Doppler Labs launched the Here One truly wireless smart earbuds in Singapore today at a media launch at the We The People Kickstarter Store in Millenia Walk. 

It was a fitting location given its origins. We actually reviewed their first commercially available and Kickstarter-backed product back in Aug 2016. That was called the Here Active Listening System . It did not play music. Instead, they delivered an audio augmented reality experience. 

And today, Here One is their next generation product that still maintains the AR experience fusing it with listening to music. Let's check out what the Here One offers.

Type - Truly Wireless In-Ears
Price - USD 299 / SGD 459

What's The Big Deal?
The specs are quite comparable with its truly wireless peers. We're looking at buds of a 12g weight that can last for 2 hours playback. There's a charging case that offers 3 more rounds of charge for the buds. 

However, these are not a pair of run of the mill earphones. To do the Here One justice, we'll focus on what differentiates these buds from the rest.

1. Smart Noise Cancellation
Doppler Labs' buds incorporate what they term as Real-World Sound Control that allows the ability to dynamically increase / decrease specific sound types. For example, you can suppress the ambient sound of a plane's engine or if somehow you want to increase it, you sure can. This is controllable through their app. This is quite different from traditional active noise cancelation (ANC) where all ambient sounds are lowered.

2. Speech Enhancement
You can reduce background noise and amplify human speech. For example, you can enhance a nearby conversation.

3. Machine Learning
Interestingly, the machine learning engine behind the buds, called Smart Suggest, is able to use your location, past use and preferences to provide suggestions. If you're in a subway, the app will supposedly push a suggested sound profile for your approval. 

Sophia Velastegui, Chief Product Officer of Doppler Labs presenting the Here One features.

Who Is It For?
The most obvious usage is for folks who listen to music but at the same time can conveniently double the device as a hearing aid. 

Pricing And Availability
The Here One is priced at USD 299 / SGD 459. 

If you are in the US, they are currently available through their online store. 
If you are in Singapore, they are available from 5 May at selected retailers including truewireless.sg.  

Doppler Labs, LRT and We The People teams striking a pose.

The Apple AirPods need practically no introduction. These were the truly wireless earbuds that were introduced to much fanfare last September as loads of folks anticipated their entry into the Apple ecosystem. And since then, they finally hit the shops around Dec 2016 and there have been a load of reviews on these.

Now what makes it interesting is to see how these fare against the world! Ok, what we mean is how they compare with its truly wireless earbud peers. 

But first, let's review them. A trip to Holiday Villa Johor Bahru provided a good occasion to test the buds and a spot to take some shots! 

Read - Advent of Truly Wireless Earbuds

Type - Truly Wireless Earphones 
Price - USD 159 / EUR 179 / SGD 238

Pros (+): Supremely comfortable fit; Simple to use; Great battery life.
Cons (-): Non-existent noise isolation

In The Box
The Apple AirPods unsurprisingly come in one color combination - white. That's classic iPod gloss white if you want specifics. 

In typical Apple style, the box is incredibly sturdy and sized at a compact 99 x 99 x 34 mm, ideal for two things - cutting on shipping costs and hardy enough to pass drop tests (not that we tried :). 

The unboxing is like what you'd expect from an Apple product - impeccably neat and premium. The top lid pops upward to reveal a booklet with the distinctive line - Designed by Apple in California. 

Lifting this away will showcase the AirPods charging case nicely wrapped in a protective sleeve.

Popping out the packaging contents, we get:

• Apple AirPods
• Charging Case
• Charging Cable (USB to Lightning)
• User Guides

Design
The Apple AirPods come adorned in signature iPod gloss white and both earbuds weigh 8g, marginally lighter than the Samsung Gear IconX (12g) and Bragi The Headphone (12.5g). What differentiates these from other truly wireless buds is its long cylindrical side that that the other manufacturers clearly do not have. One practical benefit is the earbud weight is more evenly distributed, as the battery takes up the bulk of the space within. And of course, it makes it easier for the buds to be removed / inserted.

