Motorola Products

I recently purchased a new set of Bluetooth stereo headphones. The product that I purchased was the Motorola S9–HD also known as MOTOROKR™ S9-HD. These headphones retail for a price between $60 and $80 but I purchased the OEM version via E-bay for about $25. When making the purchase I was skeptical, at this price I believed that they may be knockoffs.
I received the OEM headphones and compared them to a friend's pair, he had bought them retail. If these are cheap knock offs then they are almost visibly indistinguishable from the originals, they come with a Motorola branded charger, the same instruction booklet, spare ear buds and have the exact same functionality and flaws.
NotAsCoolAsItSeems.com has a product listing for this set of headphones it can be found here. In my opinion the list of product issues and problems listed there is accurate, however I will continue with this review to explain some of them in more detail and possibly suggest who these headphones are suitable for.

Some of the issues listed can be worked around or even solved, but these headphones definitely have problems and are not worth 60 to 80 dollars. After reading the review many of you may be convinced that I received a cheap counterfeit device, but all the issues listed below are actually discussed on the Motorola support forums and other review sites on the net. I think it is a quality control issue, some people love these headphones and receive a good pair that function correctly, others send them back receiving 1, 2 or even 3 replacement devices before they are satisfied.

Build
The headphones themselves are very light and are constructed of semi flexible plastic and neoprene like rubber. The battery is conveniently placed behind the head with the power button at its base. Alongside the power button is a mini USB jack, this is used for charging. The soft rubber ear bud covers come in various sizes, the largest of which can be used to cancel out noise. I find the headphones to be comfortable to wear over an extended period of time, they fit nicely over my large head and are light enough to be unobtrusive to the wearer a comparable weight to sunglasses.
I’ve been using these headphones for nearly two weeks, I have had ample time to put them through their paces and notice the minor build defects that most people would not with just a casual glance. The rubber on the interior surface of the headphones is seated into a groove. This isn’t always fixed uniformly along the full length of the headphones; this may be due to the degradation of the glue used to hold it in place. I wear these headphones for 6 to 8 hours a day in a warm climate while at work. The heat and sweat may contribute to a rapid degeneration of the glue that holds them together. This however shouldn’t excuse the fact that the rubber covering the controls on the side of the headphones partially peeled away after only one week. It didn’t come completely off but it did exposed the top few controls allowing me to see how the controls were constructed and maybe providing some insight as to why so many people are having problems with the volume control and other button functions. (this is one of the widely reported problems with the device)

The controls placed in front of each ear are surfaced with rubber. This rubber is actually only glued in place and offers no real resistance to sweat or moisture, there is a seam along the control edges through which moisture may seep. The button contacts underneath are simply two metal plates. I used a small amount of superglue to reseal the button enclosure. Please see the product entry here to understand why this is significant. Prior to the buttons edge opening the “volume up” control ceased to work, pressing it with a very slight rubbing motion restored functionality. Searching the internet you will read people discussing methods of increasing the moisture resistance of these headphones, the recommendation is to coat the headphone arms and controls with a few layers of vinyl based hair spray. I used a toothpick to run a small bead of superglue around the control enclosures seam.

Pairing And Sound Quality
After initial receipt of the product I charge it for the recommended 2 hours before use. Pairing with my Windows mobile phone was simple and the device was correctly identified. The controls to fast forward, pause, play and skip music tracks worked very well, as did increasing and decreasing the volume. The sound quality from the headphones was very good. Music and audio books are clear with ample base and sound range. The Motorola S9–HD Bluetooth headphones support S. R. S. WoW however changing between the two available modes is done by holding down the track advance button until you hear a tone. Depending on the device this may just result in the track fast forwarding as it does on most windows mobile based media players. In the event that this occurs you can change the settings of your media player to get the same effect. The headphones get top marks for sound quality.
I found leaving the paired device in a stationary position on a table or bench resulted in very few dropouts, the ones that occurred were usually a result of walking too far away. Due to the nature of my work I use an arm band to hold my phone while paired to the headphones. This is actually what Motorola recommends. Motorola recommends placing your paired device in a position above the waist. In this configuration I have never had a drop out. In order to fully test the pairing capabilities I place my phone in its case and attached it to my belt. In this position the phone and Bluetooth headphones experience multiple dropouts regardless of whether it was placed on the front or the back of my belt.

Device Freeze
At one point I accidentally turned the headphones off, then back on again very rapidly. This resulted in the device freezing. The indicator light at the back was illuminated, but none of the controls or buttons would work. The headphones would not pair with other devices, produce sound and more importantly they would not turn off. I thought they were broken. This is also a problem which has been reported by many consumers to the Motorola support forum and other review sites. The fix for this issue is to just let the battery drain completely and then recharge it for 2 hours. After which it should function correctly.

Battery Life
Motorola claims the battery life of up to 7 hours talk time and six days standby time. In my experience I achieve on average 7 to 8 hours of continuous music listening from a single charge. The standby time however has only ever reached three days.
 

Taking Phone Calls
On receiving an incoming call the music automatically pauses allowing you to answer and talk. After the call completes music will automatically resume. The microphone implementation however is poor. After testing I realise that the Bluetooth profile wasn’t automatically changing from the streaming music Bluetooth profile to the hands free profile. This means that the microphone is not activated. To test the microphone I paired the headset with my phone but without the streaming capability, I then use it to make a phone call with the microphone working.
Audio received from the phone is very clear with a decent volume but there is a noticeable delay in the audio transferred to the phone (when you speak), it may cut off the first one or two words you say. The volume of the microphone is acceptable, but the delay and the fact that the profile doesn’t automatically change to/activate the microphone is not. I would not recommend this as a hands free solution. Many callers may confuse the inactive microphone with a low microphone volume level (people can still hear you via the phones own mic)

Conclusion
Although this review probably seems overly harsh, I have to say that I actually like these headphones. I primarily use them to listen to audio while at work and for this they’re very good. They do sound great.

Play, pause, fast forward, skip track and all the other controls work adequately.

 I could have spent $25.00 on a wired set of headphones or $25.00 on these with the extra functions and lack of wires. If you want to listen to music with a media player and can find them for this price I would recommend them for music listeners and light exercise. They are not however worth anymore than this, nearly every review I have read mentions at least one or two of the issues I have stated above. If you are looking for a hands free solution for your mobile phone I would suggest finding a different product.

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