There's no arguing against the convenience factor of Bluetooth headphones. Free from the tyranny of tangled wires, putting on a pair of wireless headphones for the first time is a liberating experience. Whether that's when exercising or simply walking down the street, it's nice not to have a cable snag on your clothing or generally get in the way when you also want to use your smartphone. However, you often pay a premium for the Bluetooth convenience. Take the Sennheiser Momentum 2.0 as an example; if you want the Bluetooth wireless version, it's around £100 more expensive than the wired model, depending on where you look.
I'm sure we all have a pair of headphones we wish were wireless. The Voxoa BTunes, a graduate of crowdfunding platform Kickstarter, is a little gadget that can do just that, but there is a caveat. To use it, you'll need to have a pair of headphones with a detachable cable. There are plenty of premium headphones with breakaway cables, both to allow you to swap out different cables for different devices (e.g. Android or iOS remotes) or simply to have an easy method to replace the cable should it ever get damaged, but it's by no means the norm.
The BTunes replaces the cable, connecting directly into your favourite pair of cans. Different headphones have different cable connections, which is why BTunes is available in several different form factors. These range from 3.5mm and 2.5mm jack versions to models that are designed to exclusively work with Bose QuietComfort models, which have a slightly awkward connection. An easy to way to tell if you need the 2.5mm or 3.5mm version is to compare the two ends of the cable your headphones have. One end will be 3.5mm to connect to your average audio device, so if both ends are the same size you'll want to opt for the 3.5mm version.
The 2.5mm version I received works with a number of different headphones, including the Sennheiser Momentum 2.0 I used to test. Setup was simply a case of detaching the existing cable and plugging the BTunes in. The BTunes itself resembles a Bluetooth handsfree headset. I wish it was smaller, as it detracts from the overall elegance when paired with a stylish pair of headphones. The headphones go from stylish to looking slightly like a fancy call centre headset. The BTunes is at least very light, so you won't notice the additional weight.
One end of the BTunes has a multifunction power button and a cover for the microUSB port that's used to charge. You just need to hold the power button for a few seconds and the BTunes will activate pairing mode. There's also convenient NFC built in, so you just need to tap it to a compatible device and they'll be paired.
I'm used to Bluetooth headphones and devices having a spoken audio status confirmation but found the BTunes' slightly amateurish. The voice lacks the professional, soothing and dulcet tones you would expect. It's a minor observation, but it surely wouldn't have been hard to have used better voice prompts.
Once you're paired, that's basically it. The multifunction button otherwise handles turning the BTunes on and off. There aren't any volume controls on the device itself so you'll need to control volume from your connected device. If you pair with an iOS device you'll get a battery level read out in your status bar. The battery lasts around 10 hours before you'll need a charge. This is slightly above the average of 8 hours found in most smaller Bluetooth sport headphones. Larger Bluetooth cans normally net you closer to 15 hours as a comparison, helped by their bigger batteries. Wireless range was also what I would expect at around 10m before the connection begins to drop. Lose line of sight and this number will drop.
