Logitech Zone Wireless: Swanky headset means business, but that also means it comes with a hefty price tag

With more of us taking part in remote meeting and webinars than ever, there's been a mad scrabble for a decent mic and headphones by those of us overusing the captions feature on Google meetings and Zoom. Logitech provided this humble vulture with its Zone Wireless headset last month and I've been using it intermittently to …

[TonyJ]

Not been a fan of Logitech for some years.

First they bought the amazing Squeeze company and after ruining an amazing product line, promptly dumped them.

That was unforgivable enough, but they've had a habit of doing the same thing and/or dropping support early into the life of products with little to no warning. Indeed, as I think back, a couple have been mentioned here.

Also for the record Teams can transcribe as well, not just Zoom and Google.

[Captain Scarlet]

Re: Not been a fan of Logitech for some years.

Transcribe is in every bog standard cloud conferencing software isnt it? Its probably what was used by the article author.

[Recluse]

Re: Not been a fan of Logitech for some years.

Whilst I do not disagree with the sentiments of the previous poster, to provide some balance, at least as regards Logitech Media Server, I would observe that they still maintain the infrastructure to support the associated mysqueezebox.com

Also (as I understand it) on discontinuing their hardware products they released the Logitech Media Server (aka Slimserver) software under a GNU Public Licence. Then of course we still have the indefatigable support of Logitech developer Michael Herger in their forums, who also works on the open source side as well.

Logitech Media Server software IMHO is a peach of a product. The outcome could have been worse ... and all is not bad as regards Logitech

[TheRealRoland]

Logitech H800

Bought one years ago, battery bit the dust after about 3 years, got a larger battery, worked for another 2 years, power switch finally broke. Ordered a new one. Slightly new design (logo now printed at top of head clamp (?) and power button feels much sturdier. Here's to another 5 years.

[David Austin]

Re: Logitech H800

using a H800 headset to wfh using the USB Dongle, and bluetooth to unwind with audiobooks from the phone.

Working fine for 3 years, only issue was ordering new headset foam pads a few months back (£5 from ebay)

[Phil W]

Re: Logitech H800

Another vote for the h800, it's a great bit of kit.

[l8gravely]

Re: Logitech H800

Hear hear, the H800 is probably the best cheap quality wireless headset out there. It's not perfect, and my head is a *bit* too large for it, which means it starts hurting after a few hours, but otherwise it's excellent, with good audio quality. The BT is a bit fiddly at points, and I havent bothered to use BT on the laptop for calls, the dongle works well and has ok range.

Now for excellent range, my old Plantronics headset could let me wander the entire building while on a call. I once did a conf call while waiting outside during a fire alarm that went off. Good times!

[Anonymous Coward]

I might be talking sh*te..

But how are these things meant to deliver ANC? From what I understand, this requires in-ear or full over-ear, to ensure there is a seal.

And correct, these are priced wwwaaayyyy OTT.. saying that, I'm a sucker for that scam, I've gone through 3 different Bose headsets over the past 4 years (Thankfully, Amazon give a no quible refund).

[IGotOut]

Re: I might be talking sh*te..

Not at all.

ANC just takes the external sound and inverts it, cancelling it out.

All full ear coverings do is make it more effective.

[Ken Hagan]

Re: I might be talking sh*te..

I think the OP's point is that you need full ear cover to make it more effective.

[LB45]

The earpads will fall apart after 18months

Bought the H820E DECT headphones from Logitech. They actually work (still!) quite well and the range hands down beats any bluetooth only headset. I can wander around at work and at home I can basically cruise the house while waiting for my 15 seconds of fame (Are you mad? All that on such a compressed timetable! Impossible!) during terribly boring Zoom/Teams/WebEx/Whatever meetings.

The ear cushions however will fall off becoming unglued even with extreme care to not toss them about after a year to 18 months. The outer covering simply decomposed and the cushions contained within went AWOL. I was forced to improvise new covers as just using the hard plastic earphone by themselves were torture.

Judging from my searches on line this is not a one off event. Be forewarned.

[big_D]

Re: The earpads will fall apart after 18months

We use the Jabro Pro DECT headsets. The ear cushions pop over the ear piece and can be replaced - useful for work headsets, which can change owner over their lifetime.

And DECT is a great solution for workplace headsets. The range and lack of interference makes them very good value.

[Cuddles]

Re: The earpads will fall apart after 18months

"The outer covering simply decomposed and the cushions contained within went AWOL... Judging from my searches on line this is not a one off event. Be forewarned."

This is common to pretty much all fake leather and similar synthetic materials ofter used for headphones (and chair armrests). It degrades over time, and a lot faster when exposed to sweat. Most decent headphones have easily replaceable pads (and maybe headband padding) because they're essentially considered consumables. It's possible Logitech might be worse than normal, but I have a set of Sennheiser headphones that are well over a decade old now, and onto its third set of (nice and cheap third party) pads.

[Sparkus]

Did Logi give up any clue as to when their 922 web cam would be back in stock?

[ecofeco]

£175?

Pricey is not the word I would use. That is being far too kind.

[big_D]

Re: £175?

For a professional, workplace wireless headset, that price is about average.

At work, we use Jabras and they range from around 120UKP to around 300UKP.

[Claverhouse]

Their plain black Dell-like keyboards are just fine.

Wouldn't pay £175 for one, though.

[Insert sadsack pun here]

When buying wireless headphones for the purposes of Teams, Skype for Biz etc, it's important to check not only that they connect with the PC but also that they're compatible with the software. bought a perfectly good pair of JBL headphones off ebay last week, connected immediately with the laptop - totally incompatible with Skype for Biz. Googled it and it's a common complaint. Bugger.

[Dan 55]

After 1 month with them

I've bought this headset and to be honest I'm hard pressed to fell the difference between ANC being on or off. There's a slight hum and the lower frequencies are a bit muffled but as this is my first experience of ANC I don't know if this is expected or not. If it is, I could live without it. If not, it's past the 15 day period.

Also the H800 (my previous headset) seems more comfortable to wear, although I've gotten used to these.

Two simultaneous Bluetooth sources connected at the same time is nice although it can sometimes (not often) get confused about which one is the active one if you're listening to music on one channel and just about to start a conference call on the other, which is not what you want.

I'm told it sounds a bit faint on the Mac but not on the PC. My Mac's WiFi/Bluetooth chip was replaced as well. So no idea who's fault this.

It comes with a dongle which you can use to connect instead of Bluetooth if you want. There seems to be a even pricier Plus version which works with some super special dongle which works with other Logitech peripherals at the same time instead of one dongle per peripheral but I see no need for this as only laptops have few USB ports and if you're connecting using a USB dongle instead of Bluetooth you're probably only plugging in a headset anyway.

So, yeah, they work and they're a bit pricy.

[Jason Hindle]

Surprisingly, the corporate Dell does a good job.

The microphone only seems to pick up me, not the rest of the meeting participants so, so far, I’ve not needed to think about an expensive headset (though I do own an old Microsoft USB headset that I use occasionally).

[VTAMguy]

Logitech vs. Linux

Another "management app" from Logitech that will likely run only under Windows. Logitech as a corporation has deliberately turned its back towards Linux for years, refusing to acknowledge that such an OS even exists, which is fine because I can turn my back too. They are really enamored with their stupid USB dongles even when it makes the product less convenient to use - why require a dongle if you already have to use a physical USB cable to charge the thing anyway? For me, much of their stuff has not been innovative nor has it been reliable.