Confession time.  I am a sucker for headphones.  I absolutely love testing new headphones, and discovering the subtle and innovative techniques the manufacturers use to set each pair of headphones apart from the others.  Discovering the unique voice hidden inside each model is part of the reason I enjoy reviewing them so much.  In the time I have been testing and reviewing headphones, I have pretty much seen them coming from all angles” in the ear, over the ear, around the ear, even near the ear.  I have reviewed headphones that are heavy on bass and those which accent treble.  Heck I have even reviewed headphones without wires…though many of them have featured significantly inferior sound quality.  In fact, you cold say this is my personal Holy Grail of headphones: a pair of wireless headphones with sound quality which is equivalent to or better than their wired counterparts.  If there is one quality which has consistently eluded me, however, it has been stereo wireless headphones.  I can already hear many of you smirking, giggling, and shaking your heads.  Wireless headphones that sound like wired headphones, you are probably thinking, are vaporware, a fairy tale.  That can never happen.

Well, over the years here at JAMM, I have had the opportunity to following an alternate wireless technology, called Kleer Wireless technology.  Like Bluetooth, Kleer can be used to connect your stereo headphones to a phone, media player, or other device, without the encumbrance of wires.  Although Kleer Wireless claims a more secure wireless connection than Bluetooth, it has not found the same kind of universal adoption.  In fact, you will be pretty hard pressed to find a lot of devices or accessories which incorporate Kleer technology.  Still, when I learned that Sleek Audio would be incorporating Kleer Wireless technology into their high end wireless headphones….well, I was obviously compelled to learn more. 

Form and Design: One of the things I have always hated about higher end headphones is that no one has found a cure for headphone cord tangles.  There is nothing worse than leaving for my walk to the train, grabbing my headphones, and then spending the next five minutes untangling the knot of cable before I can listen to my music.  Sleek Audio avoids this whole problem with its wireless design.

So, how does it do this?  The key is in the wireless unit, which will rest on the back of your neck.   A plastic sleeve on either end of this unit give way to the headphone cables, which are just long enough to reach your ears.  I love this around the head approach, though I have found it to be ineffective in some models I have tested.  The cables end up being either too short to reach my ears, or far too long.  Unlike many of these companies, Sleek Audio recognizes that we all have a different sized head and neck.  As such, the cables coming out of either side of the unit are completely adjustable.  I will admit that it can be a bit tricky to perform these adjustments.  But once you get it started, it is a really nice feature.  Hopefully, Sleek Audio can continue to improve this adjustment mechanism by adding some kind of external control.

Which brings us to the wearability of these headphones.  One of the real values of these hands on reviews, I think, is that they give you an opportunity to hear first hand how these headphones fit and feel while in actual use,  For the most part, they were fantastic.  The speakers were skinny enough that they slipped easily into my ears, allowing the buds to create a great seal and block external noise.  The only real flaw I found was with the wireless unit in the back.  Although Sleek Audio has made this as…sleek…as possible, there is really no good way to hide the wireless controls.  They chose to place he wireless controls on the back of your neck, which does keep them well hidden and out of the way.  This unit was not particularly heavy, however, it was heavy enough that it just hung on the back of your neck, causing it to slide from one side to the other, or snag on the collar of my shirt and jacket.  No matter how much time I spent adjusting the length of the cables, this problem persisted.  I think an easy fix would have been to add a clip to the back so the unit could be attached to my shirt collar to better hold it in place.

Sound Quality: The most important part of any headphone is how they sound, and I have to say the Sleek Audio headphones sounded fantastic.  I was really impressed by the crystal clear sound quality.  But what impressed me even more than that was the fully customizable equalizer system.  Like I said, every pair of headphones I have reviewed offers something new, and this was a pretty big something.  Each earbud features a removable treble and bass module.  In the package, you will find two replacement modules for each, one to increase the treble or bass and one to decrease.  This means you can highlight either the treble or the bass depending upon your listening preferences.  For me, I prefer an even sound, so I ended up returning it to the mid-range module which shipped in the unit.

In addition to customizing the sound quality, you can also fully customize the earbuds to make them fit the exact shape of your ear.  There are several different bud sizes included, and the speaker is skinny enough to ensure that it will not interfere with the fit.  This is one of my big pet peeves with many headphones.  Often, the speaker is so large that it cannot possibly fit in any ear canal.  Sleek Audio has ensured the speakers are skinny enough to fit in your ear, allowing the bud to fill the remaining space and isolate environmental noises.  This noise isolation works much better than noise cancellation, which uses an inaudible tone to block outside noise.  Such a tone can distort the sound quality of your music.  Thus, noise isolation, like that which is featured in the Sleek Audio headphones, results in a far truer sound.

