BoneTalker ADDER Bone Conduction Headphone
It has been a while since I did a proper equipment review. I have a new chum, that I met through the world of Chinese slingshots (see https://www.slingshotworld.co.uk) who is also a marketeer with a technology company or two in Shenzen. He sent me these headphones just to look at, no money changed hands…nor am I on any affiliate thing…but this does look like great way forwards for the site. Direct from China but with a crucial quality filter to get at the more interesting and high quality tech. These were a first for me.
Manufacturer: “Bonetalker” – Zhongshan Shesheng Eletronics Co., Ltd
Website: www.bonetalker.com
Typical Selling price: $79
SCORES
Sound Quality
Deeply surprising, not ‘HiFi’ but very high quality detail. 7
Build Quality
Beautifully solid, with flexible parts and good feeling controls. 10
Comfort
They grip your cheekbones to work yet I forgot I had them on! 8
Bluetooth Quality
Unwavering signal strength and impressive fifty-feet range. 10
Value For Money
All of the functionality of the fancy brand yet MUCH less money. 10
Bone Conduction Headphones
The main reason our voices sound weird to ourselves when we hear them as others do, played back, (for me it was when I did some radio) is because of bone conduction of sound. Or rather, the lack of it.
We always hear our own voices with sounds through our own ear canals but also from the vibrations that arrive through the bones of our head. They too arrive at the Cochlea or that snaily bit that has the auditory nerves attached to your inner ear and they form part of how we sound to ourselves. Without that, played back, it sounds odd. Even worse on a P.A. speaker system, live.
We humans are equipped with rubbish ears for mammals, which despite their amazing sensitivity from impossibly quiet, to coping with millions of times louder than that (130dB odd, before real discomfort if full-range sound) they are cloth-eared in performance when compared to tiny bats and mice, both of whom have way better ones than us. Birds can hear and use sounds so complex and high in frequency that it is way above our hearing and we just hear a buzz in the most complex songs from starlings. Slowed down, that vulgar guttural noise is complex and beautiful.
These headphones work by the use of transducers designed to shake. I think it is probably achieved by use of strong modern high power magnetic motors driving high mass diaphragms. Light and stiff enough to play the music but heavy enough to begin to act like a microscopic version of what is now called a tactile transducer.
Remember those? Used in car systems and now as drum stool thud-monitoring up the butt of Metallica’s drummer (see the Biggest HiFi in the World story, here: https://www.adamrayner.net/the-worlds-biggest-hifi-meyer-sound-metallica-o2-london-2017/ ) they could make a system in a two-seater sports car with no room for it, ‘feel’ like they were running twin fifteen inch body shaking subwoofer bass-makers.
There is remarkably little audio specification given in the BoneTalker Adder’s manual. Nor upon any website, no matter where you seek the facts, so much as stuff about the Bluetooth chip and the battery power. And those are top end. The headphone kept a solidly-linked grip on my phone as I left it on my desk and wandered off to do stuff. The BoneTalker Adder cans stayed charged for days between tests and were juiced up when they arrived. That Lithium Polymer battery set is amazing.
I have heard and auditioned an awful lot of headphones, from cheap, to £12,000 and have years of experience, including the time when they went all weedy after Sony got sued for Walkman headphones being too damn fabulous. Those of a certain age can recall that experience. Straight out of Back to the Future, the clamping of original generation Walkman headphones around your friends’ heads, was great fun as it blew their minds. It was amazing.
In doing some homework about these, I found that there is another famous brand of these that tends to be double the price and saw a review from another tester who was not that impressed and said they were limited in frequency performance. But oddly, I disagree.
I found the Bonetalker headphones to be impressive. I listened to a slew of music, including favourite daft things from YouTube, upon one of which I actually heard details I had not noticed before! AronChupa ‘Little Swing’ featuring Little’ Sis Nora, has a pretend dirty-vinyl-record-groove crackle on the track at the start. And considering that the very high frequencies are not supposed to work as well through bone, I was astonished. I decided that the BoneTalker Adders must be delivering some acoustic output as well, since I was getting quality sounds all they way up to the highs. And so after making my own video where I admit that I had not tried the headphones out in pure bone mode by wearing the supplied orange foam earplugs to seal off the world as well, I did just that. As the foam expanded, the crackles and pops disappeared, along with the highs, from about 8kHz (if that) and up. Yes, bone conduction works but the BoneTalker Adders are using it in a clever way. One that allows the product to deliver open ear performance with bass, yet allowing you to hear the outside world (if the volume isn’t cranked so hard that you feel like you have two angry insects in tiny bottles strapped to your ears, drowning it out) and still enjoy the music. And that said, they were also tested in the bath. Not submerged but definitely nowhere I would have worn even in-ear capsules, wired or not. IP56 is a hoot and means that they can be worn by the madly active. Those who get all Sweaty Betty and work out and stuff… so not me!
The fit and comfort was amazing as I have a fat neck and the flexible back-of-the-head band was not pinchy or tight and has, I gather, an expensive inner part of springy metal to make it so nice and bendy under its rubbery armour. So thin, yet the power and music signal wires must be within it, too, from whichever side has the microchip to the other.
I can see why these would be perfect for runners and cyclists and most of all, those who would like to be able to run an audiobook or podcast while doing something else and yet remaining part of the world, rather than isolated from it by huge cans.
I like them a lot and could see them being useful and quiet for outdoor pursuits when taking the phone with and yet keeping it in your pocket, just to use the controls on the headphones to flip tracks or take calls/hang up the phone. I called Spike just to test that and it worked well, so BoneTalker Adders would be perfect for tech-connected outdoorsy types.
I might take mine out on the mooch and listen to poaching songs…. quietly.
Product Details
IP56 Certification for sweat resistance
Bluetooth version: V5.0 for music/handsfree calls
Bluetooth chip: QCC3003
Battery: 120 mAh lithium polymer (LiPo)
Speaker impedance: 10Ω ±3db
Anti-interference microphone: 36 ±3db
Receive sensitivity: 84 ±3dB
Frequency range: 0-20kHz
Charging time: 1.5 hours
Calls time: 6 hours
Music play time : 4.5 hours (Standard)
Standby time: 15 days
Connection distance: 15 meters
Colour: Black/White
Product weight: 35.5.grams
Package size (L x W x H): 6.42 x 5.31 x 2.36 inches
What’s in the box
1 x Pair of Earphones
1 x USB Cable
1 x User Manual
