Way back last month, as part of our Holiday Gift Guide, I reviewed the UE BOOM Bluetooth Speaker thusly:
Most Bluetooth speakers are, for want of a better word, lackluster. A balance must be struck between weight and battery capacity, and too often makers go for smaller, lighter, and therefore less powerful. You need some juice to power the kind of drivers that reproduce sound well. Which is why the UE BOOMs can double as (very stylish) doorstops.
But they’re doorstops that can produce room-filling sound with well-balanced bass, mid-, and high-ranges. They’re not just good bluetooth speakersl they’re good speakers.
Even better, they put our 360-degree sound, and with a special mobile app, you can sync multiple speakers up to fill bigger spaces, or even sync pairs up to put out L/R stereo sound. Nice!
But the best review I can give is that I gave one to each of my two teenage boys, and they’re hooked. These are the speakers they use exclusively to play music in their rooms, and they’re happy. ‘Nuff said. (KD)
And now, low and behold, they’ve one-upped themselves by releasing the aptly-named UE MEGABOOM. Ultimate Ears sent me a review unit, and I’m pretty impressed. It’s like the already-satisfactory UE BOOM, turned up to 11.
In simple terms, it’s bigger in all dimensions. It’s like the UE BOOM’s big bother. It looks exactly the same, but is taller and thicker. The drivers are 33% larger, the battery life is both longer, and quicker to charge. The sound is just fuller. And, just like the Booms, you can partner two up to run in stereo mode. Up to 8 different devices can be paired with the UE MEGABOOM, and in a feature that’s great for parties, two of them can be active at a time, so you can bounce back and forth for music choices. In short, I think the UE MEGABOOM is the top-of-the-line for portable Bluetooth speakers.
$299 at Ultimate Ears and other retailers.
