Sweden-based Zound Industries is renowned for their iconic speakers that look like a guitar amplifier. Usually they have the control buttons in guitar amp-style knobs which give them a distinct appeal, but this time they’ve taken a detour.
The Marshall Uxbridge Voice Bluetooth speaker features new age rocker buttons for controlling the volume, treble and bass levels. There are buttons for the play/pause function and a button to disable the Alexa-enabled far-field microphone.
Alexa-enabled Marshall Uxbridge Voice
The new Bluetooth speakers have built in Alexa digital assistant and support AirPlay 2. Zound claims that the microphones can listen to your voice-commands even when loud music is playing while standing on the other side of the room. That means you can go hands-free to listen to your favourite audio without even touching the rocker buttons.
With the 802.11ac Wi-Fi connectivity, one can tap into online streaming services, even with multi-room support setups. Pair it with Echo speakers, AirPlay 2 supported units or other Uxbridge Voice speakers – it will be as easy as done.
Packs a punch inside a small housing
The 6.6-inch tall and 5-inch wide speaker delivers dynamic audio thanks to the frequency response of 54 Hz-20 kHz and 96 dB SPL @ 1m, perfect for indoor listening. Further the 30-W Class D amplifier driving the tweeter and woofer ensure thumping sound at all the major frequency levels.
Clearly, the Marshall Uxbridge Voice Bluetooth speaker is made for indoor entertainment with its digital assistant capabilities. The unit is priced at $199 and will be available from April 8, 2020. There’s a Tencent’s Xiaowei voice assistant version slated to drop on May 4 2020, and yet another Google Assistant version set for release on June 11 2020.