Aoife M. McEvoy, Mary Lesman

We've talked people’s ears off--colleagues, relatives, friends, and even strangers around town (to make reservations, for instance)--all for a good cause. We wanted to find the best Bluetooth headsets and car units in the land.

Equipped with Bluetooth-enabled cell phones, we tested three product types: monaural (or “mono”) headsets, which typically sport a single base unit that you place in one ear; stereo headsets, which come packaged as a pair of earbuds or headphones that you wear on both ears for music and calls; and speakerphones for your car, which are usually designed to attach to the sun visor or elsewhere inside (the dash or windshield, for example).

Sometimes it pays to talk to your computer--particularly if you're running a voice-recognition program such as Nuance Dragon NaturallySpeaking 11.5 Professional. With this software, you can create documents and email messages, navigate the PC, and search the Web, all with your voice. This version comes less than a year after the release of Dragon NaturallySpeaking 11; the underlying voice-recognition engine remains unchanged, but this update is replete with a handful of useful interface tweaks, and it adds functionality that iPhone users and social networking hounds will fast appreciate.

Dragon NaturallySpeaking 11.5 Professional ($600 as of July 26, 2011; free upgrade for existing users of version 11) lets you turn your iPhone or iPod Touch (4th generation), running iOS 4.2 or later, into a dictation microphone. This arrangement frees you from having to stay chained to your computer with a headset. You can also post updates to Facebook and Twitter using simple commands. In addition, Nuance expanded the Dragon Sidebar, a desktop helper screen that sits beside your work, offering an index of commands and tips based on your active window.

Note: This review addresses 4.7.0.59. The vendor claims that v4.7.0.65 is more stable; PCWorld has not yet tested these claims.

If you rely on Skype for calls to co-workers, family, and friends, take Pamela Professional for a spin. This Skype-certified tool is designed to help users get extra mileage out of Skype's services. Think of Pamela Professional as your communications assistant: The software lets you set up an answering machine with your own outgoing messages. It also records Skype calls--video as well as audio-only.

The BlueAnt S3 Bluetooth car speakerphone ($80 as of March 9, 2011) is the first model I've seen that lets you choose a language: British English, Australian English, or American English, as well as French and Spanish. When the device emits voice prompts, it does so in the accent you selected at setup. I have to admit that unleashing an accent from Down Under (male voice) or the UK (female voice) in the car gave the most mundane drives a little pizzazz. (The S3 attaches firmly to a car's sun visor with a clip.)

Although the availability of five language settings targets a wide audience, the BlueAnt S3's usability during driving sessions knocks down its usefulness several notches. Like its sibling, the BlueAnt S4, the S3 has touch-sensitive controls. They're housed beneath a smooth surface atop the unit; the controls are not perceptible in a physical or tactile way. After many test calls, I was still not 100 percent convinced, in the nanoseconds after tapping the controls, that I had accessed them correctly by feel alone.

If you live in a state where it's legal to mount technology devices, such as a GPS unit, on your windshield, here's an innovative Bluetooth car accessory to ponder. The Parrot Minikit Smart ($130 as of March 1, 2011) takes on a number of roles: The cradlelike design lets you attach your phone (horizontally) to the Minikit, which acts as a charging holder and serves as a GPS unit and Bluetooth speakerphone.

If you live in a state where windshield-mounted devices are prohibited, you can try sticking the Minikit to the dash with Parrot's accessories. (I didn't have much luck with that method, though; my car's interior didn't lend itself well to attachments.)

Thanks to its friendly design and consistent audio quality, the Plantronics K100 is one of the best Bluetooth car speakerphones we've used, in spite of our few complaints. The K100 ($80 as of March 8, 2011) is easy to use, and produces generally clear and effective audio.

The K100 attaches easily to a car visor with the sturdy but bulky preaffixed metal clip. The unit did not budge during my jaunts in the car, and removing it from the visor required just a quick tug.

