Plantronics Savi Office Wireless Headset Reviews

Plantronics Savi Office Headset Features

• Wearing styles: Convertible: over-the-head, ear-loop; Over-the-Ear: over-the-ear
• Range: 350 feet
• Operating frequency: DECT 6.0
• Digital Encryption: 64 bit, DSP
• Wideband audio
• Weight: 27g
• Headset controls: volume, mute, call answer and end
• Dual connection: desk phone and PC software
• Battery life: convertible headset, up to 9 hours - over-the-ear headset, up to 6 hours
• Microphone: noise cancelling

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Plantronics Savi Office Wireless Headset Reviews

The Plantronics Savi Office headset is the latest wireless headset from Plantronics, the biggest headset manufacturer in the United States. The Savi Office, not to be confused with the Savi Go, lets you use one headset to connect to multiple communication devices/applications such as regular desk phones, PC softphones such as Skype and GoogleTalk, and PC audio applications.

With the Savi Office you can connect a softphone call on your laptop or PC with a call on your office desk phone, at the touch of a button. This allows you to dial in colleagues from wherever and however they are calling.

In addition to a massive roaming range of up to 350 feet, the Savi Office has a neat power saving feature that gauges the distance from the base station and adjusts power consumption accordingly. This gives you more talk time between charges.

The Plantronics Savi Office comes with PerSono software which lets you switch between your PC and desk phone, mute calls and put a call on hold with just a simple click of the button.

The Plantronics Savi Office Convertible has 2 wearing styles; over the head, and on the ear with the ear loop. The Plantronics savi Office Over-the-Ear is worn over the ear.

PC Magazine

Plantronics views the headset as a communications hub, with its Savi Office product serving as an intermediary between "softphone" applications, like Skype, and a landline. The other model, Savi Go, bridges the gap between softphones and smartphones. At this point, Plantronics' "unified communications" strategy does not unify all three modes of communication, but executives hinted that that was the direction the Savi line was heading.

"Desk phones have evolved into mobile phones; that's part of the equation," Bhow said, leading to the rise of Bluetooth headsets, possibly the company's most famous product line. "We really see unified communications as the next step in our evolution as well as the industry."

The Savi Office is a small hub, connected to both the PC and the wired handset, while the Savi Go is a USB dongle. System administrators and IT staff will have to make a decision, however; at $380, with additional headsets costing $180, the total cost may nearly equal the cost of a PC. Beau Wilson, Plantronics' global product manager for business-to-business communications, said that's the wrong way of thinking about the problem. "IT managers are almost thinking about headsets as afterthoughts," Wilson said. "We think that is completely wrong."

Office workers can use either an over-the-ear headset or one that can be modified for use with a headband. The over-the-ear headset has a battery life of six hours, while the other has a battery life of nine hours. The Savi Office headsets connect via DECT 5.06.0, and users can talk up to 350 feet away. As a user nears the base, a special technology senses the proximity and reduces the transmit power, saving battery life, Wilson said.

Both products have variants that support unified communications offerings from Avaya, Cisco, IBM, and Microsoft, as well as Google Talk and Skype.

Both Savi Go and Savi Office use a software interface known as the PerSono suite, which provides a simple GUI to route calls between the PC, headset, and landline. Users and IT staff can select which softphone applications can be configured, together with other options. Users can also play music back using the headset, which will pause the player when a call is received.

Savi Office, meanwhile, is a $200 Bluetooth implementation that takes the Savi implementation on the road, combining the PC softphone with any Bluetooth-enabled smartphone. Because Bluetooth uses the same 2.4-GHz radio spectrum as Wi-Fi, it isn't recommended for inside an office, Wilson said.

So will Savi Office and Savi Go one day be unified? "We're giving it serious consideration," Wilson said.

BusinessWeek

From WebWire of Wednesday, January 07, 2009

Plantronics and Altec Lansing Win Six Innovation Awards from the Consumer Electronics Association

eWeek

Savi Office from Plantronics Streamlines Unified Communications

At its heart, Savi Office is just a wireless headset solution that can be simultaneously connected to a desk phone (via a handset cable) and the PC (via USB). Users can switch between audio sources simply by depressing a button on the wireless headset component. Tested to work with the major PC media players and softphones, a switch between communications channels automatically pauses media playback or answers incoming calls.

While this functionality is useful—analysts predict the consumption of rich media and the use of softphones in the enterprise will increase significantly over the next few years—the list price of $380 for Savi Office seems steep just to cut cable or headset clutter on workers’ desks. Fortunately, Savi Office introduces a software layer that allows much more functionality.

Plantronics offers Savi Office in a couple form factors, both of which I got to try out during a recent prelaunch demonstration. The Savi Office Convertible (WO100) comes with a wide microphone and thin earpiece, while the over-the-ear (WO200) model has a wider earpiece and a more slender microphone. Both form factors work with the same base station, as the base station has a swappable, modular battery connector. Base stations can also be paired with more than one headset.

Savi Office devices come with the PerSono Suite, which can be used to control device behavior with supported telephony and media applications. It also gives the user power to bridge content between communication channels. When using PerSono, users can easily play back audio content from the PC to a caller on the desk phone, bridge calls between a softphone and the desk phone—allowing the user to basically host a conference between a land line and a VOIP (voice over IP) network like Skype—or easily record calls placed on the desk phone.

While I liked the flexibility for ad-hoc connections between communications channels that PerSono provides, I found the application took up too much screen space for the limited amount of function it provides. I would like to see Plantronics re-engineer the application to come as tool bar or as a plug-in for supported third-party partner applications.

