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- First reviewOctober 7, 2015
- Last reviewOctober 7, 2015
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kayaker2001's Reviews
Listen to your playlist wherever you go with these Skullcandy Smokin' Buds 2 S2PGHW-177 in-ear wireless headphones, which feature Bluetooth capability and a built-in remote to control your music. The removable flex collar lets you customize your style.
Posted by: kayaker2001
from CT
These are brand new and only available at Best Buy, right now, so I hadn't found any reviews and decided to take a chance. The instructions are sparse - a big folded sheet of paper with an annotated picture and terse descriptions of various functions... in a bazillion languages, but it's not hard to figure out how to use them.
For me, the fit is pretty good, no complaints there, but I find the controls a bit hard to use. The buttons work different than those on my iPhone earbuds. For example, on these, to skip to the next track you press and hold the volume up button for about 5 seconds - which is a bit awkward, especially while running. More bothersome, the buttons are enclosed in a thick gummy plastic/rubber, which gives much less tactile feedback than the crisp buttons on other earbuds.
As far as the sound quality, I think it's pretty good - crisp and balanced, with no hiss. The Bluetooth delay is minimal, so watching videos isn't a problem. The bass is OK, but not overwhelming. I guess many people might think it's a bit weak, but seems OK to me. But here's the first problem... they're just not loud enough. Now I'm NOT one to blast my ears, so it's not that I'm expecting 100 decibels out of them, but on many tracks, I have them maxed out and it's JUST at that "loud enough but really could be louder" volume. On other tracks (recorded "hotter" it seems), it's fine, and I can actually turn them down a few ticks. All in all, though, if this was the only issue I'd be pretty happy with them.
Here's the bigger issue, though. They don't seem to play well with others. If I'm wearing them around the house, I get very few dropouts. Maybe one quarter second dropout every 5 or 10 minutes - which is tolerable, I think. But if I wear these around other Bluetooth devices, they stutter all the time. I figured I'd field test this by walking through Costco this past weekend. It was unbearable. Any time I got closer than a few feet from other people (presumably with cell phones) the earbuds would cut out multiple times a minute. Passing through a crowd, they went nuts. More importantly, this interference issue also keeps me from using them for my primary intended purpose. I wanted to wear them running (I'm getting to really hate my earbud cord when I run), but I'm also wearing a wireless/Bluetooth heart rate monitor (Wahoo Tickr Run), and they just don't work well together. When listening to music, the earbuds constantly skips. I've tested the HRM with the Bluetooth receiver in my car, and it works fine, so it's definitely these earbuds and not the HRM or HRM's phone app.
So, if you think you don't need the extra volume, and don't use them much around other Bluetooth devices, they're great. But the ones I bought (maybe a lemon, I don't know) just don't cut it. I'm pretty sure I'll return them.
My Best Buy number: 0753242177
No, I would not recommend this to a friend.
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