Poly Voyager Focus 2 Headset — Launch Review
Your open office…or home office…partner in clarity (and maybe sanity)
Disclosure: This headset was provided to me by Poly for purposes of review. Poly and its employees have not seen this review in any form prior to public release, they have no editorial control over this review, and I was under no obligation to state anything other than my own opinions.
Like many people in IT, when COVID-19 hit I switched to working at home full-time. Much of my time in my previous job was spent on large conference calls where I’d barely say a word, so using my desktop video endpoint with a closed office door sufficed just fine. Ah, the joy of huge companies.
Fast forward to 2021.
We’ve added a second dog to the house, and unlike our Siberian Husky this one is a Labrador who is part Velcro; closed doors now only work if I don’t mind a neurotic dog. I’ve also changed jobs into a customer-facing architect role at a new company (permanently based at home), and now I need to be heard on most calls rather than just sitting on mute.
Enter the Voyager Focus 2 from Poly.
Unboxing
Let’s talk about what comes in the box. My unit came with the headset itself, a USB-A dongle for use with my PC, a soft protective (I hesitate to say “carrying”) case, and a headset charging stand (also with a USB-A connector). Mine is the “UC Standard USB-A” version.
I have long been a raving fan of the Plantronics (now Poly) Voyager Legend and 5200 headsets for use with my mobile phones. Their mic technology borders on Harry Potter level magic, even when sitting in a crowded airport. At first glance, the Focus 2’s heritage is very apparent. The boom mic is a scaled-up version of the mic on the 5200, right down to the mute button near the hinge.
The BT700 bluetooth dongle is small enough to be unobtrusive, although it’s not entirely flush (nor would I expect it to be…antennas take space). It does have a LED which shows you the status of your connection, including turning red when on mute.
The charging stand works well enough, and if you’ve had a headset from any major manufacturer in the last decade you’ll recognize the form factor. I do appreciate that it has a USB-A connector for power to the stand; I was able to plug it into one of my open USB charging ports and didn’t have to waste time fishing yet another wall wart to a power strip.
The case seems a little like an afterthought. It’s basically a neoprene zipper pouch. You need to fold the earpieces flat to put it in the case, and there’s no real padding to speak of. I would be very cautious about just throwing it in my backpack. Still, it’s better than the abomination that Apple provided with my AirPods Max…
However if you’re cautious or need a case to keep the headset clean and out of the way, it will work just fine.
Design & Comfort
The headset itself is an on-the-ear style with two earpieces, of course, since one of its biggest features is the ANC / noise cancelling technology.
I’ll say upfront that I have a big head. Huge. A massive melon. I had no problem getting the headset to fit, and I even had a couple of clicks to spare. The suspension band at the top of the headset works surprisingly well to keep things light on the top of your head, although to be fair the headset itself is extremely light to begin with. Clamping pressure is enough to keep the headset nicely in place as long as you don’t start headbanging on a call, but not enough to press uncomfortably inward. I did eventually experience some discomfort after a few hours, but that’s normal and expected for me with any on-ear headset due to my current pair of glasses. I do not consider it to be a design flaw, and the pressure is far more comfortable than competing units I’ve tried (Cisco, you really need to take notes here before you make another vise that looks like a headset…).
My headset came synced to the BT700 dongle, so after charging the headset I fired up my PC and turned it on. In a perfect coincidence, I had a week full of orientation sessions for my new company during this review, so I spent a lot of hours with the Voyager Focus 2 on my head in a few different rooms and environments.
Power is a solid on/off switch on the lower half of the mic side, with ANC settings controlled via a similar three position switch on the upper half. The boom mic itself has a mute button close to the hinge similar to the Voyager mobile headsets. It also mutes automatically if you flip the mic vertical and then unmutes when lowered back down toward your mouth.
That covers the physical basics…now on to the $329 (stated retail price) question: how does it actually perform?
Performance
A note as I jump into this section: I used the headset primarily with the Pexip video client and also with Microsoft Teams, but I’d expect similar performance in any collaboration software.
