Having recently jumped from an Iphone 6 Plus to an Iphone 12 Pro (now that’s what I call longevity) – I struck me during several phone calls on speaker phone that the volume of the speaker seemed diminished and that with background noise made for a less than stellar performance. Reaching for my air pods would be one response but some of the calls required input from someone else (socially distanced of course). In the course of accommodating client’s needs for conferencing over the last couple of years – I had used Jabra webcams and speakers with great results. So when the stars aligned and I saw an offer on a Jabra Speak 150 the die was cast. Time for something a bit more substantial for calls needing a quick conference on mobile !
The Jabra Speak 150 is a portable compact circular (120mm*33mm) bluetooth and usb speaker. It includes a 360° omni-directional microphone with an audio pick-up range of 1-2 metres from any angle – so just place between you and socially distanced colleague if required. The controls for volume etc are in a ring around the top of the unit.
Some interesting bluetooth features
- 8 – the number of pairings that the Jabra device will remember
- 2 – the number of devices that can be connected at the same time
- 1 – the number of devices that can play audio at the same time
Updating the device just requires the Jabra Direct application to be downloaded and run to get new firmware – although in my experience updates are not that frequent for this type of hardware.
As regards integration with Skype / teams or Zoom – these can be set as the preferred softphone to work with the Jabra 510 on PC or mobile.
The unit also comes with a handy carrying pouch which may come in useful when travel returns and need to conference from remote locations.