Tokyo - Only a year ago, you could comfortably predict that any speaker you could slip into a handbag would be laughably awful.
But all of a sudden, a lot of hi-fi companies that you’d think should know better are making speakers you could pull out of a briefcase – or even, with a struggle, a pocket.
Bang and Olufsen did one (the BeoPlay A2).
Now formerly staid and serious Japanese hi-fi kings Denon have stepped up to the plate.
The Denon Envaya Mini delivers very decent sound, delivered by Apt-X Bluetooth, which ensures music and film soundtracks stream at CD quality.
The only real question is, “Why do I need one?”
Are we going to start pulling these things out at work, saying, “That’s enough meetings for one day… let’s dance!”
Or are picnic areas going to become the site of terrifying musical face-offs between rival blankets armed with porta-speakers as we move further into the year?
Denon would argue (like B and O), that such gizmos are essential for an age in which more and more of us watch films, listen to music and play games on tablets and smartphones – adding bottom-end grunt that no flat-as-a-pancake built-in speaker could match.
If you’re sharing the gadget among your family (ie, sending the children off to watch their awful television programmes upstairs), it’ll also pair and unpair rapidly with new tablets and smartphones using a tap-to-pair NFC chip (found in many smartphones, including most Samsungs and HTCs).
The Envaya Mini is quite clever on this front: Denon’s applied its not inconsiderable technical clout to speed up the audio connection between the gizmo and smartphones and tablets, so the sound will actually lip-sync with what’s on screen. (You might be thinking, “Doesn’t it always?”, but if you try out a few of the Envaya Mini’s rivals, you’ll find it most definitely does not – many speakers render videos unwatchable.)
It also delivers very decent sound (albeit with a slightly less bowel-scrambling dose of bass than its big brother the Envaya), delivered by Apt-X Bluetooth, which ensures music and film soundtracks stream at CD quality (on Android, at least – iPhone users will have to settle for slightly muddier sounds, as Apple’s not keen on Apt-X).
The most likely audience for this thing, though, is perhaps revealed by the attention to detail paid to the built-in speakerphone, with noise-cancelling mic, making it perfect for people whose jobs involve a lot of travel, with the Envaya Mini a distraction from the temptations of the hotel mini-bar at the end of a long day.
Daily Mail