Motorola S11-FLEX HD Review

Introduction:

It’s one thing to be sitting idly in the comforts of your home listening to music with a wireless pair of headphones, but it’s totally another thing if you’re sweating it out doing something more active. For those looking to tackle the issue of listening to some tunes while doing some sort of physical activity, the Motorola S11-FLEX HD is aiming to be the perfect companion for all your fitness needs. Its sweat-proof aspect is undeniably something neat that we don’t see too often amongst stereo Bluetooth headsets in general, but more importantly, it boasts all of the contemporary features we commonly expect to hopefully make it a balanced offering.



Design:

Without question people, the Motorola S11-FLEX HD is an interesting one in the world of Bluetooth headphones. Instead of treading the conventional route, its wrap-around design encompasses the entire back portion of our head – with the actual earbuds looping over the ears and finally resting in the crevices. Constructed entirely out of plastic, with some rubbery surfaces plastered along its body, it’s nice to know that it’s flexible enough to bend to an extent. Worth pointing out too, it’s armed with a protective coating, hydrophobic moisture-repellent mesh, and silicone seals to make it sweat-proof.


Although it might appear to be lightweight, it’s actually top heavy, as the compartments housing the headphones pack some weight – though, it doesn’t become too noticeable when it’s actually worn. Now it’s great that the earbuds themselves are actually adjustable in both rotation and extension to fit into the ear. Still, with all of the adjustments and using the correct sized earbuds, we don’t have that firm sense of snugness.


Sadly, we’re not fans of the physical buttons along its body, nor are we bonkers about their positioning as well since they’re located in the most inconvenient areas. Starting with the left headphone compartment, it houses the indistinct feeling multifunction button, which isn’t any better with its response. With this, it enables us to pick up/end a call, set the appropriate equalizer option, and play/pause/reverse/forward a track – the latter of which requires some consecutive presses (such as twice to forward and a triple press to reverse). Meanwhile, the right headphone compartment features the volume rocker, dedicated power button, LED light, two microphones, and a microUSB port that’s hidden behind a plastic cover. In usage, we’re constantly fumbling around trying to feel out the placement of the volume rocker, which is located along the incline.

Performance:

When it comes to using this for phone calls, it’s passable, but far from the clearest thing we’ve heard. On our end, we didn’t have too much of an issue trying to hear out our callers, as the volume output is loud enough to audibly comprehend voices. Conversely though, our callers mention having more difficulty due to the muddy tones they’re presented with on their side. And if you’re concerned about background noise, the noise-cancellation feature of the Motorola S11-FLED HD kicks into high gear, as it’s able to quickly drown out background disturbances, such as the wind coming from an open window, so that our voice is the sole thing heard on our caller’s end. However, it’s not without some distortion muddying up its quality, seeing that voices become a tad bit hollow in tone as a result.

Showing its worth, we’re pleased that that the Motorola S11-FLEX HD is a great pair of wireless headphones for listening to music. Yeah, it doesn’t have any cool noise isolation feature or something similar like that, but we’re happy to report that the audio quality produces brilliant high tones and the perfect splash of treble – well, that’s as long as you’re using the appropriate equalizer setting. Specifically, it features balanced, extreme bass, vocalizer, brilliant treble, and unmodified settings to better adapt to the style of music you’re listening. Of them all, we have to say that brilliant treble coughs up the most balanced performance out of the bunch, seeing that it sneaks in a snippet of treble to give its quality some brilliance.

Battery:

Rated for 7 hours of talk time, 6 days of standby, and 6 hours of music playback, we’re able to inch out a little over 5 hours listening to music consecutively. Interestingly enough, the Motorola S11-FLEX HD is quickly recharged in no time at all! In fact, 5 minutes of recharging its battery yields enough charge for 1 hour worth of usage. Keeping that in mind, it doesn’t take that long at all to get this pair back up to full capacity.

Conclusion:

Flaunting an MSRP of $129.99 a pop, it doesn’t really come as a surprise, mainly because it follows in the same footsteps as its predecessors. Surely, its sport-minded design is perfect, seeing that we’re not left to fumble around with wires slapping our face as we’re running outdoors at a vigorous pace. At the same time, the sweat-proof aspect is a nice touch to an already athletic minded pair of wireless headphones. However, it doesn’t jump out in the call quality department – though, to its credit, it’s wonderful for listening to music. For all its worth, though, we were hoping to see some other neat features that we’ve been seeing on other wireless stereo headphones , such as the noise-isolation technology used in the Phiaton PS 210 BTNC. Then again, it would’ve more than likely increase its cost, so for what it’s worth, it’s not a bad option at all when you take into account everything it has to offer.

Motorola S11-FLEX HD Video Review: