Bose SoundLink Mini: Review

Revolution in Portable Speakers!

Bose SoundLink Mini

The revolution in portable high fidelity sound was marked with the innovation of 'Walkman' series in the 1980s by Sony Corporation of Japan. For almost two decades Sony Walkman ruled the market in personal music entertainment space, although other major brands such as Panasonic, Aiwa, Hitachi, Sanyo, Marantz etc too came out with similar products later.

Then were the portable compact disc players like the Sony Dicman which could play both WAV as well as MP3 audio files. And finally, now in the digital age, the iPod of Apple Inc - capable of playing both audio and video files, has been ruling the global market what Sony Walkman was once upon a time. Today the market is flooded with several genres of iPod-type players rolled out by various brands.

The Mini Connected to a MacBook Air via Bluetooth

In general, to experience a hi-fi sound from these devices, one has to plug in-ear phones, headphones or noise cancellation in-ear/head phones to enjoy music from your iPod, smartphone, tablet or other device.

Using the headphones at times can be quite tiring and one would prefer to have a similar quality belting out from speakers which can be carried easily on-the-go.

Portable speaker technology has advanced dramatically in recent years as evidenced by the ready availability of features like Bluetooth connectivity and amazing audio output. 

Over the past couple of months I had visited several retail outlets, shopping malls and tested various portable speakers of many brands. I had loaded few good as well as low quality audio tracks in my cell phone to make an honest comparison.

Bose SoundLink Mini docked in its charging  cradle

Some of the outlets had a small auditioning room but it did not hamper for those which did not have. Infact, winter had something special - listen to any of your favourite audio track and discover incredible sense of soothing magic to the ears... Mozart would have loved most songs, as each chord and note on the harp sounds so clear and perfect since there is less of ambient noise associated with coolers, fans, air conditioners etc that affects audio experience dramatically.

I tried the Bose SoundLink Mini at Croma - an electronics mega store. For the size, the sound quality is incredible. There were a number of other speakers including JBL Flip, JBL Charge, Jambox mini, Jambox Party, Logitech Boom Box, Jabra Solemate, even Bose SoundLink Bluetooth mobile II.

Cradle and charging adapter 

Seriously, the Mini blew them all away! I think it is a revolution in portable music - astounding bass, mids and high. I was hearing things in songs which I never noticed before. The Mini is not intended for outdoor party screaming-volume, but listen to it at normal level - quality is really outstanding with deep and powerful bass and pretty smooth mids. Only treble could sparkle a bit more!

At 0.6 kg, it is small enough to fit in your palm or tuck it inside your bag. The speaker has a range of about 30 feet which pairs easily with smartphones, iPad or any Bluetooth devices without wires.

The retractable prongs charging adapter

The speaker features power and volume buttons -  you control all other functions from your Bluetooth device. And it remembers the most six devices you've used, so reconnecting is even simpler. The speaker circuitry is built on Bose proprietary innovative transducer and dual passive radiator technology which enhances the sound clarity. I had watched Casino Royale movie by connecting the speakers to the laptop which was simply mind blowing.

Bose seems to have done a thorough market research before deciding to do away with the hands-free speaker phone option, an add-on facility, which comes with most Bluetooth speakers. In reality, I have found that several people who owned such speakers with the hands-free option rarely used it, but the psyche of an average buyer would naturally like to have all such options loaded since the price they would be paying for the device. 

An interesting point to note -  Earlier Bose used to make its gadgets solely compatible to Apple devices, but now it seems to cater to a wider market like Android, Windows phone and all kinds of Bluetooth products.

The SoundLink Mini strives to reproduce the musical sounds as closely as possible to those of the original performance. And Bose strive to avoid flashy sounds such as those associated with accentuated bass and / or treble frequencies. While those sounds may be attractive to the novice, but they are not enduring.

Its single-piece aluminium casing is both attractive, durable and some critics have commented that if the big 'Bose' logo was not mentioned in front of its grill, people would have thought it may have been another product rolled out from Apple Inc!

The Mini comes along with a charging cradle where the unit can be docked on top of it when indoors. However, the charger adapter can be also directly connected to the unit while on travel. A full charge would give seven hours playback time. The one I tested was for five hours and still had enough juice. It has also an aux input for devices which are not Bluetooth enabled.

Unlike other speakers, this unit cannot be charged from the laptop via a USB cable - probably it may be due to a higher input (12 volt) voltage requirement. At the bottom of the unit there is a mini USB socket which is only meant for Bluetooth firmware upgrades.

Universal conversion plugs

The charging adapter deserves a special mention. Bose has thoughtfully made prongs of the charger retractable for convenience of travelling. Besides, it has also included five conversion plugs for global usage as per the country specific AC mains.

Additionally, leather covers in black and magenta and soft covers in blue, green and orange are available separately. A trendy travel bag too is available at some of the stores.

Dr. Amar Gopal Bose

The final verdict: You might not expect sound this rich from a speaker this small and don't have to sacrifice performance for portability! After all it is a premium product from Bose Corporation - a company founded by India-born US citizen, Late Dr. Amar Gopal Bose who was also a professor at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). He was an electrical and sound engineer who devoted his life to investigating our psychological and physiological responses to sound.

Bose charges a premium for quality and workmanship. They are worth every penny to me over all the plastic speakers flooded in the market these days. It comes at Rs 16,200/- which is pricy indeed!

