Before I found the worth of Tribit’s XFree Go headphones, which wasn’t supplied till weeks after the product confirmed up, I used to be pondering they’d retail for $100—or perhaps $80 given Tribit’s penchant for low-ball pricing. In my guide, they sound each bit pretty much as good because the Sony set I take advantage of regularly.
Discovering that they had been promoting on Amazon for simply $25 was darn surprising. I’ve by no means heard a worthwhile headset priced lower than $50, not to mention one which sounds pretty much as good as this. But then I began watching films.
This evaluation is a part of TechHive’s protection of the best headphones, the place you’ll discover critiques of competing merchandise, plus a purchaser’s information to the options it is best to take into account when buying.
A showstopper of a flaw
I shortly found a serious drawback: The XFree Go grew to become unresponsive after a comparatively brief interval of sustained use. They’d nonetheless produce sound, so long as the Bluetooth connection remained, however I couldn’t alter the amount and even flip them off. There was no indicator LED, no nuthin’.
The solely manner I might unfreeze them was to plug them again into an AC outlet and wait. I don’t know if each XFree Go suffers this glitch or if a brand new manufacturing run will repair the issue. Thinking I simply bought a faulty unit, I had the corporate ship me a alternative—which suffered from the exact same drawback. That tells me the problem could possibly be frequent and even common. I’ll revisit this evaluation—and my verdict—if Tribit can ship me a pair that doesn’t exhibit the flaw; however for now, caveat emptor.
I don’t understand how huge this mannequin’s head is, however I discovered the Tribit XFree Go to be a good match.
Design and options
The set I examined had been black with painted silver highlights. Painted usually means cheap-looking, however that’s not the case right here. The XFree Go received’t woo audiophiles or fashion professionals, however their look definitely belies the worth.
That stated, I do have one minor criticism in regards to the design: The versatile metallic band didn’t appear to have fairly the circumference to span my not significantly massive, however not significantly small melon. The prime and ear pads are snug, however the general match appears only a bit tight. This will seemingly enhance with use because the {hardware} will get damaged in.
Surprisingly—once more, due to the worth—the Tribit XFree Go makes use of Qualcomm’s newest Bluetooth 5.0 chipset. There’s a micro-USB port for charging, in addition to multi-function buttons for energy/pairing/reply/hold up, volume-up/next-track and quantity down/previous-track. Other capabilities, comparable to invoking Siri and clearing pairings, are completed with totally different combos of buttons and the size of time stated buttons are held down.
Tribit’s XFree Go’s are decently snug, however appear designed for smaller heads than the creator’s.
As you might need divined from the outline above, the XFree Go can be utilized for telephone calls. There’s a mic above the standing mild for simply such events. Tribit ships the XFree Go with a helpful carrying case, a USB charging cable, and a 3.5mm-to-3.5mm cable for wired use.
Sound, consolation, and run time
I’m choosy about sound; as a former ravenous musician, nonetheless, I’m not silly about it both. Stylish packaging (Tribit’s is fairly okay) and velvet carry luggage imply little to me.
In this case I used to be fooled by the dearth of brand-name recognition and worth; and man, did my eyebrows go up once I performed the primary track on the XFree Go. I merely was not anticipating what I heard, even at my imagined $100 price ticket. The audio of us at Tribit know their stuff.
What all meaning is that I discovered not one of the tinny, frequency-challenged nonsense you get from most low-end headphones. Instead, I heard decently outlined mid-range, some precise top-end, and most excellently tuned bass. The low frequencies don’t tread in Sony Extra Bass territory—which is mainly like having subwoofer—however they’re definitely thumpy sufficient for the overwhelming majority of musical-reproduction situations.
The Tribit XFree Go include a helpful carrying case.
I put the XFree Go’s by way of the standard melange of musical types, from classical, to rock, to digital dance music, to rap/hip-hop. It handed muster on all counts, although as I stated, should you’re searching for subwoofer-like bass, you received’t discover it right here.
With low-latency Bluetooth onboard, the XFree Go are completely tremendous for watching films with out dialog lag. I did fairly a little bit of that and found that whereas this headset doesn’t really feel tremendous snug at first blush, there was no long-term irritation. I went by way of a few flicks with out it bothering me. As I stated, they nonetheless produce sound even after the controls lock up.
Runtime for the 400mAh battery was about as marketed, and you will get at the very least a film’s price from a fast cost (Tribit claims 4 hours after solely 10 minutes on the AC—about so long as it takes so that you can stand up and make extra popcorn.
A particular bummer
If not for the lock-up concern, I’d give Tribit extra love for transport such good-quality audio gear for such low costs (see my Tribit Stormbox Mini evaluation). Here’s hoping the ultra-low price ticket on this case isn’t merely a case of the corporate dumping faulty stock
All that apart, I’d have awarded the XFree Go at the very least twice as many stars if not for the control-freeze drawback. And to be truthful, the XFree Go are completely usable in lots of conditions regardless of that bug. Still, as tempting as the worth is, I can’t advocate a product that has controls that freeze up. And that’s a drag. They actually do sound nice.