Comfort
As it was mentioned earlier, the ARCTIC Sound P311 has a behind-the-neck design. From my experience, headphones with this design can be quite uncomfortable after prolonged usage. Firstly, the weight of the headphone pulls down on the ears. After a while, this can make the tip of the ears quite sore. Second, the headband is non-adjustable. As such, it applies much more pressure against the ears than necessary to stay secure. Although the headphones might feel snug and comfortable at first, the prolonged pressure can cause discomfort.
These faults of the behind-the-neck design can be applied to the ARCTIC Sound P311 too. For 30 minutes of usage or so, they can be comfortable. Nevertheless, the headset causes enormous discomfort with longer usage. After an hour of using the device, I found myself adjusting the headset every few minutes for a comfortable fit.
The discomfort is actually exacerbated in my case because I wear prescription glasses. There isn’t exactly that much space over the ears for the headphone’s headband and the temple arms of the glasses’ frame. For those that do not wear eyeglasses, then the behind-the-neck design might be slightly more comfortable.
Initially, the padding of the ear cups seems to be comfortable, albeit stiff. After some time of usage, I felt that additional padding or something that gives more cushion should have been used. Seeing as the headset can give up to 20 hours of talk or playback time, I expected something a bit more comfortable for prolonged usage.
The ARCTIC Sound P311: lack of long term comfort and lack of low audio frequencies
Audio Quality
In terms of audio quality, the ARCTIC Sound P311 is fair, but there is a lack of low frequencies. In other words, bass is not thumping unless you start modifying the equalizer. Highs are good, and the mids are adequate. Overall, the audio sounded hollow.
As for the microphone quality, it was good. According to ARCTIC, the headset features Clear Voice Capture (CVC), which allows for excellent background noise cancellation. Noise cancellation was decent enough during testing.
It would have been convenient to have a button to mute the microphone.
Whenever you make a call through Skype 5 on a computer, the default playback device must be switched to “Bluetooth Hands-free Audio”. From what I could hear, it would seem that the sound was switched to mono (therefore, the sound became very dull). I am unsure as to why the playback device must be changed. If you select “Bluetooth Audio Renderer” as the default playback device, there will be no sound coming from Skype. I suspect making two different playback devices was to separate the dual functions of the ARCTIC Sound P311: headset (Bluetooth Hands-free Audio and Bluetooth Audio Input Device) and headphone (Bluetooth Audio Renderer).
On the iPhone 3GS, audio quality was comparable to what was heard on the computer. Calls were clear, and microphone quality was fair.
What tremendously surprised me was how audio quality was preserved even at 15 meters away from the Bluetooth receiver. ARCTIC claims that the device will work at up to 20 meters from the Bluetooth device. During testing, the maximum range I got was a respectable 15 meters through several wooden walls.
As for noise isolation, the padding of the ear cups did a good job, but it varies depending on how you place the ear cups over your ears. Once you find the right spot, everything falls into place.
Overall Usage
As it was mentioned earlier, the ARCTIC Sound P311 was very simple to setup. With a smartphone, the ARCTIC product can also make and receive calls. I suggest you take a look at the product manual (Link) to see how this is done. I could not test the ARCTIC Sound P311 with the iPhone 3GS for very long, but answering calls by pressing down the main large button worked just fine.
On the computer, the ARCTIC Sound P311 does not seem to be able to answer calls coming from Skype in a similar fashion as on smartphones. I suspect that this is a lack of implementation by Skype programmers.
Controlling sound volume and track playback with the ARCTIC Sound P311 worked quite well with both Winamp 5 and MediaMonkey 3. Whenever the volume is set to the minimum or the maximum value, the device will beep. Unfortunately, when the playback device was “Bluetooth Hands-free Audio” (such as when making calls in Skype), the minimum volume beep was abnormally loud.
Battery life of the ARCTIC Sound P311 was amazing. ARCTIC claims up to 20 hours of playback time, and I believe that I got that much out of the device. I cannot confirm that the device can be in standby mode for 400 hours, but even a half of this would already be fantastic.
Another thing that I did not like with the ARCTIC Sound P311 was the clunky and loud sounding buttons. The large X-shaped plastic cover for the volume and track control buttons moves around whenever you touch it. It does not feel secure or of quality at all.
The headset itself is fairly light. When properly folded, it can be easily transported around without trouble. The carrying protective case included with the product makes this task much easier too.
