How it Works
See that? That’s the STRIVA Core, a sandwich of microprocessor and WiFi components built into the Pro, Tap, and CAP devices. This battery-powered chip controls everything on the circuit board inside, from the WiFi and USB controllers to power management. With its onboard flash memory, any computer will recognize a connected STRIVA product as a removable device. You can charge the STRIVA devices with either USB or AC power.
STRIVA works in two different ways:
1.Standard WiFi mode: Log onto myKOSS.com, go through the initial setup, and then choose the internet streaming stations you want to listen to. Turn on the Pro headphones, it syncs to your WiFi network, and starts relaying information from the myKOSS servers. After that, you can navigate through the streams and channels with the headphone toggle, which I’ll explain further later in this review.
2.CAP Mode: After the initial setup, connect the CAP to any media player through an adapted mini-USB to 3.5’’ audio cable, and stream away with a battery life of up to 3 hours. Because the CAP and headphones are paired together at the factory, multiple listeners cannot connect to the same CAP.
Both the Pro and Tap models are capable of regular corded listening as well. Ditch the CAP, attach the longer mini-USB to 3.5’’ cable directly to your device, and you’re all set.
Syncing it Up
You first need to setup an account and register your STRIVA gear on myKOSS.com. Once that’s done, your CAP becomes married to your headphones, then the site prompts to enter your router information. When these devices are synced up, the necessary configuration files are also sent from the CAP to the Pro. From there, you choose a streaming radio station, and everything should be good to go, right?
Although this should be easy (hey, the literature says so), I experienced some bumps in the road to syncing up the Pro to a WiFi network. After multiple tries of entering my router information and registering my devices onto myKOSS, I ended up contacting their support hotline, which fortunately had a specific team for the STRIVA series. The Pro was finally able to connect and pull streams, but the signal would sometimes intermittently cut out. This may just be an issue with my router, since STRIVA recognizes most network protocols such as WPA and WPA2, however its performance may depend on how tight your router’s security settings are.
The CAP mode was much easier to get up and running. After both devices were configured in myKOSS, the Pro instantly recognized the CAP once I started to play music off my connected Galaxy SII.
© 2009 - 2013 Bright Side Of News*, All rights reserved.