If you are familar with the default buds (EarPods) that come with your iPhone, you'll find that the overall AirPods aesthetic is much the same. General differences include the subtraction of the cable (obviously), dual optical sensors and a chrome edge at the bottom complete with a microphone. We'll talk more on their purpose in the Features section.

Charging Case:
The case measures a petite 44 x 21 x 54mm and doubles up as a charger when the buds are stored within. It's nicely styled and its magnetic clasp allows it to shut reassuringly.

Features
While the Apple AirPods look seemingly basic, they are anything but. Once you poke your nose into what they have to offer, you'll realize that there's a myriad of features awaiting especially if you're an iOS user. 

Playback / Voice Commands:
While there are no physical buttons on the AirPods, you can actually double tap the exterior of either earbud to enable a function depending on phone you are using.

• Siri devices - This activates Siri so you can give voice commands to control playback (eg. turn up the volume) or useful information (give directions / weather check). When calls come in, you can pick them and if you find Siri annoying, you can go to the settings to render a double tap as a play / pause function. 
• Other devices - There's a singular function - double tapping the exterior of the buds will play / pause music playback. This is arguably more useful than sending voice commands in a packed train with others staring at you quizzically.

Automatic Ear Detection:
The AirPods can detect when they are slotted into your ears thanks to dual optical sensors on each bud. You can even test out their effectiveness by double tapping the side of the bud when covering the sensors with your fingers vs removing your fingers. Even if you cover just one of the two optical sensors, the AirPods take it that the earbuds are not inside your ear.  

• iOS - On your iPhone, music will pause when you take both buds out of your ears. They will pause and resume playback if a single bud is removed. If you want music to continue even if you remove the buds, you can disable this in the AirPods Settings.
• Android - The play resume / pause function doesn't work when using an Android like what I tested with the Sony Xperia XA. However, there's no way to accidentally double tap the earbud when they are not in your ears.

Chilling with the AirPods at the Holiday Villa infinity pool

Pairing:
If you're used to the manual way of Bluetooth pairing, the AirPods offers a refreshingly simpler method of connecting to your music device (at least if you're in the Apple ecosystem).

• iOS 10.2 / watchOS3 / MacOS Sierra Devices - Apple's W1 chip may sound like a fancy marketing name but pairing is where you begin to discover its usefulness. All you need to do is open the AirPods charging case next to your device and there will be a setup prompt on your screen. It's that easy.   
• Other Devices - If you have another product like an Android phone, you'll need to manually pair via Bluetooth. Turn on your phone Bluetooth, pop open the charging case, select 'AirPods' and you're good to go.

Tip - If you have difficulties in pairing, insert the AirPods back into the case and hold the circular Setup button on the back of the case until the LED starts to flash white. You can then restart the pairing process. 

Status Light Notifications:
The status light LED is only found inside the charging case between the two buds. The charge status reflects the AirPods if one / both are inserted else it will show the Case status. Here's an idea what they indicate. 

• Green - Fully charged
• Amber - Not fully charged / Charging in progress if USB cable connected
• Amber (blinking) - You may need to setup AirPods again
• White (blinking) - Pairing mode

Sound Notifications
There are no voice notifications though there will be tones to indicate when the AirPods are successfully connected to your music device or when the charge in the buds is low.

Microphones:
There are two microphones on each earbud. If you notice the bottom of the AirPods, there is a chrome edge and within it is one of the microphones. The second is a small circular hole located on the outside of the earbud.

Apple does inject some hype about two beam-forming microphones. What does 'beam-forming' mean? You can actually read more on this over here. For the AirPods, the purpose of the beam-forming microphones is to extract voice input from ambient noise so the AirPods user is able to speak loud and clear to the recipient of a phone call. 

