# iPhone 3G & Stereo Bluetooth - Through the Nokia BH 503



## Fink-Nottle (Feb 25, 2001)

I posted last week looking for advice on bluetooth headphones and a couple of people were interested so I thought I'd follow up. I picked up a Nokia BH 503 headset today from 'The Source'. They had good reviews and I went in there to try them out. However, the shop weren't able to let me try them as they need to charge up but they said I could take them back if they didn't measure up. So I took them for $99.

They come with a next to useless cloth bag and a charger. Here are my first impressions:

-Build quality seems pretty good. Band seems very solid and buttons feel all right.
-They fit well... not as tight at my old headphones (AKGs) but they stay on well.
-No problem pairing with my Mac or iPhone... but each time I pair with one I have to re-pair with the other.
-Sound is generally very good. Solid base and good sound at the mid range and high end. There was sufficient volume. I'm no audiophile but I had no issues. On certain songs I think I noticed the effects of Bluetooth compression but it was nothing I couldn't live with.
-The controls are good. The forward and back buttons don't work with the iPhone but I hear that's true of all of these headphone... hopefully a future firmware update will fix it.
-The microphone is adequate... it's not great but it does the job. I would imagine in noisy surroundings there might be problems. I think it's just a factor of the microphone being in the earpiece and not right in front of your mouth.

So far so good... although I'll be testing it 'in the wild' so to speak on Monday. If anyone has questions let me know. My initial impressions are good though and I think I'll be keeping them.


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## Fink-Nottle (Feb 25, 2001)

Quick follow up after bringing it to work:
-The volume could be louder... especially for some podcasts. It wasn't bad but in the presence of outside noise (subway) it could be hard to hear stuff.
-No wires is great!
-The iPhone volume controls work when on the phone but not when listening to music.
-The headphone are not suitable for watching video... the sound and video no longer sync. I've heard this is an issue as the bluetooth compression etc causes a delay.
-I had one pairing issue and had to resync... not sure why.
-The headphone buttons are becoming intuitive... very nice.
I'm definitely keeping them... not perfect but pretty good. Cheers all!


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