TV evenings can become a real relationship test. And that’s when one of the viewers wants to hear louder than the other. With its TV Clear earphones, the audio specialist Sennheiser now offers a way out that fully serves its purpose. And yet the test shows that no cinema sound is possible with it.
At first glance, the TV Clear looks like many other true wireless headphones, which are actually earphones that connect wirelessly to an audio source via Bluetooth. The TV Clear also do this when you take them out of the charging and storage box and pair them once with a smartphone, for example.
The user has to find the right fit for the earphones himself using the supplied silicone attachments in three different sizes. They are then fixed to the ear with their small curved rubber wings, which are also attached to the attachments. It works well, securely and is comfortable to wear for hours, because an earphone doesn’t even weigh seven grams.
The highlight, however, is a small radio transmitter that is plugged into the jack or the optical input of the television. However, we still had to go into the TV settings to manually switch the audio signal from Dolby to PCM. But then the sound came to the earphones. Sennheiser uses its own radio streaming technology here, which ensures that the latency remains as low as possible so that the audio and video content remain in sync.
However, the TV Clear should first be connected to the smartphone before using it for the first time. Because in a separate app, some settings can be made that are helpful. On the one hand, there is a speech intelligibility program that allows high-frequency amplification in five stages by up to 20 decibels. Here the user should choose the best option for himself, which can also be checked with a sample song.
The regulation of the control, which is carried out directly via a push button on the left (quieter) and right (louder) earphones, is a clever solution. But there’s another control option, triggered by double-tapping the earbud socket.
What then happens left and right can be specified in the app. Choices include skipping to the next or previous track, pausing and playing music, and a transparency mode. In addition, the smartphone voice assistant and the announcement of the battery status can also be selected on the right side.
But the most important thing is the transparency mode, the strength of which can also be adjusted. Because if you watch TV together, you might want to have a chat every now and then. We found the transparency mode to be better than many other earbuds on the market.
But when it comes to television, it’s more of a nuisance because it unnaturally amplifies the hissing sounds. In practice, you would switch him on with a double tap if you wanted to talk. Unfortunately, the TV Clear does not make an announcement after a double tap as to whether it has been switched on or off.
Conclusion: The TV Clear are really only suitable for watching TV. There you can select a higher volume on your earphones, regardless of the set volume of the TV set. The speech intelligibility program can also be used to amplify the dialogues separately. That’s all good.
However, we found the bass to be a little weak. It doesn’t bother you too much when watching TV. But when listening to music. Significantly cheaper earphones also produce a better sound. Especially since the TV Clear also do without active noise suppression. The TV Clear costs 399 euros. For this price we would have wished for more punch.
And if you have connected your TV set to a surround system at home, you have to do without the cinema sound with the TV Clear, because only stereo is possible here. Unfortunately, the necessary conversion of the audio signal on the television to PCM also means that a connected sound system no longer reproduces the better Dolby sound. If the earphones are only used with the radio transmitter while watching TV, they last about 15 hours. The charging case can recharge them 1.5 times.
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