10-03-2007, 04:00 PM
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Thoughts Media Review Team
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 749
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The Long Trek to a Jawbone review...
Product Category: Bluetooth Headset
Manufacturer: Aliph
Where to Buy: Expansys (affiliate)
Price: $119.95 USD Includes headset, wall charger, USB cable, 4 earloops (2 right and 2 left) and 4 earbuds.
System Requirements: Pairing unit will need to support Bluetooth 1.2 as a minimum.
Specifications: Physical dimensions: 22mm (.87") x 58mm (2.3") x 17mm (.67") Technical: 6 hours talk time, 120 hours standby. Charging from a USB port (with the unit off) takes about 2 hours.
Pros:
Noise cancellation and voice activation technology are excellent; Lightweight and comfortable;Smaller and less obtrusive than other Bluetooth headsets.
Cons:
Difficult to get a snug, tight fit into the ear;Buttons need a significant push to activate;USB charging cable uses a proprietary connector;Audio quality not particularly good for music.
Summary:
Yes, this could be considered pretty 'old' news. The Jawbone has been around for a number of months now and there have been innumerable reviews already posted around the Internet. You've no doubt heard glowing reviews of the noise cancellation abilities of the Jawbone and if not, here's a demo. We really did try to get onto this while it was hot, but getting a unit to review was quite the journey, and I thought some insights on what happens on the way to a review and some actual hands on, extended use of the unit outside of the office environment might be of interest.
Read on for the full review!
Introduction
Our journey starts back in April 2007. Fresh upon news releases regarding a Bluetooth headset with incredible noise canceling capabilities, one of our review team was contacted by a marketing representative from Aliph, asking if we'd like a unit for a review. �You bet!�, we said back, and awaited a response. And waited, and waited. A month of emails back and forth later, we finally determined that the marketing group had no more review units and wasn't likely to get anymore soon.
At this point, we usually just give up and move on, but I'm intrigued by the noise canceling technology. I use my BT headset while riding my bike to and from work, so there is frequently quite a bit of wind noise and I'm always worried about it falling off my ear. According to the marketing material, the Jawbone could be a solution. Not only does it have military-grade noise canceling built-in, but it also features an in-the-ear design fit, which should be perfect for keeping it audible and in place while I'm riding.
So, now it's mid-June, and I've begun checking all the local cellular franchises to see if any of them carry the Jawbone. Unfortunately, my home town is a bit backward technologically, so none of them had even heard of the Jawbone � most of them thought I was mispronouncing Jabra. Next step -- check eBay for a reasonably priced unit. Unfortunately, most are trying to flog it for a buy-it-now price that's either equal to or greater than the price direct from Aliph. Ah ha! Found a used one for $40USD -- but it doesn't come with the power supply, USB cord, or the set of earbuds and loops. OK, no problem. I understand from the user manual that the unit is charged using a wall-charger to USB adapter and I have plenty of those from other gadgets. The eBay unit comes with an earbud and loop, so I'll see how that fits first. The only thing missing is the USB charge cord. So, I check on Aliph's website and while they will gladly sell you a wall charger ($20USD) and the set of earbuds and loops ($20USD), there's no mention of the USB charge cable. I fired off an email to Aliph's customer support people, explaining my predicament and asking if there was any way I could purchase just the cable. Within a couple of days, I got a very nice reply with an offer to send me a cable (gratis) for the review! Thanks, Aliph! � things are looking up.
About the beginning of July, the eBay Jawbone arrives, and of course, the provided earbud and loop don't provide a snug fit on my ear. So, back to the Aliph site to put in an order for the earbud & loops set. Guess what? Aliph's out of stock of those, but should have some more 'in a week or two'. Hearing nothing after four weeks, I start getting a little antsy, and contact Aliph via phone. I'm told that they should have stock in a couple of days and they will be shipping out my units then. I guess there were more delays since the ear buds and loops didn't arrive until mid-August.
Right, it's now been almost 5 months and I finally have everything to start the review. So, here we go...
What Comes in the Box
The Jawbone, as you get it in the commercial package, includes everything you need to get going.
Figure 1: What you get with a Jawbone (Note: the Wall-to-USB power supply is not shown).
Included is the Jawbone unit, the USB charge cord, a set of 4 earbuds of different sizes and shapes, and 4 earloops. There are both a large and regular loop for each of the right and left ears. (To be honest, I didn't really see why there needed to be a distinction between left and right, since you can bend the metal part of the earloop to match either side.) Also included is a printed copy of the user manual, which is available online here. The manual is well written and includes lots of illustrations, so I would strongly suggest you read through it before trying to fit or use your Jawbone and there is quite a lot of useful 'how to' information there and discussion about how the noise canceling technology works. Also included will be a wall-to-USB adapter into which you plug in the cable to charge the Jawbone.
Here are some shots of the Jawbone itself.
Figure 2: Front View.
Figure 3: Side View showing the Voice Activator button (in white). Note that the rubber bud has been removed from the earpiece on the left side.
Figure 4: Back view, showing the connectors for the USB Charge Cable.
Figure 5: A view of the USB Charge cable, with the pins in the proprietary connector which fit into the back of the Jawbone. Be careful how you fit this in, since those pins look like they could easily get bent.
Getting a Good Fit
The Jawbone is one of the few Bluetooth headsets which provides a variety of options for getting a good solid fit. Believe me, getting it to fit right is important to ensuring it works as advertised. A number of personal reviews (found on PriceGrabber) have shown many people are finding it difficult to get a comfortable fit for their Jawbones and of 'dropouts' when talking to people. (There is a reason for that little white button on the bottom of the unit which touches your cheek!) After playing with various combinations of the earloops and earbuds on both ears for a couple of weeks, here's a process I found that works for me.
