Page 2 - Physical Look - Hardware
Like all true wireless earphones, 1MORE provides a carrying case that doubles as a charger for the earbuds. The charging case is consistent with the overall color scheme of our white 1MORE ColorBuds 2 True Wireless, which has a matte white finish with 1MORE's logo on top. Both its shape and design are quite conservative looking like an egg, but I am not complaining. I prefer a matte finish compared to the glossy one like my ColorBuds True Wireless, mainly because the glossy finish will attract fingerprints and scratches will be more obvious. It measures in at 3.8 cm in height, 6.0 cm in width, 3.0 cm in depth, which is identical to the original ColorBuds. It does weigh an extra 4g with the earphones in at and weighs 44.3g though. This makes the ColorBuds 2 compact and can be conveniently carried in a bag or jacket pocket. In front, there is one multicolor LED to indicate the current charge status, which is green for full battery, orange for medium battery, and red for low battery. It glows red when it the charging case is plugged in and charging and turns off when charging is complete. It will also flash red if the charging case's battery is too low.
Each piece of the ColorBuds 2 True Wireless has a 55mAh built-in battery for up to 6 and 8 hours of battery life for ANC on and off, respectively, at 50% volume. Do keep in mind there is no true ANC off mode on the ColorBuds 2; the only options you have are ANC on or passthrough mode. They weigh 4.9g each and measures in at 27mm by 21mm by 20mm at its largest dimensions, just like the original ColorBuds. They take approximately 70 minutes to charge using the charging case and a 15-minute charge adds an extra 2 hours of play time. The charging case supports up to three recharge cycles, or an additional 12 and 16 hours of music with ANC on and off, respectively, for the earbuds with its 410mAh internal battery. The charging case itself also takes about 85 minutes to charge via its USB Type-C port. I am very happy to see a USB Type-C port, given it is 2022. In addition, the charging case also supports 5W Qi wireless charging, which is awesome. From my experience, the ANC on estimate seems to be right on point since I got 6.1 hours at 50% volume from my tests. However, I got the exact same result using passthrough mode, which fell short of the estimate by a couple of hours.
The 1MORE ColorBuds 2 True Wireless earbuds are revealed once you flip open the top of the charging case. The pairing occurs as soon as the case lid is opened rather than when the earbuds are removed from the case, making the process faster. The earbuds have a simple and clean appearance in a good way, where the exposed portion comes in a translucent white finish with 1MORE's logo on the outside. I am a fan of its understated look, which looks exactly the same as its predecessor, and it works very well in not calling too much attention to itself in day-to-day use. Adjacent to the 1MORE logo is also where a small indicator LED is located to indicate its charge or pairing status. This is also where the outside microphone for identifying environmental noise is located. The LED lights up white so indicate its charge or pairing status. A pair button in located between the earbud cavities.
The 1MORE ColorBuds 2 True Wireless earphones connect to your audio source device via Bluetooth 5.2 using a Qualcomm chip. Protocols supported over Bluetooth 5.2 include aptX Adaptive, AAC, and SBC. SBC, or Subband Coding, is the default Bluetooth audio codec with reasonably good audio quality and low processing power requirements. aptX Adaptive is the latest version of aptX that promises a dynamic low latency mode, adaptive bit rate, and high-resolution audio. In case you are asking, Apple devices does not support aptX, but many Android devices do. Fortunately, for Apple users, the ColorBuds 2 True Wireless supports AAC as well, which communicates at about 250kbps from the source.
Each side of the 1MORE ColorBuds 2 True Wireless will automatically turn on once you open the case. As you can see in our photo above, since there are no wires, 1MORE uses a triplet of pogo pins on each side to keep those electrons flowing when it is inside the charging case. You can use these earbuds in mono or stereo mode, and it will indicate using different sounds in your ears the battery and connection status for each earbud. The ColorBuds 2 supports Qualcomm TrueWireless Mirroring, which allows the user to seamlessly swap between listening to one or both of earbuds.
The design of these earbuds is symmetrical and the capacitive tap controls on both sides have similar functions in order to facilitate its mono mode support. Each side can be used to control the voice assistant, calls, and music. I found the tap controls to work quite well. I never had a problem with accidental activation, since it requires a double tap or a touch-and-hold to do anything. Each side can be used to play/pause, answer/end call, activate voice control, and switching listening modes. Both earbuds also feature two microphones each -- one on the outside for detecting environmental noise and one on the inside for capturing your voice -- for a total of four, with cVc 8.0 environmental noise cancellation to improve voice call quality, which we will see how they perform on the next page. Since the ColorBuds 2 have an ergonomic shape identical to the original ColorBuds and are so small and light, they feel very comfortable. I could almost forget they are in my ears. I found its fit to be very good as well. When I am running, they do not lose its seal easily. Through my extensive testing, they have never fallen out of my ears. I tried shaking them out and they simply will not go anywhere.
Taking off the sleeves reveal its 7mm dynamic driver with graphene film. Its frequency response and output power were not given. Its 32Ω impedance is a bit higher than the original ColorBuds' 22Ω impedance though. 1MORE claims these drivers provide "rich, detailed sound and satisfying bass performance", which I will discuss in my auditioning results in just a moment. You can create custom sound profiles, called SoundID, to your preference in the 1MORE app. The drivers aim directly into your ear for a more direct and transparent sound reproduction characteristic like many modern in-ear monitors. At the same time, it makes the earphones much easier to clean in the long run too. The circular-shaped acoustic tubes via the sleeves assist the aim into the user's ear canals, and since these earphones are designed for a closed configuration, the ColorBuds 2 True Wireless are made for both active and passive noise canceling.
Adjacent to the drivers, next to the pogo pin contacts, are infrared sensors on both sides. They detect whether the earphones are in your ears or not and will pause your music automatically when you take them out. This feature works very well from my experience. The 1MORE ColorBuds 2 True Wireless are also IPX5 certified for water and sweat resistance.
With all this in mind, how will they perform? As always, we have the entire Page 3 dedicated to presenting our auditioning results.
Page Index
1. Introduction, Packaging, Specifications
2. Physical Look - Hardware
3. Subjective Audio Analysis
4. Conclusion
