Jabra TALK Review

Introduction:

Not everyone requires a fancy-schmancy or feature rich Bluetooth headset to get by, but rather, some would simply prefer a more humble offering to chit-chat with another person – while still being relatively easy on the wallet. Well people, the Jabra TALK is aiming to be just that device, as it’s sporting an easy to swallow price tag of only $29.99. Certainly, it doesn’t have an extensive features list, but let’s cross our fingers in hopes that it can get us to do what we all do naturally – talk!

Design:

Giving it a good look up and down, there’s no hiding the fact that it’s pretty much ordinary looking with its design. For the price and all, we can’t expect a whole lot in this segment, but at least it’s sporting a sleek profile design to remain somewhat favorable in our books. Donning an all-plastic body, combined with some chrome elements, it flaunts a mostly clean looking appearance – though, the chrome accents tend to exhibit smudges more. Lightweight by nature thanks primarily to its choice of materials, we don’t notice it much as we’re wearing it on our ear. Additionally, the ear loop aids in keeping it snug on our ear, while the earpiece can tend to feel a bit irritating during prolong usage.



Placing our attention on the main façade of the headset, the microphone is perched on the usual spot towards the one edge, while the multi-function button is discretely a part of the lower plastic piece. Pressing down on it will either pickup/end a phone call, whereas long pressing will execute a redial.



Towards the backside of the Jabra TALK, there’s a microUSB port to charge its internal battery and an easy to move power switch. Within close proximity to the earpiece, there are actually two icons that hide away LED lights to indicate its Bluetooth connection and power status. Lastly, adjusting the volume on the headset is a breeze, since it has a distinct feel and response.

Performance:

Talk about the lack of being able to talk with ease during conversations! Unfortunately, the only time that we find the Jabra TALK somewhat useful, is when it’s being used in areas where background noise is minimal or non-existent. Sure, the volume output of the earpiece is pretty strong, but it doesn’t particularly help when voices have a distinct hollowness to them. Well, it doesn’t get any better for our callers on the other end of the line, mainly because the Jabra TALK lacks the modern convenience of noise cancellation – enabling the microphone to pick up every single distortion and noise in the process. And for driving, you’ll want to keep the windows up because we find it incomprehensible to use as our callers mention the distracting sound of wind on their end of the line.

Battery:

Again, we’re not entirely expecting the headset to offer days of battery life, and instead, the manufacturer has it rated to provide 6 hours of talk time or 8 hours of standby out of a full charge.

Conclusion:

We all know the good saying of “you get what you pay,” right? Well people, those words ring loudly in this case, since the Jabra TALK fails to deliver a decent chatting experience – that’s unless you’re in the middle of nowhere with no background noise creeping into the conversation. No doubt, its $29.99 price point is quite irresistible, possibly making it a quick impulse buy for many people, but we’d totally recommend shelling out another $20 to pick up something else with a little more meat in the features list department – while still providing better audio quality.