On another subject, I’ve looked at the new BA Q1 online and it looks exactly like the JB 2. Unfortunately, it lost the tie clip (I love that feature and use it all the time) but has voice control – very cool. Only downside I see is significantly lower battery life on the Q1 than the Z9i.

My Z9 developed bent recharge pins due to the fact that you can insert the recharge cable either way. I again contacted BA and they told me to send the unit back to them. A few days later the Z9i turned up – fantastic response this time.

Hopefully, they will overcome the earbud problem but suggest you always have spares available.

This little dynamo is exactly what I was looking for and much more. The design is cool, sleek and discreet. It’s also a comfortable fit for me. I like the in-your-ear fit to enhance and isolate my sound while driving down the highway with my windows down and the stereo cranking! The z9i is able to give me the high quality sound and appropriate volume I crave. Pound for pound, it’s a helluva value for the price I paid.

I have two phones on me at all times; both are Smartphones. For my job I was supplied a BlackBerry 8700c, a real no-frills work horse. And my personal BlackBerry is an 8310 Curve. I’m an advertising sales mgr, so my sales reps, clients and boss need to contact me by phone at a moment’s notice. Plus my wife and I are therapeutic foster parents to 4 teenage boys, so on any given day I have both phones blowing up demanding my time. The ability to have both phones paired and simultaneously connected to the BlueAnt z9i is an absolute luxury and time saver to the max!!

The thought of having that tie-clip to hang my headset on my shirt or jacket pocket is such a cool idea! And now I always know where it is. Even if I keep it on my ear I’m never irritated by its light weight.

Now I can handle all calls as they come in without having to memorize any complicated button combinations or sequences. And for the VERY FIRST TIME EVER, everyone can hear me and I don’t have to yell or repeat myself. Automated systems and rude operators all hear me clearly. I feel reborn with this headset. It makes me feel like a secret agent with the best communication gear on the planet.

…just call me double “O”, I got a license for killer phone calls!!!

As for the ear gels, truth be told, I have not had that problem but I will definitely keep a lookout for it. I thought it could be a batch thing but if you are constantly buying every 3 months, it seems more an issue with build quality than anything else.

I purchased my Z9 in March ‘08 at my local Best Buy and thought it was a great product right out of the box. While searching reviews of the headset, no one mentioned anything about the ear gel until I got to mobilecityonline.com and read some user’s feedback. I read the gel falls apart after three months and you’re stuck shelling out $10 for a new one. Since this was a brand new unit, I figured these folks were just bitching and mine would be fine. Well, literally three months to the day of buying it, my ear gel began “melting off”. The hard rubber softened after three months and rolled off the plastic mold to the point of it being unusable and, in fact, uncomfortable. After speaking with Blue Ant tech support, I was told they didn’t have any in stock but to go to the website noted above to order them. MobileCityOnLine also didn’t have any but I was able to make a back order order so when it came in, they would then bill my charge card and send it. Luckily, it was about two weeks and they sent it to me. I’m glad I was able to get the gel, but wasn’t happy to spend the ten bucks.

So that was in June. In August the new gel started doing the same thing (softening and peeling off) and I had to reorder another, except this time I got two, at another $20. Then, as you would only guess, in late October (again three months later) the one I put on in August deteriorated and I had to put the next one on, which was really frustrating.

However, as luck would have it, the tie clip on the Z9 broke early in November and I reached out to BlueAnt once again. They were as nice as could be and asked me to send the unit and original receipt back to them for review. I could keep the ear gel I replaced, but just had to send back the unit itself, not the charger, cable, ear hooks, or anything else. Once BlueAnt received it, they stood by their two year warranty and sent me a new Z9i (no more Z9s in production) and I’m using it as of a couple of days ago. I had replaced the sent back Z9 with a Moto H680 knowing full well I would return it once I got the new BlueAnt, and I can only tell you the people with whom I speak are so happy. Man, that Moto was awful.

So, the bottom line is this – the BA is great and I wouldn’t trade it for the world (had the original JawBone before the Z9 and couldn’t stand it because of fit). BlueAnt, the company, was stand up, too. However, I’m stuck shelling out $10 every three months for a new ear gel. I don’t like it, but if I want to use this product, that may be the cost of doing business, unless something serious comes along that can compete with the BlueAnt. But until then, my budget calls for $40/year for eargels.