When I'm driving and I need to rely on a Bluetooth speakerphone to handle calls, I like controls that are superlarge and a cinch to access by feel alone. You (and a gazillion other drivers) too, right?

The Jabra Cruiser2 ($100 as of March 1, 2011) delivers the goods: This portable speakerphone, which is a bit bigger than an iPhone, has a wide bar at the top, where the Answer/End button--the main call control--sits. At either end of the bar are the volume-up and volume-down controls.

The BlueAnt S4 ($100 as of March 8, 2011) Bluetooth car speakerphone is sleek and slender--far more slick-looking than its predecessor, the BlueAnt Supertooth 3. As with the Supertooth 3, you affix the S4 to your visor, thanks to the convenience of magnetic pull: You slide a metal clip onto the visor, and then the S4 clamps onto the clip by way of the magnetic blobs underneath the unit. The clip can stay permanently on the visor; you pop the S4 on and off the clip with minimal effort.

I like the fact that the S4 is slim and that its magnetic setup makes for a quick in-and-out. I also like how the speakerphone houses a dedicated sliding on/off switch at its side. (The rest of the device's controls lie below a smooth surface--it lacks physical buttons.) But the big attraction for me is its "hands-off" orientation: The S4 lets me take care of almost all phone tasks using my voice--so I can avoid having to reach up and press any buttons at all.

"Black and boring" is one way to describe the Jabra Easygo Bluetooth headset. But its $40 (as of March 1, 2011) price tag is attractive considering what you get: average to above-average call quality, extra earbud covers, and a choice of wearing style (you can go with or without the earhook).

I'd go for the hookless approach any day; having a loopy contraption hugging my ear tends to distract me. Still, donning the Easygo--with the earhook attachment or without it--felt lightweight and relatively unobtrusive. The smaller earbud cover felt a tad too large for my small ears, but when another tester with larger ear canals tried the unit on for size, it fit just fine.

The Motorola Oasis ($80 as of March 1, 2011) Bluetooth headset looks a bit like a folded-up miniature-golf putter. Its shape is unusual--the Oasis's hook is squarish by design--and its boom microphone folds inward, so ferrying it around is easy. Also unusual is the placement of the Call button: It's located on the boom, whereas on all other headsets I've tested the chief button sits somewhere around the ear's curve or adjacent to the ear. The novel position of the Call button took getting used to.

Finding an acceptable fit required both hands, along with some futzing and shoving. The part of the headset that accommodates the volume controls and mute buttons (the "putter" portion) is bulky, and this hook shape perches over the ear. Plus, the earbud fitted with the smallest cover still felt too large for my ears. Pushing the earpiece in helped anchor the Oasis to my ear somewhat, but overall the fit did not feel comfortable, secure, or balanced.

As Bluetooth headsets go, the BlueAnt Q2 fulfills its job as a communication aid well. But it works best when you use your voice as much as possible (instead of its buttons) to interact with it. For a hook-oriented headset, the fit feels comfortable, sturdy, and lightweight to boot. (We tested the silver-hued Q2 Platinum version, priced at $130 as of March 1, 2011.)

Hook-based headsets almost always require two hands and a certain amount of adjusting to insert, so I was pleasantly surprised at being able to place the Q2 in my ear single-handedly. You can push the hook itself in towards the headset base unit (as well as farther out); thanks to that flexibility, I arrived at a nice, tight fit. You can also pull out the hook entirely, swap the earbud cover for the stabilizing one, and wear the Q2 hook-free. The fit this way also felt comfortable and snug, even while I walked around.

I had high expectations for the Plantronics Voyager Pro UC. For starters, the $200 (as of March 1, 2011) Bluetooth headset promised to deliver a full-on communications package that would allow users to connect it to a PC for software installations and updates--the headset can integrate with Skype, for example. And its sensor technology can detect when the Voyager Pro UC is in the user's ear, so you can make it answer calls automatically.

Does it pass muster? With regards to all of the above, yes. But it fails to meet expectations in other ways.