So Nothing really isn’t the typical revealer when it comes to product launches.
They’d first of all set up several publications where you have to decipher for yourself what product’s knocking.
In fact, at this point I feel like a master safe cracker if I manage to guess any of the products right from the teaser images.
That happened with the Ear (3a) launch as well, a product that currently is and has been in my custody for the closest to 4 weeks now. And trust me when I say I’ve 90% listened to audio with this throughout the period.
The only few times I’m not using it is when I’m with my wireless “wired” earbud outside the house, which is pretty much the safe thing to do as it’s got “wires” that cling to my neck since I’ve lost countless earbud cases by just taking them on outside routines (leaving me with lots of orphaned buds laying around).
And on top of that, I couldn’t keep up with constantly taking the Ear (3a) out for reasons I will discuss any second from now.
When I first got it, honestly I appreciated the craftsmanship.
Nothing being known for their obsession with transparent tech in their smartphones also gave away some of that DNA into this earphone.
The unboxing experience is clean and minimal, but not the fullest because why am I missing a USB cable?
Might not sound like a big deal, but I mean, what if we just get it.
A compensation comes in the form of the ear tips that are packed in a variety of sizes, depending on which is suitable for your ear canal. Personally, I just use all of them in order of which one gets lost first. Thankfully I find some grip across all sizes.
I don’t know why Nothing made us ruin the box during unboxing because the seal just tears out one side of the case instead of like a top opener.
Because this is like the most well done earbuds package I’ve personally handled, since a lot of manufacturers would not bother, of course, as it’s a bunch of earphones that are cheap or people won’t pay attention to. This box has got style.
Prior to getting the earphone, I actually resonated between yellow and white immediately the promotional materials for the colors were released.
I have “Nothing” against the other colors, I just think these two stand out better.
Also, Pink is pretty saturated as it’s what everyone on social media was posting at the time. Good to welcome a fresh color.
Luckily, I hit the jackpot by getting sent the primary choice.
I already knew what to expect from the pictures.
But holding it brought the reality of the situation.
Really cute, pebble shaped, aesthetic, and well done with how the color pops and the subtle reflective hints of yellow around the glass lid edges.
Half of that excitement goes away realizing it could just break, like anytime, you’re just one clumsy drop away.
I would’ve given it a shot at some heavily intentional durability drops, but I’m not JerryRig rich, so my sentiment stays a feeling currently.
So far I tried as much as possible to prevent or minimize as many accidental drops as this could get, which even became harder because of the glassy top and tricky build.
You can go around with these during the most normal parts of the day when the hand is all dry and sunshine.
My experience is when the palms dampen from sweat and moisture, not only will this kiss the floor more, but it will also be as hard to open as your can of coke right after you’ve trimmed your nails. You get the point.
It’s usually a tough ride, so within these thirty days, it was a routine of first wiping with my cloth or just leaving the buds briefly in my pockets instead of the case when I needed to take them out for a pause.
The back material too can get scratchy quickly, so it’s best to avoid rubbing it too much on wooden surfaces or anything like that, so over time it doesn’t move from world class good looking to something that came out of retirement from kindergarten.
That’s pretty much the observed frustration from my own experience.
A beauty and the beast situation.
With the case, you get these very small LED lights that seem divided into three.
With the Glyph Bar in the phone (4a) becoming a thing just some months ago, you might want to call it the same. But Nothing says nope.
Though it does have a special functionality behind it, aside from working as a traditional charging indicator light bar, it also acts as a battery bar for the case, so you know how much is left without guessing.
But of course, I know your phone’s Bluetooth and the Nothing X app can also tell you that. Still good to have when it’s just you and the case without the phone.
Now let’s talk sound, where probably anyone thinking of upgrading from the past product or attempting to for the first time will crave more emphasis on.
This is actually the first audio product I’m having from Nothing.
I have been updating my Nothing portfolio starting over a year ago, since these items aren’t really common in Africa like overseas, so I usually get my chances through these review programs, thanks to the community team every time.
And to Carl and Nothing, maybe Africa is added on the map of future stores, perhaps.
Using the Phone 3, Phone 4a, etc. feels like alien tech to day to day people when it’s not retailed there, especially ones as fancy as Nothing’s catalogue.
Anyone who imports regional items, you understand.
Being an audiophile myself with a substantial history cutting across earbuds in different categories, this one still made its own unique impression.
Prior to this, I was riding with the Oppo Enco X2, and since switching, it doesn’t feel like I’ve missed on any of the details I’ve gotten on previous earbuds tiered around this pricing mark.
The default sound initially is okay for someone who isn’t into the nit bits of prioritizing some sound profiles over the other and just wants sound.
But I felt some misses with the bass and got working with the Nothing X app.
In the app, you are greeted with a simple and intuitive interface that no one needs to go looking for a tutorial on how to navigate. You just click under Equalizer where you have three segments for customization.
The first one is the simplest form where depending on the track, you can always bounce in to adjust the curve to what suits your sound.
For example, most R&Bs could do with Voice and Treble.
Instrumentals could do with Bass.
Or you just hit on Custom and drag the blob to manipulate the numbers in a more personalized format. Make sure you have your sound choice playing to help you decide how you’ll want similar sounds in the same genre to come out, basically serving as a template.
But again, if you just want a fine line equally across all frequencies, the default “Balanced” is still the way to go.
For people with a more advanced insight on how to control their sound, the “Advanced” section offers a more complex approach, but not very math level difficult. You get this mixer interface with frequency sliders that lets you shift between frequencies and decide which should be most prominent. People in the sound game would get more insight with this, but again you don’t need to know what you’re doing because it’s not that serious.
