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I'd been happy playing my MP3 player through my home separates but unsightly trailing cables made me think I should invest in a quality speaker dock to give my iRiver a better home. I did my research in the usual department stores to see what was on offer. Everyone raves about Bose and although it's designed for the iPod I thought I'd check this out as a benchmark, to be honest I found the sound quality didn't warrant the £250 price tag. I also checked out the Monitor Audio iDeck which was excellent, though I found it a little too bassy. Which brings me on the iGroove, I find it hard not to wax lyrical about it. The design is gorgeous, a gloss black curved design which will add style to any room, but this isn't style over substance. I find it hard to believe that such a well-balanced room filling sound can come from such a compact bit of kit. I'm jealous of the functionality the remote brings to the iPod as once plugged into the dock it will charge your iPod and enable you to skip tracks. If like me you have another brand of mp3 then you have a cradle to plug in and a headphone plug to put in your player, it might sound a little indiscreet but it works and looks fine with my H10. My one regret? I wish I'd checked Amazon as I ended up paying over £200 on the high street.
Update Nov 2007 - My iGroove is still going strong, not found anything that compares in sound quality and I can be smug everytime I see people floating around the £200+ Bose in John Lewis. Price has gone down over 50% since last year, it was a great buy then, now it's just a steal!
Update Mar 2010 - Still going strong and sounding as good as ever! The other half has just got a 5th Gen Nano so going to try and get the latest adaptor for it.
Reminder: Do your christmas shopping early. Amazon's CHRISTMAS SALE is now on. Click on the image to check it out.
Showing posts with label iPod dock. Show all posts
Showing posts with label iPod dock. Show all posts
Friday, 26 November 2010
GEAR4 HouseParty 4 - Product Review
Click here to check it out
I bought this Gear4 HouseParty 4 after much searching and comparison of similarly priced iPod Speaker Docks. Whilst eventually I would like to purchase a Bose Sounddock, at the moment I just need something to replace my CD player which has had it after many, many years. The criteria for my purchase was the best sound quality possible, whilst costing around £50 - £60. Which I felt was a reasonable price for a decent Speaker Dock.
I ordered this based on the number of high reviews here on Amazon, although I was a bit dubious about the speakers capabilities having never owned a speaker dock before and not having the ability to test one before buying. I took the plunge anyway and when the unit arrived I was amazed!
It's smaller than I was expecting, very simple clean design, will easily fit anywhere in a room and has a very slim credit card style remote control. Took me a few minutes to setup and even though the instruction manual was a few pages long, you don't really need to read it, this unit is really simple to use. I'm using this with an iPhone 3G and all I had to do was dock the iPhone, it'll ask if I want to turn on Airplane Mode so as to reduce interference from the phone and that's it away you go. If a song is already playing on your iPod/iPhone it'll keep playing when you insert it into the dock. If like me you're using an iPhone, as soon as you remove it from the Speaker Dock it'll automatically turn off Airplane Mode which is a nice touch, saves you keep going into the settings on the phone.
The sound quality of this unit is really quite good, better than I was expecting, bearing in mind that this is replacing my main CD unit. Initially there was some trepidation when I first played something through the speakers, it was obviously something I wasn't expecting when comparing to my CD player speakers. After playing various different types of music through the speakers, it became apparent that this unit will just take anything thrown at it! Low volume, high volume, anywhere in between and I get zero distortion. The sound produced is almost as good as my CD player speakers, good bass without being overly bassy. I was a bit worried about the quality of the sound, but my fears have been in vain it seems.
The unit comes with a built in FM radio which comes in handy. You also get a credit card style remote control which is very handy and seems to work quite well. It cycles through all the menus on my iPhone without problems, allows you to select songs easily enough. You can also shuffle and repeat songs, etc from the remote. The one thing that I didn't see the point of was the 7 EQ options. Turning any of these on and you'll wonder what's happened, to me they're a bit pointless and most users will probably use the unit with the EQ settings off. A minor quibble, but maybe something that needs work for the next model.
Overall, if you're on a budget and looking for a good quality iPod Speaker dock that gives good sound, easy to use, looks the part and works well with both the iPod and iPhone, then I can highly recommend this unit. Ultimately, if you can go in store somewhere and test one then I'd always advise before buying as different people prefer different units and everyone has a different ear when it comes to sound. I can't fault this unit for it's price and am very pleased with it, 5 stars!
Now less than £40.00. Buy it now. Click on the picture to check it out.
Reminder: Do your christmas shopping early. Amazon' CHRISTMAS SALE IS NOW ON. click on the image to check it out.
I bought this Gear4 HouseParty 4 after much searching and comparison of similarly priced iPod Speaker Docks. Whilst eventually I would like to purchase a Bose Sounddock, at the moment I just need something to replace my CD player which has had it after many, many years. The criteria for my purchase was the best sound quality possible, whilst costing around £50 - £60. Which I felt was a reasonable price for a decent Speaker Dock.
I ordered this based on the number of high reviews here on Amazon, although I was a bit dubious about the speakers capabilities having never owned a speaker dock before and not having the ability to test one before buying. I took the plunge anyway and when the unit arrived I was amazed!
It's smaller than I was expecting, very simple clean design, will easily fit anywhere in a room and has a very slim credit card style remote control. Took me a few minutes to setup and even though the instruction manual was a few pages long, you don't really need to read it, this unit is really simple to use. I'm using this with an iPhone 3G and all I had to do was dock the iPhone, it'll ask if I want to turn on Airplane Mode so as to reduce interference from the phone and that's it away you go. If a song is already playing on your iPod/iPhone it'll keep playing when you insert it into the dock. If like me you're using an iPhone, as soon as you remove it from the Speaker Dock it'll automatically turn off Airplane Mode which is a nice touch, saves you keep going into the settings on the phone.
The sound quality of this unit is really quite good, better than I was expecting, bearing in mind that this is replacing my main CD unit. Initially there was some trepidation when I first played something through the speakers, it was obviously something I wasn't expecting when comparing to my CD player speakers. After playing various different types of music through the speakers, it became apparent that this unit will just take anything thrown at it! Low volume, high volume, anywhere in between and I get zero distortion. The sound produced is almost as good as my CD player speakers, good bass without being overly bassy. I was a bit worried about the quality of the sound, but my fears have been in vain it seems.
The unit comes with a built in FM radio which comes in handy. You also get a credit card style remote control which is very handy and seems to work quite well. It cycles through all the menus on my iPhone without problems, allows you to select songs easily enough. You can also shuffle and repeat songs, etc from the remote. The one thing that I didn't see the point of was the 7 EQ options. Turning any of these on and you'll wonder what's happened, to me they're a bit pointless and most users will probably use the unit with the EQ settings off. A minor quibble, but maybe something that needs work for the next model.
Overall, if you're on a budget and looking for a good quality iPod Speaker dock that gives good sound, easy to use, looks the part and works well with both the iPod and iPhone, then I can highly recommend this unit. Ultimately, if you can go in store somewhere and test one then I'd always advise before buying as different people prefer different units and everyone has a different ear when it comes to sound. I can't fault this unit for it's price and am very pleased with it, 5 stars!
Now less than £40.00. Buy it now. Click on the picture to check it out.
Reminder: Do your christmas shopping early. Amazon' CHRISTMAS SALE IS NOW ON. click on the image to check it out.
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