I’m a huge fan of the Jawbone bluetooth headset. Not so much a fan of the price but the product is top notch. It uses the vibrations from your jaw and face rather than audio vibrations in the air with a standard microphone.
I broke down and bought another one because I needed it for both personal and business use, not to mention a project I’m working on. This gave me a chance to review the latest model. Let’s just say I’m a little annoyed at some things, happy with most others. This review is for the Jawbone ICON. I didn’t see the need to spend an extra $40 on the ERA, though I wish to hell Best Buy had the ICON + Nerd. That looks nice…
1. Fit. The biggest complaint I have with anything is fit. Jawbone includes lots of earbuds to help give you a good fit but they left out the old over-the-ear stems. Very disappointing. While these things broke more often than not they gave me an assurance the device was on my ear and not going anywhere. Instead they’ve replaced it with earbuds that I can’t seem to fit on the device, and a whacky hybrid over-the-ear stem that is very flimsy. There’s no backwards compatibility with the old stems so I might as well throw those all away.
The old Jawbone. See that nice over the ear piece?
2. Sound quality is great. As usual. Not a problem. I walked around a grocery store talking and the person on the other end had no idea.
3. Size. Damn thing keeps getting smaller!
4. Buttons. I’m a tad confused here. There’s a single button on the back for disconnecting (and I’m assuming connecting using voice assist) but where’s the volume? It should be more intuitive.
5. Charging. By far the biggest improvement to the new line of Jawbone’s is the charging. No more proprietary charging crap. Straight up USB as it should have been all along. Really happy about this one.
6. Annoyances: One final little annoyance, the switch to turn it on and off. Why? Why a switch at all?! This is just something that will cave in and break over time. Every device I’ve ever owned with a recessed switch, from iPhones to mice, usually wear out and break over time. It’s a given. The old Jawbones has a button you press and held. I miss that already.
So for the Jawbone ICON I give it a 4 out of 5 stars. Sound, size, and charging are really improved and much loved, but fit and button placement/usage should have been left the way they were. Otherwise a great purchase…so long as you don’t lose it…
