Page 2 - Physical Look - Hardware and Software
Like its predecessors, the Creative Outlier Pro earphones are made out of hard plastic. Because of this, fingerprints are easily left on the surface. The exterior color scheme consists of a mix of white and grey. Both earbuds have the Creative logo in grey facing outside placed on the side. The overall size of the Creative Outlier Pro is a little larger than the Outlier Air V2 and Outlier Air. The earbuds weigh 7g each or 14g for both, but it does not feel too heavy due to its dimensions. Ultimately, the exterior of the Creative Outlier Pro is solidly built. While I wish more work had been done to prevent fingerprints and oil marks from appearing, I do like the sleek look of the metallic grey color.
Like the Creative Outlier Air V2, the Outlier Pro has tap controls. These touch controls work differently for three different modes: Playback, pause, and call. When it comes to playback mode, several combinations can be used for the Play/Pause, Next, Previous Track commands. Noise control can be modified by double tapping the left earbud -- this will toggle between active noise control, ambient mode, or just having neither mode on. Play/Pause can be done by tapping the right earbud twice. Tapping the right earbud three times will skip to the next track, while tapping the left earbud three times will rewind to the previous track. Holding your finger on the left earbud will gradually lower the volume, while holding your finger on the right earbud will raise the volume. As with previous Creative earbuds, when in pause mode, tapping earbuds would bring up Siri, Google Assistant, or Bixby, depending on what phone you are connected to. Holding your finger on either earbud in this case will put them into pairing mode. When it comes to call mode, tapping the left earbud twice will answer a call, while tapping the right earbud twice will decline or hang up a call. Holding your finger on either earbud for three seconds will end the call. Finally, holding your finger for a longer period on the left or right earbud will lower or increase the call volume, respectively. It should be noted that you must have your fingers directly on the shell outside the earphones -- the commands will not register if your finger falls anywhere else. You can add these voice assistant commands in the Creative application, which is available for download in the Google Play store and iOS App Store. I found these controls to be very intuitive and easy to use. Overall, lightly tapping the outside shell of the earbuds proved to be a comfortable experience when dealing with controls.
The Creative Outlier Pro utilizes Bluetooth 5.2 to connect to your electronic devices. Like with its predecessor, the supported codecs for the Outlier Pro are SBC and AAC. Subband Coding, or SBC, is the default Bluetooth audio codec with reasonable audio quality and low processing power requirements, maxing out at 328 kbps. AAC, or Advanced Audio Coding, works better for Apple devices and maxes out at 250 kbps. However, AAC is still known for better sound quality despite the lower wireless data transfer rate.
Looking closer at the Creative Outlier Pro, we can see the size of the wireless in-ear monitors compared to the tips. Each earbud uses a 10mm neodymium driver with a graphene-coated diaphragm. These are rated for a frequency response of 20Hz to 20kHz, which is the normal hearing range for humans. The company also advertises Super X-Fi technology for sound enhancement. The silicone sleeves on the drivers serve the purpose of creating a passive noise canceling effect along with aiming at the user’s ear canals. This is also true for the drivers, which are pointed straight into your ear for sound reproduction. These sleeves come in two different sizes and styles, including a flatter tip and a more normal tip. These earbuds are also IPX5 rated, meaning they are protected from a light water spray from any angle. This is great for rain and sweat, which is those looking to listen to their favorite jams while running or performing other outdoor activities. Of course, unlike the Creative Outlier Air V2, the Outlier Pro also has active noise cancellation. This will allow for the elimination of unwanted noise, although this will drain the battery quicker.
Each side of the Creative Outlier Pro contains two pogo pin pads to charge the set when inside the case. We also have some magnets inside to hold the pair of earphones inside its charging case. This will prevent the earbuds from falling out, which is something I found very helpful on many outings. Printed “L” and “R” letters can be found near the pin pads on their respective earbuds to indicate to users which ear the earbuds should enter. Flipping over the earbuds, we can see a large white ring around the matte plastic, similar in look to its predecessors. There are LEDs under these rings that will flash red and blue, which is dependent on the status. Flashing red indicates that earbuds are in the middle of pairing, and solid blue indicates that the earbuds have successfully paired to a device. Each earbud also contains three microphones for picking up voice during calls, although this is not seen in the photos. We will test this on the next page.
Like its predecessor, the carrying case is made out of metal and plastic. The metal feels very solid and is a design choice I am glad they kept. It has a nice cold feeling when grabbing it. The case dimensions measure 82mm in length, 45.9mm in width, and 30.8mm in height when closed. The case opens from the right side to show the placement positions for both earbuds. We also have three pinhole LEDs on the right side with a USB Type-C input for charging. This slightly differs from the Creative Outlier Air, which had four pinhole LEDs. The three LEDs indicate the battery status for the charging status of the left ear, battery life of the case, and charging status of the right ear, respectively. In addition to USB Type-C, the case also supports Qi wireless charging.
The Creative Outlier Pro uses lithium polymer batteries for its earbuds and carrying case. Each earbud has an 85mAh battery inside, while the case has a 900mAh battery, which is double the rated battery capacity of the Outlier Air V2 carrying case. Creative has advertised these earbuds to last 15 hours on one charge, which is three hours longer than the Outlier Air V2. In my day-to-day use, I got about 17 hours at 50% volume with active noise cancellation turned off, which is both more than the ratings and my expectations. You can get four total charges with the carrying case, so the total time comes out to just over 68 hours, which is a good amount of playtime and a vast improvement over its predecessors. Turning ANC on will reduce the battery life by 33%.
The pairing process for the Creative Outlier Pro works in a similar way as other Bluetooth earbuds out on the market. Both earbuds must be removed from the charging case first, and your connecting device should have Bluetooth on. From there, you should be able to find the Creative Outlier Pro for pairing. After that, the pairing is finished. Like its predecessors, Android devices will only report the battery life of the primary earbuds, which is the side that gets paired first. As a result, the primary side will have its battery drained faster than the secondary side.
The Creative application is available on the Google Play Store and the Apple App Store for users to download to your mobile device. On the main page, you can view the battery life of both earbuds along with three options for equalizer settings, noise controls, and custom buttons.
The equalizer options allow you to adjust the bass and treble settings for the earbuds on a scale from -9 to +9. You can also set the flat scale for the equalizer to your liking based on however much you like with a pretty reasonable scale. You will have to choose to enable the master equalizer first though in order to adjust any of these settings though.
The noise controls are fairly straight forward to adjust. You will first have the option of being able to choose between active noise cancellation mode, ambient mode, or neither. When in either mode, you can choose the scale of how heavy the noise cancellation should be.
The last option is the custom buttons. These are the tap controls on the earbuds, and what is mentioned above is the default settings. However, you can choose to re-map these to your liking if you are used to different tap controls from different earbud configurations. For example, the default settings do not have voice assist, so if you are used to having voice assist on your earbuds, you can map that to tap controls using the Creative application.
Page Index
1. Introduction, Packaging, Specifications
2. Physical Look - Hardware
3. Subjective Audio Analysis
4. Conclusion