App Support:

• iOS - It would not be accurate to say that the AirPods have no app support. In fact, the support is integrated with iOS 10. If you pop the AirPods charging case open, a prompt will initiate from your iPhone and settings can be configured accordingly. The good thing is the AirPods firmware can be updated. Most recent is from 3.3.1 to 3.5.1 on Feb 1, 2017. Any significant change? Can't really tell from our end though feel free to buzz if you find something. 
• Android - There's no dedicated app for Android though to be fair, Apple never did mention such compatibility on the packaging.

Performance

Sound Quality:
The Apple AirPods sound quality is quite decent, that is if you do your listening in a relatively quiet environment. I was feeling nostalgic so I decided to give a listen to Kitaro. If that name does not ring a bell, Kitaro is a Japanese artist that specializes in epic instrumental music (some call it 'new age'). He made an equally epic performance compiled in the Live In America (1991) album and with that, I tried his magnum opus, Matsuri. The treble comes out not quite sparkling but nonetheless clearer than many in-ears while bass from the drums came out reasonably well. I reckon these aren't sealed in-ears which likely contribute to the drop in the impact of the low frequencies. 

Calls:
Making a few calls, I did a sound check in several locations of incremental ambient noise level. One was in at the Holiday Villa JB infinity pool with a few folks splashing around (low ambient sound) and another was in the heart of KSL Mall (high ambient sound). In those locations, I checked how well the recipient could hear me and the result was positive - they could hear me loud n clear, despite the noisy crowds in the second instance. 

Noise Isolation:
Like the EarPods, noise isolation is non existent. Environmental sounds aren't filtered at all and basically, you can safely listen to music while jogging. The flipside is when you're commuting, all the ambient sound from the trains will hit you so you'll have to increase the volume quite a bit to appreciate the sound.

Fit:
This was probably the most comfortable pair of truly wireless buds tested. When slotted in and when the music paused, there were moments where I actually forgot there was something in my ears.

Charging:
To charge the AirPods, all you have to do is slot them in the Charging Case and they are magnetically latched within. If you're wondering how it works, there are two contact points deep inside the two holes of the case that link with the chrome edge of the AirPods to initiate charging.

A full charge of the AirPods through the Lightning cable will provide 5 hours playback / 2 hours talk time while a quick charge of 15 minutes will get you 3 hours / over 1 hour talk time. The charging case states 398mAh of power so we're going to make a guess that that's the total power within the case only. If you use the full capacity of the case in tandem with the AirPods, Apple claims you can get up to 24 hours playback / 11 hours talk time. 

Update (6 June 2017):
I decided to completely drain both the buds + case just to check the charge times. Here are the results based on charging through a MacBook Air USB port. As you can see, the charging speed of the buds is really fast. 
Charging Case (100%) - 1h 25min
AirPods (80%) - 15min 
AirPods (100%) - 22min

Putting all these figures in perspective and considering just the buds at full charge, the playback on the AirPods last above the average. They come up short against Bragi The Headphone (6 hours) but easily edge the feature-filled Samsung Gear IconX (1.5 hours) and Erato Apollo 7 (3 hours). 


Overall
The Apple AirPods are a great pair of truly wireless earbuds to own. They are really comfortable to wear and sound drop offs that some truly wireless in-ears unfortunately have are not experienced in these buds. Now noise isolation may be non-existent and options are limited for Android users but if you are a user of Apple products, the AirPods is certainly a convenient, reliable and stylish option for consideration.




Apple AirPods and Truly wireless earbuds compared

In a subsequent part, we will look at a comparison between some of the best truly wireless earbuds in the market. We will look at some of them within the same price range such as the Apple AirPods, Samsung Gear IconX and Bragi The Headphone. 

Stay tuned!

Where To Buy
The Apple AirPods are available from the Apple Online Store and take a 6 week turnaround to deliver.

Credit to Apple for an evaluation unit.