WAY TO UPGRADE OLD MUSIC SYSTEMS

 · If nostalgic sentiments attached

The sound processor - Sonodyne Uranus amp

I found myself falling through my memories when I stumbled across this today! It was once-upon-a-time a high-end sound processor – alias, my Sonodyne Uranus amplifier with matching bass reflex speakers which I had got it decades ago at a time when digital technology just entered into the acoustic space replacing the analogue system. This had indeed induced nostalgia quickly and easily. 

       

During that era, premium home stereo systems which ruled the Indian market were now the defunct Akai-Bush, Sonodyne Uranus, Philips Monster and Norge among others. Real high-end products such as the legendary Bose 901 Series Home Theatre System, Denon, Onkyo, Adcom, Marantz, Quad, Yahmaha, Tannoy, Gale, Luxman etc were available too, but only in the grey market with a prohibitive price tag or for those lucky ones who had a US or foreign-returned relatives.

I can recall a couple of my friends in Shillong who had a penchant for such great stereo systems – Jonathan (Joe) Chittaranjan and Michael Pariat. It was my association with them where I got to see, listen, feel and analyse some of the well-known sound systems of the world.

Laptop connected to the Sonodyne Uranus amplifier

At Joe’s place where we used to spend hours together listening to music, dubbing and creating mix-tape mixer cassettes for various occasions, will always remember his high-end Technics and Sony stereo systems. Although Sony had just entered the market with an Indian partner – ‘Orson’ (later known as ‘Sony Orson’) but, the system which I had seen at Joe’s place was a very high-end one and not available at any of its retail outlets throughout the country. Yes, I still remember his matching Technics stroboscope belt-driven turntable too which had a real stylish hydraulic automatic self- return tone arm and pick-up cartridge!

Michael lived at a picturesque place surrounded by lots of pine trees. It was equally a treat visiting him taking the steep ups and downs drive-way contours towards his house. A pleasing personality, Michael was considered a ‘music bank’ during the university days – give him a list of your favourite songs and he would record them for you in a cassette with utmost precision. He would take note of the average cassette players owned by most of us and accordingly would adjust the sound level, enhance the high frequency, bass response, midrange and perfect balance for equal output from both speakers. His recorded cassettes always had the clarity like a compact disc since the annoying Hsss… sound was eliminated and this was his signature!

It was at Michael's place where I got to see for the first time the legendary Bose 901 Series Home Theatre System. This killer sound machine with mind-blowing sound effects absolutely carried me off. Perhaps, Michael was one of the few people in the country to own such a system at that time – It was just like owning a Lamborghini or a Ferrari car! The Bose 901 speaker, the one that was originally introduced in 1968, is still in production today.

Whenever after returning home from these two friend’s place, I

Front panel open of the amplifier

used to rigorously clean the head of my player with an after shave lotion and adjust the alignment with a small star-head screwdriver to enhance treble effect as the sound always seemed to be muffled in my ears! Inspired, I had also created my own version of home theatre system by fixing a 10 inch speaker in a tea chest and multiple old radio speakers of all sizes in earthen pots with cross-over network circuits! Ha ha ha, those were the crazy good-old-days. And trust me, though I have now physically grown old but, I am still the same and crazy like before as far as acoustics and home sound systems are concerned.

Both Joe and Michael were very lucky to have a decision maker in the family who were very interested in high-end music systems. Joe’s dad, Late H.S. Chittaranjan, ex-DGP of Assam and Meghalaya was extremely fond of good music and unique gizmos. Infact, uncle Chittaranjan was very young at heart. Michael, who comes from a very refined background, had a family member settled in the US who brought such goodies whenever he visited India.

Laptop connected to the Sonodyne Uranus amplifier

Coming back to my amplifier, I was wondering what to do with it now? With the digital boom, electronic junk has become very common in every household, taking up valuable space and I was seriously considering to get rid of this too.  Had just cleaned the system with a damp cloth then connected the speaker cables and mains. Oh-my-god! the LED function key came to life and a mild humming sound from the speakers could be heard. Next, I connected it to my laptop using a 3.5 mm stereo jack and the other end with flower jack to the Auxiliary input of the amplifier. Played a track and guess what? The mere 32 watt RMS (Root Mean Square) device sounded so good and refined in this digital age comparable or even better than many systems currently available in the market. Push opened the front panel of the amplifier to adjust the bass, treble, balance, loudness and filter/scratch controls that sounded even pleasing.

The F&D USB player with remote control

Looking at it for a while I was wondering one of the downsides of this amplifier – it does not have a remote control. After doing a market and internet research, I came across a solution. A USB player is available in the stores which can be integrated with the amplifier through an Aux cable. It is a small devise which has provisions for memory cards as well as pen drives, play audio/video files, FM radio and a remote control that enables the entire function of the system. The USB player commonly available has only a pen drive provision which cost less than Rs. 400/- while the one which is smaller and sleeker has memory card and pen drive slots is close to Rs. 900/-. It comes in F&D, an imported brand.

Interestingly, technology has developed so much that now bluetooth converters too have come up which can be directly connected to such amplifiers. Once it is paired with cellphones  or other bluetooth enabled devices,  it can remotely play music with the ability of adjusting volume, equalising and shuffling of tracks. It is a small device and is available of Belkin brand, a well known Chinese company. The cost of this bluetooth converter is around Rs. 2,300/-.     

So if anyone of you are having a good old system and have nostalgic sentiments attached to it, think twice before you consider to get rid of it. You can still enjoy the bass and mids of Santana’s Black Magic Woman to high notes in Adele’s Skyfall or Led Zeppelin’s Stairway to Heaven including thud of bass in Bollywood songs without investing much for a brand new music system in this festive season.