I was really impressed by the sound quality of the Sleek  Audio headphones.  The unique customization system of both fit and equalizer makes this about as close to custom headphones as you can get without taking an ear mold.

Wireless: I have had some pretty harsh words for wireless headphones in the past.  The truth is, in my experience, while Bluetooth is fantastic for mono headsets and phone calls, it just does not stand up to stereo music.  Virtually every stereo Bluetooth headphone I have tested has failed miserably with skips, poor audio quality, or even completely dropping the connection.

As a result of my experience with Bluetooth, I have been anxious to find an alternative wireless technology; and to date, that alternative has been Kleer Wireless.  Although I have spent quite a bit of time talking about Kleer Wireless, I have not had many opportunities to test it out live, and I have to say I was quite impressed by what I found.  Not only did it maintain a flawless connection, but there were also no skips or any of the other problems I had with Bluetooth.  In fact, the music piping in through the Kleer Wireless connection sounded virtually identical to wired headphones.  No extra skips or other problems.  Simply put, this was a wireless alternative unlike any I have found before. 

Now, the downside to Kleer Wireless is that it does not exist natively on any devices.  So, you will need an adapter, which is included in the package.  This adapter worked fine for me, it plugs right into the headphone jack on your device, and is small enough to remain relatively unobtrusive.  I really hope to see Kleer Wireless incorporated natively in more devices soon.

Of course, if you want to share your music with another Kleer enabled headphone or speaker, pairing the adapter with a second set of Kleer enabled speakers or headphones is also no problem.  In fact, the process is identical to Bluetooth pairing, so it should be pretty familiar to anyone who has used a Bluetooth headset or other wireless accessory.  You can connect up to four Kleer enabled accessories at a time.

Battery: Before we look at how the battery performed, I want to point out one of my favorite features in these headphones.  Obviously, the folks at Sleek Audio have encountered this scenario: you are heading home after a long day at work.  You reach into your bag or pocket to slip on your headphones and zone out.  You push play on your music and…nothing…silence.  It only takes a second to realize that while your mp3 player is working just fine, the battery in your wireless headphones has died.  Hope you have a backup pair available.  Well, in a minor fit of genius, Sleek Audio has provided that alternate pair of headphones for you by including a wire.  No big deal, just a headphone wire, but it allows you to bypass that dead battery and continue using the Sleek Audio headphones, even if the battery goes dead.  Just pop the earbuds off of the wireless unit and snap them on the wire, and you are ready to rock.  Fantastic!

So, what about the battery in this one, though?  How much are you likely to need that extra wire?  I thought the battery was great.  It easily made it through an entire week of regular use (I should say five day work week).  The real problem for me, however, was the fact that you are really dealing with two batteries, one in the adaptor and one in the headphones.  This can easily result in uneven draining, where the adaptor gives out before the headphones or vice versa.  It would be nice if the adaptor could be powered off of the battery in your media player.

Nonetheless, Sleek Audio addresses this problem by including a dual charger.  Just plug the dual charger into the USB port on your computer (or AC with an appropriate adaptor) and you can connect it to both the headphones and adaptor at once.  It is not as good as only requiring a single battery, but it does do a fantastic job of minimizing the problems associated with multiple parts with multiple batteries.

Conclusion:  I am sure that Sleek Audio will not mind when I say I have found the Holy Grail in these headphones – wireless headphones which offer the same connection and sound quality as wired headphones. I could tell almost no difference in the quality of the sound whether I connected wirelessly or used the included wire.  Amazing!   Add to that the level of customization with the interchangeable earbuds, treble, and bass filters; and you end up with headphones which are as close to a custom fit as you will find without making a mold of your ear.  Frankly, I have never heard anything like this before.

What I Liked:

• Kleer Wireless
• wireless audio which sounds just as good as wired
• noise isolation
• customization with interchangeable easrbuds, treble, and bass filters
• extra wire if you choose not to listen wirelessly
• fantastic sound quality

What Needs Improvement:

• two batteries means double the opportunity for failure
• wireless unit snags on collars and slips around the back of my neck

Where To Buy: Sleek Audio

Price: $320

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