OVERVIEW: Croise. R PBH-200 from Partron - heaped Korean Bluetooth-headset with excellent sound
Devices Medgadgets / / December 19, 2019
What a Partron? What a Croise?
Partron - a major Korean electronics B2B-producer, supplying components for all kinds of art throughout the world. The company mainly produces parts, rather than the end products, and therefore virtually unknown to the general consumer. Croise - this B2C-brand Partron, the same components are assembled into finished products: smart bracelets and accessories Croise. E and Croise. A, as well as wireless headphones headsets Croise. R.
Design and execution
Croise. R PBH-200 made in a rather unusual form factor.
The base is a resilient plastic rim anatomical shape, which rests freely on the neck. Non-removable thin wires from the rim end miniature vacuum-plugs headphones with interchangeable tips in three sizes.
From an aesthetic point of view, the disputed structure and causes conflicting emotions. One person asked, "Why do I make the headphones with a horse collar?" Someone kind of design, on the contrary, I liked. In general, the appearance - it's always vkusovschina and subjectivity, but from a practical point of view, the cervical rim has advantages over classic.
Almost the entire mass is concentrated in the rim of the device and presses in the head or ears and on the neck, to which 38.9 grams - nothing. Due to the width of the rim and the anatomical shape of these grams are evenly distributed over a large area, which is why Croise. R PBH-200 did not felt.
Of course, not without marketing. The manufacturer claims some superelasticity adaptive "superalloy", which remembers the shape of the neck. In fact, nothing I have not noticed. He just flexible and more inclined to preserve the original form, rather than to any permanent deformation.
Due to a shift in the bulk of the rim, headphones, earplugs seem virtually weightless and have such a compact profile that can be seen in the ear, but when viewed from the side.
The increased size of the rim is a large surface area and the ability to make larger control buttons. They are easy to find and easy to press by hand.
Battery and protection
Zasheynoe location allows you to do more than the rim so that it fits over various things, such as increased battery at 195 mAh, which is honest practice pulls 11:00 (not least due to the energy-efficient Bluetooth 4.1) of continuous music playback when declared by the manufacturer 12 hours. To charge such a battery will need about 1.5 hours using the adapter on the computer A or 1 or 40-60 minutes using an adapter 2 A.
Headphones Charging occurs through the port microUSB, hermetically sealed lining. The product description says nothing about protection from moisture and dust, but, judging by the presence of protective elements in the design, you can engage in sports and perspire in these headphones.
Features
If you bring the earphone close to the recess at the end of the rim, it primagnititsya and will not hang out when not listening to music.
The idea is sound, but the implementation is not the best. Initially there earphone in the blind recess is problematic.
Among other things, the rim Croise. R PBH-200 is the vibration motor - a very cool thing for headphones. Firstly, it is automatically activated when the distance from a smartphone that can be useful forgetful and careless people lose things. Secondly, it duplicates the motor built into the smartphone and alerts on calls, messages and so on. Even if headphones are not in the ears, you still learn about a new event, feel the vibration of the rim.
I met a decent number of headsets with a microphone problem. It is a question not even adverse scenarios such as running or talking in strong winds. It so happens that the only deshovenky microphone located not the best way, is not doing its basic functions. In Croise body. R PBH-200 is built just two microphones, working with the support of CVC technology from the CSR, which swallowed Qualcomm last year.
The main purpose of CVC - detection and suppression of unwanted ambient sounds. In practice, the technology was working. External noise, whether it's crowded mall or passing next to cars while talking on the street, are filtered out. Not completely, but with tangible difference to the interlocutor.
Another interesting feature Croise. R PBH-headphone 200 is the ability to connect to two devices simultaneously. I'm always playing something from the Google Play Music, it is often a need to watch something with the sound on a laptop, without disturbing others. Regular headset, in such cases, had to first turn off the mobile, then pairing with a computer, disconnect it from the computer again, and pairing with a mobile. Now, enough to put music in your phone to pause and then Croise. R PBH-200 themselves pick up sound when you start with the laptop. It is very comfortable.
Now you need to tell us about the most difficult. To explain the sound quality of the text - the one more task, but I will try. Perhaps the most striking feature of the positive Croise. R PBH-200 - a good uniformity of sound "out of the box", that is, without EQ with witchcraft, which is caused by a preset in accordance with the curves of Robinson and Dutson.
Less obvious, but no less important advantage is a preset reduction in the risk of hearing loss when listening to music at high levels for a long time.
Classic subjective tests, like the thoughtful listening-remastered version of Bohemian Rhapsody, headphones have been fine, but brought a special joy really roaring gitarki in heavier genres, such as music I like most and Metallica in my playlist happens more often than Freddy.
Technology is not for everyone
It is necessary to clarify another important point, which is at the same time seems both funny and sad. The fact that Croise. R PBH-200 adapted aptX codec (design all the same CSR), capable of transmitting music via Bluetooth as comparable to CD.
Manufacturer proudly reports about it, but forget to clarify that the support should not only aptX headphones, but also smart.
I'm really happy purity and authenticity Croise sound. R PBH-200, although my Nexus 5X, as it turned out, not friends with aptX.
The problem with sound quality estimate that 90% of people do not feel the difference and 90% of the remaining 10% "Professional students" fail elementary blind test to distinguish one from the codec's ability to another.
Of course, synthetic sound aptX analysis confirms the superiority over the conventional and most common the SBC codec, but the average person will likely not be able to see this even in the presence of a suitable smartphone.
The second disappointment I experienced when trying to install a special Android-based application for monitoring and management Croise. R PBH-200.
In theory, it can be used to change the backlight and alert, take pictures on the camera button on the smartphone headphones, and convert incoming text messages in the voice service using Text To Speech. Unfortunately, Nexus 5X has not appeared on the list of supported devices application that looks rather strange, given the benchmark conventional smartphone from Google.
in total
If you do not care about the look and feel you are looking at audio equipment solely in terms of sound quality and price ratio, then Croise. R PBH-200 is definitely worth your attention. For 4000 rubles these headphones provide excellent sound, which can become even better in the presence of smartphone support aptX. Do not doubt the convenience of wearing Croise. R PBH-200, they sit better than you might think, and for a long time work on a single charge. Single repulsive factor in this case may be too unusual design.
Layfhaker thanks online store Medgadgets.ru for providing the test device.