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The Slick - But Flawed - Treblab X5 Earbuds - Reviewed!
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May 29, 2025
[Updated for new X5 model!] Everyone wants great sound without wires of any sort. Nothing around your neck, nothing sitting on the top of your head. But creating the perfect wireless bluetooth earbuds is a pretty tricky task. Treblab comes close with the Treblab X5, but as tech expert Dave Taylor of https://www.AskDaveTaylor.com/ finds, it's not quite perfect. Still, if you're in the market for wireless bluetooth earbuds, the Treblab X5 are going to be on your short list. Here's how they work, what's great about them and what you need to know before you click "Buy". NOTE: Trelab updated the X5 in June 2020 with lots of improvements: • Bluetooth 5.0 - more stable and faster connection • Two-step pairing - just press the button and take the earbuds from the case • CVC 8.0 - a clearer voice with batter noise cancellation • New design of ear fins for a better and more comfortable fit • New 8.2 mm drivers for crisp and balanced sound You can find the new X5 on Amazon here: https://amzn.to/30tayPa
View Video Transcript
0:00
wireless earbuds but are they any good
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let's have a listen Dave Taylor here and
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I'm looking at these well let me open up
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the box I'm actually looking at these
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these are the trail AB x5 true wireless
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Bluetooth earbuds and there's a lot to
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like about these these are the 2018
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redesign of the x2 and they've really
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tweaked it a lot and gotten a lot of it
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right
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they feature beryllium drivers and a
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c.b.c passive noise cancellation system
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which honestly I don't know what this
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whole CVC thing is because basically if
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you put something in your ears you hear
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less of the environment around you
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that's about what it does unless you
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have active noise canceling so they do
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come with a lot of different ear hooks
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and ear tips and it's always important
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to get the right sized ear tip to make
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sure that it's fitting your ear properly
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that makes a world of difference with
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the sound and here's one thing that's a
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little bit tricky is that when you take
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them out the one on the right goes in
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your left ear and the one on the left
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you guessed it goes in your right ear
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which takes a tiny bit of getting used
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to because I keep looking at it and
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thinking well if I pull it out on the
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right it should go on my right ear that
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is not work properly now you can take
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the ear part off the tip if you'd like I
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actually tend to do that I don't really
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like these but it does if it fits you
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and it works right it does give you a
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more secure fit which is great if you're
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gonna go for a run or you're gonna go to
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the gym or something so all that's
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really good and one of the other things
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I like about these is they have actual
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discreet buttons on them they have
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actual buttons so you're not just
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guessing and tapping and hoping
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something's gonna occur so on the right
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you have power or sorry volume up and
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volume down and the upper button always
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doubles as a power button so if I push
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and hold it then I will actually have
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this one turn on and then the left one
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is next in previous or answer and hang
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up on a phone call and again
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the top button doubles as power so for
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me to be able to get these up and
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running with my Apple iPhone is I put it
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in I push the top button it says power
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on I turn the left one on by again
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holding the top button power on
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connected power on connected and now I'm
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on my phone and I'm ready to go
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this is an iPhone 10 running iOS 12 so
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you know iPhone Android phone whatever
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you got if you got Bluetooth then these
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are ready to roll now one thing they've
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done really nice design-wise is when I
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put them back in the case then it
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automatically they turn off and
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disconnect so now they are charging
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again which is really nice looks like I
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didn't put that one in quite right let's
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see there we go so now it's charging now
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speaking of charging let's talk about
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that the earbuds themselves can run for
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up to six hours on a single charge which
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is a lot that's pretty impressive
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it varies depending on the kind of music
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and more importantly the volume of the
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music you're listening to if you want to
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get maximum battery life out of earbuds
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or anything like that you want to not be
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pushing the music as hard as you
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possibly can but here's the thing is
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that this charging case actually gives
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you four full charges so that's over 24
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hours of music that's pretty nice and
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it's about two two and a half hours you
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can see here on the front hopefully the
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little blue lights are indicating that
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they're charging and then in the middle
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is a micro USB connection that's how you
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charge the base unit so as long as you
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keep this thing charged you are pretty
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much ready to go for a good long period
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of time very nice now let's pull them
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out because I want to point out one
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other thing is that they are ipx4
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water-resistant so that's really
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important if you're gonna have them at
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the gym if you're gonna go for a bike
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ride or run you're gonna have sweat you
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might have rain you might have snow I
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don't know why you would go for around
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in the snow beyond me but maybe you do
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that this is not going to be a problem
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for these so that's really good to know
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and like I said volume up and down next
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in previous so let's talk about the
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experience of wearing these because
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they're actually pretty darn comfortable