Let’s start with inbound audio. I had zero breakup of signal anywhere in my house on the main level, which sounds really impressive but in reality only covers about 75’ of total range. That said, it IS really impressive, because most Bluetooth devices here tend to drop out due to walls / doors / dogs / whatever else gets in the way. I didn’t experience any dropouts with the Voyager Focus 2.
ANC worked very well for its purpose. Does it match up to my Sony WH-1000MX4 or Apple AirPod Max headphones for noise cancelling? Of course not. But…different tools for different purposes. The Focus 2 isn’t going to cut airplane noise so you can take a nap, but it will cut out your dogs (or kids) whining, the vacuum and TV on in the background, the lawn crew across the street, and I’d assume your annoying coworkers if you are ever in an office environment again. It also nicely cut out my office fan and the air conditioner. I didn’t notice a ton of difference between the mid and high settings, but it did seem to get more aggressive in high and I left it there most of the time. I’ll have to test it again once we are allowed back out into the world.
As for the mic, not once did I have a single complaint from a far end participant. No requests to repeat myself, no problem carrying on a conversation even amidst the clamoring from two dogs when the doorbell rang. I inquired from a few colleagues (tricky since I couldn’t let on that this was an unreleased unit at the time…so I just stated I had a new headset and left it at that) and all of them said my audio was very clear. I did do an unscientific test by recording myself, and indeed it was clear, with no discernible background noise to be heard even with a fan running three feet away.
Caveats
This wouldn’t be a true review without at least a little weirdness. I experienced a very odd situation where I could not get the headset to unmute properly in the Pexip app without the Poly Lens software running on my PC. As soon as the Pexip app took control of the headset audio, the headset would mute and could not be unmuted until the Poly Lens app was started. This could very well be due to how Windows or Pexip handle exclusive use of the device.
That said, I don’t consider this to actually be a big deal, because you really, really, really want the Poly Lens app on your PC. In addition to getting firmware updates you can modify all of your headset settings through the app, and there are lots of options. Want a voice prompt every five minutes to remind you you’re muted? You can set that in the app. Want to change your voice prompts to soft beeps? You can set that in the app. Sidetone levels, ring settings, answer on pickup…it’s all there in the app. The app will also automatically start with Windows so it’s ready and waiting for you. That made my odd muting experience above into a non-issue for practical use.
The only thing I wish is that the high setting for sidetone volume was a bit louder since with ANC it’s very difficult to hear my own voice, but I’m also used to loud self-monitoring when I do things like podcasting. It’s not a bug by any means, it’s just a personal preference.
Battery, Controls, & Misc.
I have not performed a full battery run-dead test yet, but I can say that I never saw the battery percentage in Poly Lens drop below 50%, and that includes after a full day of heavy use. Most days I would use the headset for an hour or two, throw it on the stand for an hour, use it again, etc. and those days it stayed at 75-100% in Lens.
I also didn’t do much testing of the on-headset controls beyond mute, although they did seem to work as expected when I did try volume adjustments. I do not have the Microsoft Teams-specific version of the headset so I cannot comment on that functionality, but I experienced no problems using the regular version with Teams on my PC.
I know Poly claims that the headset can be used for music. I’ll be honest, that was not a focus of my testing. I’m an audiophile, and specifically a HEADPHONE audiophile, so my standards for headphone audio are insanely high. I’ll say that it was certainly better when listening to things like YouTube than I would have expected a UC headset to be.
Random Thoughts and Conclusion
I know much will be made of the ANC and inbound audio quality in marketing materials, but do not discount the importance of the microphone technology. Poly is calling it “Acoustic Fence”, but it seems to basically build on the excellent mic tech that Plantronics has used in similar booms for the last few years. That is not a bad thing…over dozens of airports and tens of thousands of miles I have never found a headset mic that performed as well as those units, so I’m thrilled to see it continued and updated here.
In total, I had about a week to test the Voyager Focus 2 before public release and the publication of this review. I’ve been very pleased with the performance during my daily use and I will continue to use it as a daily driver. I’ll give an extended use update down the road, but for now I’ll say that the Voyager Focus 2 looks to be a very solid addition to the Poly lineup, and the excellent Plantronics heritage is immediately apparent in the audio quality in both directions.
I’d recommend it without any hesitation.