Razer is a well known name among hardcore PC gamers. In the process of developing and innovating in the gaming mice and keyboards domain, they have also been constantly polishing products in the audio category. April 2017 saw the launch of the Razer Hammerhead BT, a wireless follow up to their Hammerhead Pro V2. Let's check out what this offers. 

Type - Wireless In-Ears 
Price - USD 99 / GBP 99 / SGD 169

Hammerhead BT vs Hammerhead Pro V2
Now before we check out what these wireless buds offer, we do a quick comparison with the Pro V2 to see a quick (and rough) summary of the differences. 

1. Wireless vs Wired
This is a no brainer but still necessitates a mention :) The 130cm cable of the Pro V2 is now a much shorter 63cm that now rests around your neck. 

2. Shirt Clip / Battery Unit
The battery unit lies in the middle of the cable connecting the buds. You can connect them with a shirt clip that you magnetically latch onto your shirt. 

3. General Aesthetics
The cables are now striped green and black instead of pure green. And with the added power, the BT is marginally heftier at 28g while the wired Pro V2 weighs 20g. 


In A Nutshell
Here are 3 points that tell summarize the Razer Hammerhead BT's capabilities:

1. Bassy Sound
The Razer Hammerhead BT boasts 10mm drivers that are aimed at 'Hammering In The Bass'. If its predecessor is anything to go by, you can expect an emphasis on low frequencies. Bassheads will likely love this.

2. Battery Unit (Where Is It?)
For wireless in-ears, many manufacturers usually implement the battery unit either in the earbud piece (like the Bose SoundSport Wireless) or on the in-line remote (such as the Jaybird Freedom Wireless). Razer has taken a different approach. As mentioned earlier, they actually placed the battery unit in the middle of the cable. When combined with the shirt clip, this potentially reduces the microphonics. Oh, and the battery lasts a very decent 8 hours. 

3. Signature Lights!
Razer's signature lighting glow found on their gaming mice can now be found on its in-ear earphones. There's a green pulsating glow from the Razer logo on the outer earbuds during usage and this turns red when charging. Very nice. Now where's the Chroma earphone variant?

Packaging Contents
Taking the contents out, you get the:

• Razer Hammerhead BT
• Shirt Clip
• 4 x Silicon Tips (S / M / L / M double-flange)
• Charging Cable (USB to micro-USB)
• Carrying Pouch
• User Guides

Target Buyers
Bassheads who want a pair of edgier looking wireless buds that still look great.

Pricing and Availability
The Razer Hammerhead BT goes for USD 99 / GBP 99 / SGD 169. 
They are available worldwide from razerstore.com. 

Alternatively, if you liked what you read, do feel free to support us by buying from  Amazon through this affiliate link. 

Sony is no stranger to waterproof earbuds. They continually refine their products as we see here today with their new NW-WS623 Walkman (SGD 199). While it looks practically the same as the WS413 that we reviewed last year, they added a long-desired feature called (*drumroll*) Bluetooth! Here are our first impressions.


What's the Big Deal?

1. Bluetooth
Damn right. While it's a feature that's in practically every wireless pair of earphones, the previous iteration did not need it as there was 4GB of memory built within to use when swimming. However, Bluetooth is always a good to have feature especially if you enjoy jogging while streaming from Spotify. These earbuds can link to your phone through NFC too.

2. The Best Features Remain
Generally, the noteworthy features of its predecessor remain for the WS623. It's a 32 gram unit with a 12 hour battery life and an ambient sound mode that allows you to toggle between good noise isolation and keeping in touch with environmental sounds. It's still waterproof and dustproof and looks mighty decent.

3. Earbuds Provided
Like its predecessor, the WS623 does not skimp on earbuds. There's 8 pairs of buds - 4 pairs for swimming purposes (a silicon layer covers the hole where music is channeled) and 4 for conventional usage. Oh, and they're all color coded to prevent confusion.


Pricing and Availability
Sony NW-WS623 (4GB) - This will be available from Sony Stores worldwide in May 2017 for USD 148 / SGD 199. The colors will be Lime Green / Blue / Grayish White / Black.