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but there are some issues the first one
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is with a phone call the left one turns
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off its just the right one that's going
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to be working and that's perfectly
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normal because what they're simulating
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is that you're holding the phone up to
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your ear so that works fine but on the
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other end of the phone call the people
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that I've called reported that I sounded
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muffled and they weren't super impressed
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with the audio quality that's a drag
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might not be a big deal if you're not on
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the phone a ton if you're using these
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mostly for music you don't even have to
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worry about that the bigger issue was
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that in maybe 15 or 20 hours of
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listening I occasionally had the left
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one drop out for a second or two and the
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way that typically happened was that if
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I had a quiet period between one song
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and the next that when the new song came
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on the right
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earpiece would start playing it and then
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after a second or so the left piece
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would catch up and then I would have the
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stereo experience and this was song
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after song so it was kind of weird I'm
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not sure why there's not like some
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setting in this that just says assume
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that you're connected for five or ten
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minutes even after the last signal
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you've gotten from this unit and that
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would totally solve that problem they
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accept there was also one time when the
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left completely dropped out and I ended
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up having to restart the earbuds to
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actually have at work which was really
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unfortunate because they sound good not
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great but they sound good they are
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certainly very good for listening to
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music at the library or having a very
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discreet music system while you're maybe
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sitting at work in a cubicle farm or
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something like that I mean these are a
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good solution for that and with their
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battery life that's really a lot to like
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but that dropout was something that's
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really concerning and I will note that
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with my Apple earpods
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I have never zero not once ever had the
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left earbud ever drop out so this is
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something where I think that that's a
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secret piece of amazing Apple
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engineering that
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these other companies seem to have quite
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figured out so these work really well
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people love them you go on Amazon you'll
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see the vast majority for viewers really
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or fans and every so often someone will
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say I get drop out on the left ear so
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kind of a drag in terms of the music
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quality itself they're good they're
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fairly mid-range heavy there's not a lot
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of bass going on even with the right
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size ear tips which are important you
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can adjust that with the EQ on your
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music source so you can certainly
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compensate for most of it and probably
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just realistically it's not going to
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compare with putting on big ear you know
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big headphones or something so they
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sound good
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you know nothing to write home about no
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big soundstage no beautiful crisp
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reproduction of your classical music or
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your violin so you know solo or
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something like that but certainly
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eminently listenable so I think that
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they are a somewhat mixed recommendation
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now here's the thing is clearly I'm very
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honest in my reviews I'm gonna tell you
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what's good and what I like and I'm
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gonna give you the bad I'm gonna give
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you the things that maybe could have
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been done better or designed better or
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didn't quite work that honesty is
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something you don't find a lot here on
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YouTube so I would really appreciate if
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you could subscribe to my channel and
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then what you get out of that is you get
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more of my honest reviews now every so
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often a company will come along and say
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you know I think we're done I we were
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just expecting you to just hype it up as
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it's just a bunch of marketing stuff and
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this is like that's not what I do
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so I appreciate if you can subscribe to
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the channel and give me some feedback
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thumbs up thumbs down if you don't like
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that something in the comments whatever
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I'm gonna be straightforward and if I
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end up running out of products to review
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so be it I'll just have to buy
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everything anyway so I'm gonna give
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these a middling recommendation they've
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done so much right the engineering is
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really nice the Box the packaging it's
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really cool
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battery life fantastic this all looks
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really great and for most people it
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seems like they don't have any issues to
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drop out so maybe I'm just super
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sensitive or maybe I have a steel plate
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between the sides of my head and I don't
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realize it
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because that would cause an issue so
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something to consider
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anyway these are the trail AB x5
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wireless Bluetooth earbuds and you can
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pick them up for yourself at amazon.com
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for 7997 this is Dave Taylor I want to
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give these yet another shot and I will
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catch you hang on and open them ok I
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will catch you in my next video
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[Music]