For the last week I have been travelling with a wonderful new companion – the joy of high quality audio from a very tiny speaker around my neck.

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I’m not a fan of wearing headphones for a long time but do like the ability to have a high quality stereo sound-space around my head. The T3 easily delivers this – albeit unlike headphones your companions will also hear the music.

Weighing in at a mere 115g the T3 package  measures just  6×10.2 x 1.9cm but is quite capable of filling a room with sound. Using OrbitSound’s airSOUND technology to produce stereo out of one large speaker on the front and a couple of small portholes either side seems a lot like black magic but it works.  At first I was a little disappointed with the bass response but I was holding the speaker in mid air and a soon as I placed it on a table the bass came alive. With good high frequency response and detailed placement the sound was excellent. As long as you place the device on a reasonably hard surface and listen facing the end with the with the lanyard hook you will enjoy stereo sound that seems to be focussed on you wherever you are.

This personal stereo field is particularly noticeable when hung around your neck with the supplied lanyard. In this configuration your body is used as the bass resonator and the sound is focussed such that it appears you are wearing high quality headphones. In fact very high quality headphones.

One of my friends who is a guitarist remarked that these would make excellent monitors for performance due to the high quality focussed sound.

There are several modes of airSOUND available Off, Normal and Max(wide). I much preferred normal which gave a very natural sound. Turning airSOUND off was dramatic, with the sound literally dropping away, and showed what a high impact this technology makes.

With over 10 hours playback from a 2 hour mini-usb powered charge of its rechargeable battery and easy connection by 3.5mm jack to most mobile audio technology – this is the perfect system for a road warrior.

Highly recommended.

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