A little over a year ago, I purchased a pair of Treblab xGO earbuds. They were having some kind of sale and I figured I could take a chance on them at the cost they were advertising. I can't remember the exact sale price but I purchased the xGo with a pair of Treblab xRun earphones for a total cost around $55.00. I figured that's not a bad cost for a fairly decent brand of bluetooth buds.
Ordering from the Treblab website was a breeze. Processing and shipping was very quick. I ordered on Saturday and received them on Tuesday. Easy peazy.
I opened the package and turned on the buds. I know usually they tell you to fully charge them but I wanted to jump right in on the testing. Pairing with my Samsung S8+ was simple as many of these products are nowadays. According to my phone read out, these buds had about 30% charge in them.
I played a few songs from my Amazon Music app and all seemed to be working well. Button functionality on each earbud is simple: one push for play/pause and two push on left for previous track and two push on right for next track. Long hold turns on or off. The buttons can also be used to answer, reject or hang up phone calls. After about 3-5 minutes of flipping through various audio-range songs, I decided to put them back in the case, plug in the case and charge both the case and the earbuds.
A few hours later, I used them for a bit longer and that's when I recognized an issue with them. For some reason, the right earbud would cut in and out. It didn't lose connection because I could still push the button to play, pause, advance and power off. For some unexplainable reason, the earbud would just stop producing sound or it would break up like a bad radio signal. All the while I would still be able to hear my music out of the left earbud. This 'breaking up' would occur whether my phone was next to me on my desk/table or in my pocket.
This is/was very, very annoying. I did find that sometimes there was less cutting out after using the earbuds for thirty minutes or more. It would still occasionally occur but not like every five seconds as in the beginning of use. It's almost like they needed to warm up or something but it didn't always work after 'warm up' either. I made due with the issue as I didn't use these all that often because of the irritating issue. I would occasionally use the xRun earphones without issues but would always return to my trusty X2 earbuds from 2018. The X2s are my go-to earbuds and I have never had an issue with them.
When the xGos did work consistently, in stereo, as they should, the xGos did not have too bad of a sound. The lows were good enough and the highs were not screechy (if that makes sense in my non-audio expertise). The silicone ear tips made a good enough seal to help keep outside noises from being heard. I guess this is part of noise-isolating or noise-canceling but don't recall if they even have that. Getting used to the simple functionality of the buttons was difficult too because of the many buttons and functionality I got and was used to with my X2s. Even if these worked perfectly, the one thing I'm not a fan of is the case. It's little longer and thicker than the Airpods case which makes it bulkier in my pocket. I also don't trust the durability of the flip lid on the case as it doesn't seem as sturdy and I feel like it could crack if for some reason there was pressure on my pocket.
The images below are of the case, the earbuds, and a couple of comparison shots of the case size versus the 1st generation Apple Airpods.
FINAL VERDICT: Based on my experience, I would not recommend these because of the annoying issue of the sound cutting in and out in the right earbud. I'm not sure if it's a universal problem or I just got a wonky set. Sometimes I would just use one earbud (the left one) while at work so I can hear someone in the office calling out my name or whatever. So the cutting out wouldn't be too much of a problem in this case. However, if I was walking a trail or working out, using both earbuds was preferred and then I would get frustrated with the cutting out. As mentioned, this is just my experience and someone else may have had a better experience and/or gotten a better pair. In fact, I hope so as I did like them when they worked properly.
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