Just actually have your song playing and keep shifting around everything like an imaginary DJ till you find a balance. And you can do that again and again for as many genres, making sure you save each customization so you can switch easily and not have to redo the same thing over again.
The “Explore” section is pretty much just a few already made profiles you can choose to use instead of designing yours.
What’s even better is you can share and import from other users as well, since Nothing has always revolved around community, experiences, building, and interactions, like with the photo preset sharing on their smartphones. You can always experiment on curated sound profiles from other Ear (3a) users by importing their QR code, and you can share yours as well by exporting.
Overall, the sound quality is great.
It would’ve been half as great without the customization, so knowing I can personalize my listening experience with different approaches already elevates the bar with this from earbuds around the same pricing category.
The Noise Cancellation is actually functional. For those not familiar with ANC (Active Noise Cancellation), it’s just a feature designed to block out and filter external ambient noises away from your listening or idle experience. Like most times, even without sound on and I just want less external ambience coming in, I just use my earphones with ANC on.
The app has three customization modes, and on Noise Cancellation you can select out of four different options to decide between the intensity.
With our standing fan running and blowing loud, I couldn’t really tell the difference from mid to Adaptive because it all just feels like they block out noise the same. So you get the most difference with the leap from Low to Adaptive.
Transparency is for those times you would want to hear something that was previously blocked out.
So instead of turning the ANC off, just use Transparency to allow dominant ambiance back into your ears. Like someone suddenly calling you out or you’re trying to fact check if the rain suddenly started falling outside.
Maybe less of a dissatisfaction, more like “listening fatigue”, I feel there should be a way to toggle off the voice effects of sighing and thumping that occurs when you move between the noise cancellation frequencies.
Initially, it could be exciting because no earbud I’ve used gave a way for such an extra feature. Now the fact you get to hear it over and over, including that it pauses the playing sound for one second just to “sigh” is as not so cool as hearing your TV console read the menu options every time you navigate. But at least on TV you can turn it off.
Spatial audio is just an extension of trying to immerse you into the sound like the equalizer does.
But bad news, you can’t use your custom equalizer profile with the spatial audio at the same time. You’ve got to choose one.
A somewhat breakout feature I believe is the new audio Snapshot recording for all audios and calls.
I already read through the brief even before the earbuds came in, I’ve experimented on it, and yeah, this is definitely not something I would convert into practical use.
Like with earbuds, I only care about great sound, music, and partially ANC. These other features are just the gimmicks of the earphone world.
The Snapshot works by first observing the controls to see what to press or customizing what to press.
For mine I have to pinch both buds.
And doing that triggers a recording that can last a maximum of 60 seconds. Even if these things were to be considered for actual use, limits like these already establish as deal breakers for situational reasons.
You can customize from when to start recording, all the way from 30 seconds back of the audio. This part is sure impressive, like recording back in time or something.
But I’ve tried to see cases where I’d need this. I’m not much of a call person, and why would I want to record a conversation unless it’s a non existent girlfriend singing me the best happy birthday song I would want to save and cherish forever, or maybe anything else around a similar route or “preserving memories”. I wouldn’t want to record a snippet of music when I could just rewind back and listen.
For anyone who finds a home with this feature, it’ll be interesting to discover your use cases nonetheless.
There is a caveat by the way.
Nothing offers you tiers for their transcription model with the recordings, something you’d have to start paying for when you eventually exhaust the trial stage of the Pro model, if you feel it’s something you would want to continue with.
I’m glad it came with Dual Connection, which is something missing from some earbuds even in such modern times.
It usually comes in handy for someone like me working around with multiple devices. Maybe I’m watching a video on one and editing on the other, there is that seamless switch whenever audio resumes playing on either device.
A lot of people might be tempted to use this for gaming. I don’t know about your preference when it comes to latency, but the Ear (3a) did have just a slight delay on that part for shooting games, CODM specifically.
You know when you pop a couple of gun rounds and feel it only sounded split seconds after. Not very significant to alter the gaming experience, at least for the average Joe like me who rarely notices small misses like that. But for people who game for the life of it, you may have some discrepancies in this segment. Is it usable? Sure is.
Battery fares really great on the earbuds. Initially, it was me just randomly plugging and using like I normally do, and I didn’t care less to study the lasting hours.
Recently I’ve been more conscious, I’ve been using and draining entirely before charging, and I’m definitely impressed.
On a YouTube live program last week that stretched for over 3 hours, I used one of the pairs from 100%, and at the end of the session I had clearly 29% still available.
Same can be said for movies and long music sessions. That basically covers full lengths for almost any activity without doing “plug and wear” every time it sings low battery.
Even on low battery, charging is absurdly fast as well.
A few minutes worth of charge can deliver hours of usage, plus the case lasts pretty long too.
The last time, I used it entirely with the buds (discharge earbuds, put back in the case) mildly for up to 3 days before revisiting my charging cable again. Solid ground holder in the battery department.
.
.
.
That’s about it with the Ear (3a) from a full month perspective.
I probably went long with this review, I get it, talkative much.
But it’s just me talking through the experience rather than documenting stiffly.
I’m definitely taking these further into the year, and if probably anything like an update worth sharing comes up, I will sure communicate the changes.
And yeah, I’m definitely keeping these more for indoor use, not entirely because of my differences with the build, but for the inevitable fact that I may lose it anytime if I keep bringing it out on trips, like I’ve literally done with the others before it.
And I don’t want to lose something this good looking. At least not anytime soon.
