| A Must Have for Your Next Workout: SmartOmi U8 Headphones |
[31 May 2017|03:03pm] |
The weather is warming up and I’ve begun taking my workouts outdoors! I love the fresh air, feeling the sun beat down on me, even while working up a sweat. What I don’t love? That awful wire to my headphones getting all tangled up in my arms as I run, and occasionally getting ripped right out my ear – Causing me to have to stop and pause and fix my ear piece, and even possibly having to plug the cord back into my phone!
Sure there are lots of headphones out there that are wireless so you don’t have this problem, but have you ever noticed how uncomfortable they can be too, pinching the ear? Even worse, some are still loose and the earpieces still fall right out of the ear, especially once you get some movement going.
Luckily I got to try my workout lifesaver- the SmartOmi U8 Bluetooth Running Wireless Sport Headphones. These beauties are soooo incredibly comfortable! They fit into the ear perfectly and snug (so no more falling out!) but they don’t pinch! They feel great! They also have a rubber ear piece to securely place around the ear for extra hold. The rubber is super flexible and stays in place and feels super soft, smooth and comfy on the ear as well. These headphones are so comfortable in fact, I’ve found myself wearing them around my house or while I work for hours on end, even after I’ve finished my workout! They’re perfect to wear for long periods of time!
They don’t look goofy like some other wireless headphones too! They look chic and aren’t so big that they look ridiculous when worn. The sound is amazing too! Clear, crisp, good bass and they’re noise cancelling too.
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| SmartOmi Boots Mini: A Truly Wireless pair of Headphones for Under $100 |
[31 May 2017|03:04pm] |
SmartOmi Boots Mini: A Truly Wireless pair of Headphones for Under $100
If you’ve been looking for a pair of truly wireless headphones, chances are you’ve seen some of the brands that are available out there but were scared away by the outrageous prices. But there’s hope as a company by the name of SmartOmi wants to take down the competition with their SmartOmi Boots Mini earbuds.
The wire-free headphones are not only affordable but at a price of under $100 the audio quality isn’t half bad. Granted I still believe that the Jabra Elite Wireless Earphones are the best truly wireless headphones I’ve ever used, at this price, dare I say that these are great if you need a pair of headphones that will simply get you through a few hours at work, or through that strenuous workout in the evening.
There wasn’t much to unbox as the SmartOmi Boots came in a simple case that just included the earbuds, their docking station, an instruction manual and a microUSB cable for charging. It’s worth noting that these headphones do not have wireless charging present which means you can’t just throw these in your bag and keep on going so they will require charging as you would your smartphone after a workout.
Also since the earbuds are docked to charge and not encased, chances are they may fall off the dock while in your gym bag or purse, so if I were you, I would put them in a separate pocket of your bag just make sure they are together.
But SmartOmi does promise up to five hours of battery with over 200 hours of standby which is actually pretty decent. But I’m a bit of a critic, especially after being scorned before by earphones that dub themselves “truly wireless” so I had to put these to the test. As always I put all of these wireless earphones up to six tests:
Single Earbud Listening
Well you’ll be happy to know that the single earbud listening experience can be had by the SmartOmi boots. This is ideal when you’re at your desk and have to often take a phone call or two, or listen to your surroundings. I prefer to use the right ear for single ear testing, but I experienced no drop offs of audio quality regardless of which ear I decided to use.
True battery Life testing (where I take the headphones fully charged, sit them on my desk at work, and play music through them until they die while timing the effort.
A bit of a downer here as SmartOmi promises five hours of battery life for their earbuds, and the closer I got to that was four hours and 11 minutes of music prior to the headphones actually dying out. Now I know that they say “up to”, and that’s vital in terms of giving a description of wireless headphones to a customer. Obviously, your experience may vary in the way you listen to your music, but using continuously for the allotted time, I only received that amount before it died [without a “battery low warning” at that.
Sweat Test – We all sweat at the gym and it’s good to know that these earbuds will stay in after a long workout, be it cardio or weightlifting.
I have to admit, I was VERY surprised by the sweat test. Not only did they withstand a two-hour gym session, but I actually ended up forgetting they were in my ear for a period of time. After leaving the gym and pausing my music, it hadn’t dawned on me that the headphones were still in my ear until I looked in my gym bag and the headphones weren’t on the dock. But during the actual workout, the headphones never got choppy or dropped connection, and what’s more, they didn’t build up a host of earwax in the tips which was an added bonus.
Movement Test – I started doing this after seeing plenty of reviewers of Airpods shaking their heads to see if the Airpods would fall out, so it only made sense to incorporate this into the test
In terms of movement, you can actually refer to #3 as I was able to move comfortably, even to the point of forgetting they were in my ears.
Audio Isolation – Testing to see how isolate sound can be while in your ear. Can you hear your surroundings? Can you hear the person next to you?
Since the SmartOmi boots don’t have active noise cancellation, I wasn’t truly amazed by these. Sure at high volume you won’t hear outside noise, but on a crowded train, I could still hear the elements and people around me (albeit muffled). This is a gift or curse depending on who likes that option.
Music Playlist – Testing with a variety of sounds from Daft Punk to Chance The Rapper to Adele, I put headphones through a simple test. Is the audio bad or good essentially?
This would’ve been number one, but I always save the best for last. Using Spotify as my main source of music listening, I can say the SmartOmi gives a modest listening experience at its price. At the gym I like my music to be up tempo and bass-heavy, and with these headphones, the audio obviously didn’t sound like those $300+ headphones, and I was not expecting them too, but there was something different about the actual audio quality. I’m not sure if it’s because the earbuds form a pretty secure seal around your ear canal while listening, but when paused, or even at lower volumes, you can hear head movements and gestures which might sound odd but is bothersome to me.
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