouth, so even if there is some loud noise around you don't have speak up or cover the headset with a hand. The sound reproduction is excellent and the speech of an interlocutor retains individual nuances. Pro is ideal for use in a car.

Multipoint is supported too. I connected the headset with iPhone 4 and Blackberry Torch at a time without problems whatsoever.

A2DP and other extras

I will enumerate key changes and additions:

When you connect to iPhone the screen shows a battery indicator for the headset. Owners of Apple products will be happy. By the way, the connection to iPhone 4 requires no password.
A2DP is supported, so you can listen high quality music (podcasts, play games, etc)
Plantronics Vocalyst works for owners of two Plantronics headsets, including Pro +. Annual subscription will cost you around $25 for sending and listening to e-mails and special app for Blackberry OS and Android OS. I installed it on HTC Desire. This application helps to interrupt an incoming call and send an SMS informing the caller that you are behind the wheel at the time. You can also listen to SMS in English. Unfortunately the app cannot handle Russian as yet. Vocalyst also helps posting messages in Twitter, update information in Evernote, listen to the latest news, record and listen to alerts. It is a useful service for countries, which languages are supported.

Conclusions

Pro+ costs $100 in the US. I liked the following:

Excellent speech transmission
Wonderful ergonomics
Rich kit from the box
Convenient controls
Operation with two phones at a time
Availability of A2DP
Battery indicator on an iPhone screen

A bit of criticism:/p>

A2DP is traditionally added via a new firmware. This policy was used in Jawbone Icon and Blueant. In this case the approach was different – new kit, package and upgraded firmware, but the operation time remains the same! I wonder whether we can upgrade its predecessor to Pro +? I would suggest this variant to the owners of the Pro model.
It would have been better to get a detailed User Guide for Vocalyst, as here we don’t get any information. 99% of customers will prefer to spend their time on something else instead of discovering all features of Vocalyst independently. New features must be better communicated to people who buy your products.

Anyway, I can easily recommend both Pro and Pro +. Car owners should pay particular attention to the latest model due to an impressive kit.

Do you want to talk about this? Please, go to our Forum and let your opinion to be known to the author and everybody else.

Sergei Kuzmin ([email protected])
Twitter Livejournal
Translated by Maxim Antonenko ([email protected])