Energizer Headlamp Smart LED With Voice Activation

Voice Activation: This is super useful for almost nobody. You soon stop trying to use it. It is finicky and confusing. Some people in some situations who can practice the commands will find this a godsend. Everybody else? You will end up just using the buttons.

Light Good: The new LEDs make almost any headlamp super useful. This one is bright, adjustable in angle and brightness, and has little red and green lights too, for some reason.

Strobe Bad: Somebody could be in an emergency situation and use the Strobe function for attention-getting and battery saving … so of course, we ALWAYS seem to be stuck with this awkward function. The button next to the power button will turn strobe off while light is in use, otherwise, every mode strobes. Another way to get away from this stupid function is to power off/on.

Adjustability OK: the headband is comfortable and easily adjustable. The Light has the usual and very useful swivel for aiming. The brightness can be decreased for improved battery life.

Voice Command: You just won’t use it. I thought if I had both hands working on something and a tool in my teeth as well, with sweat dripping down my face and no desire to back off until I get some widget adjusted just so- wouldn’t it be great to just say: “Energizer, decrease brightness,” or “Energizer, low mode,” or, if I’m an idiot: “Energizer, red light- Energizer ,strobe mode.” But no, it never happens.

By the way, do you have to say “Energizer” at the start of every command? Kind of. If you give a fresh command within 15 seconds, then no. But if 15 seconds goes by, then any new command must preface with “Energizer.”

Notes:
-if you activate strobe, it NEVER stops; switch to “spot light” and it is a strobing spot light; switch to red light, and it’s a strobing red light. The only way to stop it is to say “power off” or, if you hadn’t said a commands in 15 seconds: “Energizer, power off.”

-Once you power off, you must hit the physical button to turn the light on again.

-There are a series of complicated green flashes to indicate the 3 AAA batteries need replacing. There is also a verbal warning, which is handier. When the battery is extra low, the headlights work for awhile with no further verbal warning.

-Sometimes, the commands won’t work. Also, you have to say them just right, and there are eleven commands to remember, three of them you have to tack on the word “mode”.

The voice activation worked once in a quite office when it was first unpacked, but never again in areas with background noise like a shop. I was skeptical about the voice activation but primarily bought it for its lumen spec.

When I saw this, I thought “How cool, a hand’s free headlamp with voice commands.” I have owned a cheaper Energizer headlamp before that had a nice green light, but none in this price range. Unboxing it, the housing was snug. I inserted the included batteries and all of them fit with good connections. The strap is wide and comfortable and easy to adjust. The directions in the box were easy to follow. So, as far as the light goes, it’s a nice lamp. It has the green and red lights which I like for night fishing and the lamp can angle down which is important for tying knots and unhooking fish. These are two of the main things I personally look for in a headlamp. That and it’s waterproof for fishing in the rain. So in terms of this being a functional headlamp using the manual controls, it’s a 5 star headlamp.
The voice recognition on this thing is imprecise. I’m not going to dock a star, because I’m unaware of other voice activated headlamps so I have nothing to compare. I would say the voice commands only work 85% of the time. You need to speak pretty clearly and loudly borderline yelling and sometimes you need to repeat yourself. Now….I realize that you’re not going to be sitting in the dark repeatedly cycling through commands, but if you really need to change this light hands free, you may not be able to with a single command. I think the biggest negative is that you can’t turn it ON with voice activation. You CAN if it’s been active recently, but there’s some sort of automatic shutoff after a period of time, at which point you need to hit the ON button manually. To me, this would the single most important verbal command. There were times when I shouted a command several time before it registered. You can also have fun tricking the voice recognition to activate using other words besides the actual commands. Like I said, this thing isn’t very precise. Words that are close or similar to the verbal commands will also activate the changes. After a short delay, you have to activate the voice command feature by speaking the word “Energizer.” If you do not do that, you can use the manual controls that function like a normal headlamp but you have to cycle through the modes. I will have fun impressing my fishing buddies with my “Iron Man headlamp.” I’m sure it will come in useful changing the color of light from green to white when my hands are dirty or I’m fighting a fish.

The voice feature doesn’t work half the time