First, if your Jawbone came with an earloop inserted, take it out. Working with the Jawbone unit and each of the earbuds, try various combinations in each ear until you find one that will stay in the ear by itself, with no other support. Make sure it stays in place when you gently rotate your head and feels comfortable. Also, ensure that the little white voice actuator button is touching your upper cheek at all times.
Now, based on which ear you've got your Jawbone in, take the appropriate earloops (right or left). Remove the Jawbone from your ear, and try each of the loops, by themselves, over the ear. Feel free to bend the metal parts of the loops (gently!, since I hear from other sources that they are a bit brittle) to make it fit flat against your ear. The metal post where the Jawbone is attached should be across the hole in your ear.
Finally, put the earloop and Jawbone back together and try it for fit. In my case, it takes a bit of wrangling to get it on, but once it's there, it feels comfortable and sits well on the ear and against the top part of my cheek.
Figure 6: Here's what it looks like on my face. Notice that it sits pretty high up on the cheek.
Figure 7: Here's what it looks like from the front. Sorry about the elongated head � blame my phone camera. As you can see, from the front, the headset is barely noticeable and not too geeky :-).
Unfortunately, none of the buds fits 'into' my ear properly, so I can't really get the snug fit I was hoping for, but it seems to work fine and stays in place while I'm riding.
Using the Jawbone
There are only two multi-function buttons on the Jawbone and they are well hidden. (Did someone say 'function follows form'??). One is located in the black end, just under the embossed word 'Jawbone'.
Figure 8: The front of the Jawbone, showing the location of the two multi-function buttons.
When the unit is off, pressing and holding this button will put the Jawbone in discovery mode. When the unit is on, it will either turn on and off the notice-canceling circuitry, or adjust the volume. (The default is Noise Can celling On).
The other button is just under a small clear inset about � of the way down the main body of the unit.
With the Jawbone off, pressing and holding this button for a couple of seconds turns it on. The nice thing about the Jawbone is that once it has been paired, powering it on automatically sets up the connection again. There is no need to go through pairing or exchange of PIN codes again. Once the unit is on, pressing this button once acts as either call pickup or voice dial activation, depending upon whether the phone is ringing or not. By pressing and holding this button for 3 seconds, you will shut off the Jawbone.
These functions take a bit of getting use to as a first time user, but are fairly standard for BT headsets. Generally, I found the buttons difficult to locate when wearing the headset and they needed more of a push than I liked. Especially with the unit touching my cheek, it really felt like I was making an indent in my face to get it to activate.
The Jawbone also sports an LED (a bar located between the two buttons) to show its current status. When turned on and paired, it will blink white every couple of seconds. (Why Aliph selected white instead of blue, I'm not sure). When it goes out of range of the master, a tone will sound in the earpiece and the LED will blink red. When you turn off the unit, the LED blinks red as well. When the Jawbone is in discovery mode, the LED alternates between red and white.
Figure 9: Location of the LED.
Generally, I've found the range of the Jawbone to be pretty similar to the better BT headsets around today � fully able to utilize the 10m (32ft) range of its classification. As noted above, if it loses connection, a tone will sound in the Jawbone to let you know.
The volume of sound produced by the headset is amongst the loudest I've heard. It would be even better if I could get the unit to actually sit inside the ear canal, but Aliph needs to produce a smaller earbud for me to do that. As far as quality goes though, I found it only mediocre. Voices carry through fine, but a lot of the lows and highs are lost, making it sound a bit like the pocket transistor radios of old. Callers report that the quality is very good, being actually better than using the microphone in the phone itself. I tried running music through the headset and found that while it was 'serviceable', there was no real fidelity or depth. My guess is that this is due to processing by the noise canceling circuity, which makes sense, since the focus is on getting the voice message through.
And how does it do in noisy environments? Pretty well, in fact. While I didn't have a weed-whacker nearby to test against (as per their ads on YouTube and the demo above), I did get calls a couple of times as I was riding around on my bike. If your caller speaks directly into their microphone, there should be more than enough volume for you to hear them, even with significant wind noise. All of my callers were able to easily hear and understand me as I continued to talk to them while riding.
Conclusions
So, bottom line � is it worth the money? The Jawbone is amongst the most expensive Bluetooth headsets available today, but it does do the job it is advertised to do, which is a big plus, especially for noisier environments. Having the adjustable earbuds and loops is a big advantage for me, since it lets me get a close fit to my head that doesn't feel like it's going to fall off as I ride around. If Aliph could develop an earbud which would fit properly in my smaller ear, and lighten up the switches a bit, it would be absolutely perfect.
Don is an Associate Director with Fujitsu Consulting and leader of its Enterprise Mobility Community. He's also careful to avoid people with weed-wackers when riding around on his bike. :-)
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10-04-2007, 05:49 PM
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Ponderer
Join Date: Jul 2003
Posts: 114
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I love my jawbone, but the lack of a mini (or micro..?) USB connection really bugs me a lot.
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10-06-2007, 06:42 AM
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Neophyte
Join Date: Jul 2007
Posts: 1
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JAWBONE
Personally I think the jawbone is to big and not a good fit. I would like to see a side by side comparision to the Blueant Z9. which I think is the best headset on the market. 
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10-20-2007, 09:08 PM
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Intellectual
Join Date: May 2006
Posts: 146
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Great review! Thanks!
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