Sony NW-WS625 (16GB) - This looks the same as the WS623. The difference is its increased storage and the addition of a remote commander that can be fit on your finger. Instead of adjusting the controls located around your head, you just hit the control on your finger. Together, it goes for USD 198.

Who's It For?
This Sony WS623 is SGD 50 more than the WS413 but you'll have to consider your expected usage to see if it makes sense. If you swim lots, the WS413 is quite sufficient but if you reckon you spend more time streaming music from your phone for normal usage like jogging / commuting, the WS623 is hands down the unit to choose from. 

27 Apr - News Release - B&O Play launches the ultraportable Beoplay P2 wireless speakers. Below is its corresponding press release.

Update (17 July 2017)
Here's our review of the B&O Beoplay P2.

And if you don't have time to read it, here are 3 points to summarize what the P2 is about:

1. Fits in the Palm of Your Hand
If you wanted a smaller footprint than the BeoPlay A1 and A2 Active, then the Beoplay P2 (140 x 80 x 28mm) weighing 275 grams might just do the trick. Ideal for music on the go.

2. One Button. Tap and Shake Controls.
The one button on the bottom is for power. All other playback controls to play and skip tracks can be activated by tapping / shaking and if you want more customization, you can check out the Beoplay app.

3. Affordability
This is B&O Play's smallest speaker yet and its most affordable too at USD 169 / SGD 259. 


==Press Release==
Double tap on the anodized aluminum grill to play or pause music. Shake to skip a track. Beoplay P2 is an intelligent and unapologetically beautiful portable speaker that easily slips into your bag or pocket to take anywhere – always ready to amplify moments with goosebump-inducing Bang & Olufsen Signature Sound. 

B&O PLAY continues to empower the transformation of everyday moments with the introduction of Beoplay P2. Beoplay P2 is the smallest and most intelligent member of the B&O PLAY range of wireless Bluetooth speakers and is designed by award-winning Cecilie Manz for a spontaneous and spirited approach to life. It comes in premium materials such as pearl-blasted aluminium and real leather, with customizable and intuitive control features via Beoplay App and, despite its minimal footprint, renowned Bang & Olufsen sound engineers have packed Beoplay P2 with power and stamina to punch out the rich, clear and crisp sound that you would expect from a B&O PLAY speaker. 

“Music plays a big part in amplifying everyday moments, so we made a personal speaker that you don’t want to leave your home without. Beoplay P2 is a stunning piece of Danish design, a study in stupendous craftsmanship and the accumulation of 90 years in sound and acoustics with a sound quality that is second to none in this category”, says Director of Concept and Design in B&O PLAY Matthias F. Ørum-Hansen. 

“We decided to remove all switches and buttons for a beautiful exterior and a simple and magical user experience that can be customized in Beoplay App. With just a double tap or shake, you can play, pause and skip track, launch your favourite personal assistant, change sound profile in ToneTouch and you can set up Beoplay App to wake you up with the same music that concluded a beautiful evening - reliving your latest goosebump moment as you wake up and get ready to chase the next”. 

A highly tactile and refined appearance 
Like a pebble you find on the beach, the appearance of Beoplay P2 is rounded, smooth and desirable and fits perfectly in the palm of your hand. A basic geometrical shape with a defined rim separates the pearl-blasted anodized aluminum top from the soft and warm polymer that make up the underside. The curvature of Beoplay P2 has undergone endless fine tuning to give it a highly tactile and refined appearance. The perfect shape to slip easily into a pocket or bag with a genuine leather strap to add an extra layer of portability. 








The Beoplay P2 Sleeve is available for a suggested retail price of USD 39 / GBP 29 / SGD price is to be confirmed.

The Beoplay P2 is also available on Amazon for USD 169.

Update (17 July 2017)

Read on for our review of the B&O Beoplay P2.