Cordless headsets aren’t new, but Jabra’s new T5330 caught my attention (and kept it) nonetheless. Why? Because it’s comfortable. In fact, it’s so comfortable that I often forgot I was wearing it. If your ear is aching from an overweight piece of cordless crud, read on.

The headset portion of the T5330 resembles a pen in both size and shape, aside from a slight bend that angles the mic towards your mouth just a little. The earpiece consists of a rubber plug and an adjustable arm.

To wear the headset, you simply flip up the arm, rest the headset against your ear (the speaker sits just inside your ear, as an earbud would), and then flip the arm back into place. The process takes two seconds and attaches the headset securely to your ear so that you can push the headset’s buttons without shaking it loose.

The T5330’s base station connects to your phone via the receiver’s cord or, if your phone has one, the RJ-11 headset port. The base station uses the Bluetooth wireless networking standard to communicate with your headset. The base station also doubles as the headset’s charger: According to Jabra, the headset offers up to four hours of talk time between charges. The T5330 is compatible with landline and IP phones.

The T5330’s instructions state that you’ll exceed the base station’s range at more than 33 feet away, but Jabra tells me the base station’s actual range is up to 100 feet. I tested the unit with a Cisco IP 7940 phone and had crystal-clear reception up to about 90 feet. That’s plenty of room for someone who wants to walk around the office and occasionally duck into the hall.

by Joshua Gulick