The Jabra Ear Wave Boom is not the business traveler's cell phone hands-free headset of choice, in spite of sleek styling, a fair price and plenty of marketing hype.
The Jabra Ear Wave Boom seemed like a nice idea. I don't like ear buds and other cell phone devices I must actually stick inside of my ear, so this hands-free headset looked very nice for the price of only $23. The "Ear Wave" seems to wrap around the ear from behind and comes with a universal headset jack (Nokia phones excepted). Both medium and small ear gels are included for a more personalized fit.
All good so far? Well, it turns out this hands-free phone headset is more complicated than it needs to be. Even after a week of solid use I still fumbled to position the thing correctly. And while the framework wraps around the back of the ear, the earpiece still has to be shoved into the ear canal. So much for not having to fuss with something inside my ear opening. To be fair, the device does stay in the ear when properly placed, rarely popping free on its own.
Once placed, the ear piece also places a bit of uncomfortable pressure on the ear cartilage when used for longer phone calls of more than a half hour.
The boom is another problem. The microphone picks up every ambient sound, even when Jabra advertises the mike as a noise-canceling device. Slight wind hurt the ears of my listeners, turning into loud, wild wind tunnels on their end, as I have been repeatedly told.
I often walked along the breezy bay on my recent San Diego business trip. I simply could not use the Ear Wave Boom headset when walking and talking. I had to go out and buy another hands-free headset to get my walking and talking exercise sessions done, or else hold the actual phone to my ear for 45 minutes at a time. Just in case you are wondering, it DOES get tiring to walk around with my hand by my ear for that long.
The Jabra Headset Overall:
To sum, the Jabra Ear Wave Boom is neither as comfortable as advertised, is not easy to place (requiring embarassing fumbling) and picks up too much ambient sound. While the look is sleek, and the price is right, I am still on the hunt for a phone headset that really meets my traveling and hands-free cell phone needs.
