Get a FREE fully-working copy of Steganos Security Suite 7 (worth £49.99) when you sign up to the Practical PC Newsletter. Review: Jabra GN5035 multimedia USB headphones
Iain Laskey Finds these headphones ideal for both gaming and Skype
| Product | GN5035 |
|---|---|
| Company | Jabra |
| Web | www.jabra.co.uk |
| Price | Around £25 |
| We like | Sound quality, long cable, remote control |
| We don't like | Remote too far down the cable |
| Rating | 9/10 |
| Requirements |
For anyone who makes a lot of calls Skype is a wonderful things assuming the person they are calling is also on Skype. Even calls to people with normal telephones can be done cheaply and easily, especially when used in conjunction with Skype's ability to embed links in web pages within your browser allowing you to call a number on a web site just by clicking on it.
Of course, such activities do require some sort of speaker and microphone arrangement on your PC and in most cases, it's far easier to make use of one of the huge range of headphone and microphone combinations out there.
Jabra have a range of products in this area but here we're looking at their GN5035 model which is well priced at around £25 or less but boasts a noise cancelling microphone, 40mm speaker units for extended bass and a remote control on its USB cable.
Installation on XP and Vista was a breeze, just plug and play with no drivers needed. The remote control allows you to adjust Window's audio volume level as well as providing a mute button for privacy if needed.
In use the headphones proved extremely comfortable over prolonged periods of time. The headband felt slightly odd initially as one band moves inside the other but once on, the soft cups provided just the right amount of pressure.
We liked the generous length of the cable but felt the remote was a bit too far away from the headphone end and we often ended up hunting down the cable for it rather than finding it easily to hand. Unlike volume controls in a normal cable which often provide their own attenuation, a USB based device has to work directly with the PC so if you have the Windows audio applet open, the sliders move up and down as you adjust the level. For ease of storage, the headphone cups can be rotated making the whole thing much flatter which was a nice touch.
Sound Quality
We initially tried the Jabra GN5035's with Skype on both Skype to Skype and Skype to landline calls, we found the sound quality more than acceptable with a nice warm yet detailed output. The people the other end reported that the sound quality was good for them too giving the noise cancelling microphone the thumbs up as well.
We next tried listening to CDs and MP3s and playing games, mainly Bioshock. The sound was again very enjoyable with particularly good stereo imaging, especially with games. Bioshock certainly caused more than a few jumps when voices appeared all around us with a level of realism not always found elsewhere. Whilst not up there with proper HiFi headphones, we were surprised just how pleasant these could sound across a range of musical types and certainly far better than they had any right to be at the price.
Conclusion
If you want a good multimedia headset for chatting online or even just for game playing without upsetting the rest of the family, we think you'll be happy with the Jabra GN5035 multimedia headset. They sound good, have a decent length of cable and generously sport a 2 year warranty. Unless you're set on a wireless solution, these are an excellent choice for all your multimedia audio needs.
