Jabra BT320s

Hi, I did some major research before shelling out my pennies on a Bluetooth headset and plumped for the jabra halo first edition headset. They have a good spec and seemed to satisfy my requirements without costing the earth. They come packaged pretty well and have their own mains charger plus a USB charger, and a cable for using them as normal 'wired' headphones.

I have been using them extensively for about two months and have the following to report:

I have only used them with my ipad2 and my iphone so maybe some of the following is not so pertinent with other phones or laptops? The charging is good when used with the mains charger and only takes a couple of hours to fully charge. Using a iPad charger and the USB took significantly longer. Once charged they do deliver a good, useable, life and I am very happy with that. The way they turn on is a bit weird and the clicking together of the arms is a bit fiddly. After a short space of time, about a week, the headphones had loosened up to the point where they no longer held together which was worrying but the design meant they still work perfectly well once on the head.

Now down to the nitty gritty. There is some problem with the way the headphones connect to the iPad which follows the same, annoying, routine every time. Like I said, this is probably an apple IOS related problem but even so... Once opened, clicked on and connected to the iPad, they go through a routine of stuttering for about five minutes with clipped sound which drives me mad. What also seems to be happening is they must take up quite a bit of the processor time which inadvertently also affects the iPad. So I have this double bubble of the headphones sound breaking up and then then the iPad struggling to stream content whilst coping with the Bluetooth connection.

I specifically bought these to watch online films on Netflix and iplayer without the fuss of annoying wires which, eventually, they do but the initial connection problems do make even the most patient man start to reach for the hammer. Ironically, using the wired connection works perfectly with no loss from either the pad or the headset so if I have a weakish wi fi connection I generally use the wire. I paid £34 for these as I think the halo 2 set have nicely dropped the price of the originals and to be honest, for that money they are an absolute bargain even with their annoyances. The sound is perfectly clear and very pleasant. The slim design means you can lay fairly comfortably on a pillow whilst listening and on the very few occasions I have used them as a hands free, my callers say they are incredibly clear due to the double mic sound gate setup.

Overall they do exactly what I thought they would, cheap, good sound, good design and option for wired connection for when the charge runs out during the final scene from 'Usual Suspects' :-) I wouldn def recommend to a friend with the following advice: "get these as they are great but be prepared to watch the first five minutes of your iPad film twice" maybe they work perfectly with a lap top? Dunno. And anyway, what do you want for thirty odd quid?