Does the Plantronics M3500 take a big step forward from its ancestor, the M3000? Anthony Newman takes a look at Plantronics' latest entry into the Bluetooth market.
Upon first picking up the M3500, those familiar with the previous Plantronics Bluetooth headset would be forgiven for thinking nothing's changed. The company has opted to keep the same physical shape: a stubby, tapered block. Indeed, this design does feel somewhat archaic when compared to svelter designs such as the delectable HS820 from Motorola. At 27 g, and with quite a bulky shape, the M3500 feels large and heavy on the ear.
 | Despite excellent audio and transmission, the M3500 struggles due to poor ergonomics
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This must in part be due to its balance. The ear clip is mounted at one end of the device, meaning it tugs forward rather uncomfortably. Jabra's offerings, and even Motorola's, have better distribution. And the comfort isn't helped by the ear loops here, either, although on the M3500 they appear of better design than those bundled with the M3000. Two sizes of loops are provided, neither of which proved a good fit for our - perfectly normal, we've been told - ears.
The loops seem somewhat fragile in their rigidity, clipping into place inflexibly on the body of the unit. Because they don't hinge or have much give, it's difficult to slip the headset into place, especially over glasses, and the clip doesn't mould well to the user's head. We found that within minutes we were in some discomfort, and movement only made this worse.
However, the use of the older body design does have the benefit of retaining the M3000's usability. A large 'talk' button receives and ends calls, and with compatible handsets serves to redial the last call or activate voice dialling. Volume buttons allow adjustment of noise levels within the call. Finally, a small button governs power, muting, and allows the DSP to be switched off - more on that later.
Pairing is somewhat unusually - yet easily - accomplished through pressing of the up and talk buttons at the same time, which deviates from the de facto 'hold the power button until a light flashes' method. While on the subject of pairing, the M3500 can pair with multiple devices using both the headset and handsfree profiles, as one would expect from any modern Bluetooth headset. Furthermore, to help the user while pairing, charging and using the headset, LEDs are provided that can flash both green and red.
In use, the headset showed fast boot times and only slight lag in connecting to the phone to make or answer a call. Not the best we've used, but fast enough. Alarmingly, on our rock-solid reliable Nokia 3650, the M3500 managed to cut off the first call we made with it: about a minute in it made a garbled noise and turned itself off, all while fully charged and within a metre of the phone. It happened again, fairly frequently, sometimes in the first seconds of opening a Bluetooth connection, sometimes after a few minutes of conversation. We cannot be sure whether this is endemic to the model or just a problem with our unit.
When it wasn't dying on us, call quality from the M3500 was good. This can probably be attributed to what Plantronics calls 'Audio IQ', a noise-cancelling, signal enhancing, all-singing, all-dancing Digital Signal Processor. There's a noticeable difference when it's switched off, but not noticeable enough to justify the DSP's other impact - battery life. Compared to its rather enduring predecessor, the M3500 dishes out a measly 3 hours of talk-time. However, for those 3 hours, users can enjoy decent voice quality at a good range: there was virtually no static right up to around 7 metres, whether in direct line of sight or obscured by the head, and with the interference of a wireless network to boot. Furthermore, in a design choice both rare and good for a Bluetooth headset, the battery is user-replaceable.
Plantronics have provided a very complete package with the M3500. As well as a normal wall charger, an in-car charger is provided in the box - although USB charging is not possible. The headset comes with its own leather slip-case for attaching it to a belt, which is rather swanky, although not something we'd really use. Various ear-loops and other plastic gubbins are also included, of course.
Availability
The Plantronics M3500 is available now in markets worldwide for a recommended price of $169.95 USD.
Conclusion
Although its sound quality is practically unrivalled, there's no substitute for comfort or portability when it comes to Bluetooth headsets. In these areas, we found the M3500 sadly lacking: it's both large and uncomfortable, and when backed up by worse battery life than its predecessor we're not sure the trade-off for sound quality was a good one. What's more, the unreliable connection worries us, whether specific to our unit or to the production run. All in all, there are better Bluetooth headsets out there.
- What's positive: Sound quality; array of buttons
- What's negative: Uncomfortable; poor battery life
Overall: 
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