Jabra Freeway Bluetooth speakerphone unleashed at MWC

Virtual surround-sound and clever FM tweaking from the Jabra Freeway
Virtual surround-sound and clever FM tweaking from the Jabra Freeway

Over at Mobile World Congress, Jabra has pulled back the curtain on the Jabra Freeway, a Bluetooth speakerphone with three speakers to provide virtual surround sound.

The speakerphone, which clips handily over a car visor, is also HD voice ready and offers voice control and noise cancelling using dual-mics.

In-car surround sound

Jabra reckons the Freeway is the world's first three-speaker speakerphone and as such offers true 2:1 stereo through the two 3 watt tweeters and the centre bass speaker.

The virtual surround sound is quite impressive, employing the same sneaky tricks that flatscreen TV manufacturers use to fool the ear.

Jabra showed us a demo of the speakerphone receiving an HD voice call, and that was undeniably crisp, clear and spookily felt as though the caller was in the room with us. It uses a 2x sampling rate to double the width of the sound spectrum.

Future-proofed

Although HD voice isn't widespread at present, Jabra hopes that by including this technology it is future-proofing what will likely be an expensive product.

Other nifty additions include a motion sensor which turns the speakerphone on and off depending on whether you are in the car or not, and an FM transmitter which actually auto-adjusts the FM band on the speakerphone and the car radio if compromised by a competing signal.

Jabra is yet to reveal a UK release date and UK pricing.

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