Unfortunately, the PerSono Suite is only available for Microsoft Windows-based PCs, although Plantronics claims Apple Mac users will still be able to use Savi Offices devices as a headset. They just won’t be able to control many behaviors of the Savi Office solution. Sadly, the battery indicator for the headset is only available as part of the PerSono Suite, not on the base station or headset.

Savi Office utilizes DECT 6.0 for transmissions between the base station and headset, promising much greater range capabilities (the documentation claims up to 350 feet) than would be possible if using Bluetooth technology. As called for by the DECT standard, wireless transmissions can be protected using 64-bit encryption.

Savi Office utilizes adaptive power algorithms, allowing the device to sense proximity to the base station, dialing back power utilization when it is not needed. 

During my demonstration, Plantronics representatives made sure to highlight the wideband audio capabilities of the Savi Office line. With wideband support enabled, I found that music from PC-based media players sounded much deeper and richer than when in narrowband mode.

However, use with telephony is a bit more of a mixed bag. Standard POTS lines or extensions from a TDM PBX only support narrowband calls, so the wideband support on the headset adds little to no benefit. But Skype users or those in companies supporting wideband IP telephony (in the core and on the desk or softphone) will notice a significant improvement in call quality.

Users control the use of wideband audio from the PerSono Suite (so Mac users cannot control this feature), but they should be aware that use of wideband audio will have a significant impact on battery life. Plantronics representatives expect use of wideband audio will cut battery life approximately in half.

Plantronics has partnered with several enterprise-grade communications providers (including Microsoft, Avaya, IBM and Cisco Systems) to ensure Savi Office plays nice with the leading enterprise softphone clients. However, I would prefer to see more integration to further bake the functions of the PerSono Suite into the soft client of these communication platforms. For instance, I know the Microsoft Office Communicator can be extended by third-party applications via XML, and I presume other enterprise softphones can be similarly modified.

The Wall Street Journal

Plantronics Unveils New Wireless Audio Solutions for Unified Communications

Plantronics, Inc. (NYSE: PLT) today introduced the industry's first suite of Unified Communications wireless headset systems that integrate multiple devices and applications for improved business collaboration and cost savings. Designed for today's distributed workforce, the Plantronics Savi(TM) Series provides a new level of communication versatility combined with superior audio and reliability.

"As Unified Communications becomes more prevalent in the enterprise, professionals are increasingly using a mix of communication tools, including desk phones, softphones and mobile phones, on an everyday basis," said Melanie Turek, industry principal, Unified Communications at Frost & Sullivan. "Intelligent headsets that can unify devices and applications to help eliminate costs and improve workforce collaboration are truly essential for successful UC deployments."

Revenues for the worldwide unified communications application and service markets grew by 294 percent in 2008, according to Frost & Sullivan. The analyst firm forecasts a CAGR of 72 percent for the market (2008-2014). The Plantronics Savi Series features two wireless headset systems: Savi Office and Savi Go. Savi Office is designed for office workers and provides a single wireless headset for mixing desk phone calls with PC audio and softphone calls. Savi Go gives mobile professionals a simple-to-use wireless headset to connect to PC and mobile phone communications. Both products have variants that support UC offerings from leading providers, including Avaya, Cisco, IBM, and Microsoft, and other popular services, such as Google Talk and Skype.

"Plantronics is participating in numerous Unified Communications pilot projects, helping IT departments increase adoption by understanding end user needs and preferences," said Chuck Yort, vice president and general manager, B2B Solutions at Plantronics. "Experience is teaching us that the last leg of UC -- how well end users interface with devices -- is just as critical as the infrastructure. Our new Savi products are reliable, minimize risk and spur adoption for IT decision makers, and deliver great audio, comfort and ease of use for end users."

Plantronics Savi Office -- PC and Desk Phone Integration
As the PC emerges as an audio platform for business, professionals require a way to seamlessly transition between the various audio-intensive functions performed during the workday. With the Savi Office headset system, professionals can use a single wireless headset for wideband PC audio, including web conferencing, multimedia streaming and music listening, and switch to/from both desk phone and softphone calls at the touch of a button.

Plantronics Savi Office features a new software application, PerSono(R) Suite, to manage calls and audio. PerSono Suite provides an intuitive, one-click interface to let users mix desk phones and softphone calls, mute a call, or put a call on hold with a single click. Users can personalize PerSono Suite and save ring tones, volume levels, and default settings.

Additional Savi Office features and benefits include:

• Mobility: All communications and PC audio listening on Savi Office are wireless, giving professionals the freedom to talk hands-free and work without the hassles of a cord, up to 350-feet away from the desk.
• Audio Quality: Savi Office is built on digitally encrypted, voice-dedicated DECT(TM) 6.0 technology for exceptional audio quality and lower interference with other wireless devices.
• Personal Choice: Savi Office is offered with two different wearing styles: convertible includes over-the-ear and over-the-head styles and a discreet over-the-ear style, both with noise-canceling microphones.

Additional Savi Go features and benefits include:

• Device Simplification: The Savi Go headset includes multipoint technology that allows users to switch between their mobile phone and PC calls with the touch of a button.
• Audio Quality: The headset features an extended boom and noise-cancelling microphone for call clarity, and a single button on the headset provides remote answer/end, volume up/down and mute.
• Ease of Use: Savi Go also comes with the PerSono Suite software to help manage PC audio and calling.

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Plantronics Savi Office and Savi Go Wireless Headsets

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Plantronics Savi Wireless Headsets