Nuraphones
£349, uk.nuraphone.com
As I collected my watch, my book and my headphones from where they had been charging overnight, I thought: ‘What’s going to be the next thing I have to charge up? My shoes?’
In ten years’ time, so many of my everyday objects will be ‘smart’ I’ll probably end up cutting out the middleman and just sleep on a gigantic wireless charging pad with my clothes on.
I blame Apple for the headphones. Its decision to kill off iPhone’s headphone jack has led to a wave of alarmingly high-tech (and expensive) ear wear, and a slightly icky new buzzword: ‘hearables’.
I blame Apple for the headphones. Its decision to kill off iPhone’s headphone jack has led to a wave of alarmingly high-tech ear wear, and a slightly icky new buzzword: ‘hearables’
Nuraphones are Bluetooth headphones which boast not only an alarming latex proboscis that extends into your ear hole, but also ‘personalised’ sound.
Each ear canal is different, so the cans use a built-in microphone to work out the shape of yours, then adjust the sound accordingly. It takes a minute of bleeping to set up, then your own bespoke sound kicks in, like a graphic equaliser from the future.
When I tried them for the first time, I practically got my credit card out on the spot. It’s electrifying.
The weird proboscis means the cans offer detailed treble at the same time as big waves of bass. It feels like being at a rock gig, minus the youngsters standing in front of you filming it on their phones.
The headphones say ‘Welcome back, Robert’ when you put them on. But while the tech’s great, it doesn’t feel terribly finished. The headphone wire sometimes pops out. The battery conks in about a quarter of the time it takes my Bose cans to die.
The sound is impressive for a company that’s come from nowhere. But while the idea of ‘personalised’ sound is great, there’s a whiff of hocus pocus.
I ‘personalised’ mine for my wife, and they still sound good to me – which suggests there might be an element of emperor’s new ears here…