Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

I purchased this on Black Friday for $179 with case. I am a long time mediator (3-4 years), but I wanted to improve my meditations. Sometimes I just don't know how well I'm doing. I wanted something that would show where I was at scientifically: beta, alpha, theta, etc. I have used this every day since December 2017. So for the first 4 months (almost 50 hours of meditation time) I “trained” with the free included App. You put in the headphones in your cell phone (turn it on airplane mode so you won’t receive notifications), and you pair the device with bluetooth. Open the app, and set it up. How it works is you have 5 ambient noises to choose from. My fav was Rainforest. It's raining and windy, but if you quiet your mind, the wind settles down. Quiet it more and the rain stops. Quiet it more and it gets quiet. Quiet it more and you hear bird chirping. If you notice the birds chirping and think about it, the rain comes back, if you still keep thinking about it, the wind comes back, etc. And now you have to quiet your mind again. I just absolutely loved it because it gives instant feedback. You know how quickly your mind starts to wander. So that was useful, but after using it there seemed like there was something really wrong with the app. (Not the device, I don’t want to turn this review into a review of 1 application) Now you might be thinking, bird chirping is deep Alpha, quiet is alpha, storm raging is beta, but no. As of the writing of this text, (May 2018) how to app operates is it goes through a calibration where it sets a baseline for the whole session. So if your mind in baseline is active, when you quiet down for meditation, you get lots of bird “points”. If your mind is quiet during calibration, you will have a stormy session, no matter how quiet your mind really becomes. This is the foundational app so I think it’s worth talking about it’s limitations. You will soon graduate off this app. I’m not saying it wasn’t REALLY useful, it’s just there is no scientific way you can ever have the same brain state in calibration, so it’s limited and hyper prone to bad data for most people. Presently, I now use an app called “MuseMonitor” ($10 from the google app store). Now we’re getting into the science. I can record my brain waves (all the data from the MUSE device) and map them proper in excel or their website will map it as well. Note: Nobody tells you this but eye movement is incorrectly labeled as delta. Before this device I used to have the NeruoSky, but that was dastardly uncomfortable and you couldn't wear it lying down. It only had 1 sensor too. The MUSE is totally comfortable, no wires (BT) and strap adjustable. You can’t underestimate the value of comfort and ease. You won’t use it unless it’s easy and comfortable! I’ve also looked at Open BCI. But I wouldn’t be able to wear that lying down and it’s must more complex and messy. Maybe one day. The developer side of the MUSE is also well established, so if you want to use the device for user uses, I think you’ll find a good home here. So yeah, all in all, I do love this device. Still use it every day. I’ve never had any connection issues, or pairing problems. I wish there were more guides on how to interpret the raw data. As of the writing of this review, there isn’t ANY simple guides and guidelines on how to interpret the data. They just refer you to books on EEG. Not helpful. I’m really interested in this stuff so I’m going to try to make one myself.