Over the last few days we have been trying out the latest instalment from Urbanista, This time round its the Urbanista Seattle Wireless Headphones.
Off the bat they look plain so to speak but the do sport some cool features we are all not custom to right now but will be pretty much the norm in the next year or two. They have just one physical switch and the rest then works by touch control via gestures which is pretty cool and for a pair of headphones costing circa €99 this is a nice feature to see. These come in a corded version from around €55
They come in several colours
Packaging and contents.
This company topically always have good packaging which is nice, I prefer to see an effort going into a product and that starts with the exterior. Urbanista shine in this department with the retail box giving lots of information on the outside and then when opened its presented quite well and looks premium. Inside we get the headphones themselves set in a moulded plastic and the the usual array of cables we would expect to find, The Micro USB to USB charging cable and the 3.5mm headphone cable. However this cable is not the typcial one we find but a better textured lace like one and it looks good, Also inside is the usual manuals I doubt anyone reads these days..
Connectivity and battery life
These will work with more or less and smartphone or tablet supporting Andriod, iOS devices and Windows Phone so there will no shortage of device compatibility here, The battery life as stated is around 12 hours which seemed consistent throughout the testing process so easily a full day for anyone, especially those on a long commute to work, Also you can go wired too should you run out of juice sometime.
Build quality
The look plain and perhaps a tad cheap but overall the passed my expectations. They are fold-able first of all which is probably a requirement today for storage reasons but there is no travel bag included in the package,perhaps this is something for them to think about in the future as it is now becoming the norm. they are plastic all round but very light which is good and to be fair I think they will survive quite a few knocks. The headband is flexible with a rubberised cushion underneath and it was comfortable for me during my testing. The cups are VERY comfortable and more comfortable than what they may look. Very soft,not clamping your ears blocking external sound pretty well too.. Cups are clearly marked as you can see on the images and video. You can adjust the arms either side but thats all you get on the adjustment side of things. Given that as mentioned they dont clamp onto your head and are comfortable as a whole..
Controls and connections
Not bad at first look.. In fact just one switch to power on and connect via Bluetooth. We do have the usual’s like the 3.5mm headphone socket and the Micro USB port for charging. The rest is hidden under the same side mind you so all is on the one cup so we dont have to fiddle between both,this is a good idea. There is soft touch controls which allow you to use gestures to do the rest, You can tap to answer calls and play and pause,slide horizontally to skip tracks and slide horizontally to adjust the volume,this may take a while to get the hang of it but after a few minutes suing it you should be fine since most of us are custom to the physical keys we see on headphones, Overall its a good idea and how everything is place on one side rather than both..
Overall thoughts
Look.. They do look probably a bit plain but for the price you pay the sound is good and its clear with highs,mids and lows sounding good, Lets not forget the comfort hear and the external noise almost completely blocked with the soft cups. They are robust,light and have plain design but overall they are a good purchase at the price-point and probably on par or better than some offerings out there today.
You can purchase these from Urbanista direct or on Amazon. Any questions fire away on here or on social and check out our video below. Talk to you soon in our next review coming soon.
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