Bang & Olufsen’s Beoplay A5 Wireless Speaker: Ridiculously Expensive but Worth It

As summer approaches and families and friends head to the beach or the park, many of them are on the lookout for a seemingly simple but hard-to-find product: a good, durable Bluetooth speaker. It sounds like an easy product to make, but most options have pretty severe flaws.Many speakers are too quiet; or fire music straight ahead rather than around them; are only audible at a volume that distorts audio quality; or over-emphasize bass for a dramatic but unpleasant sound. Some do not last long on a charge or have weak Bluetooth connections, and many are extremely unattractive. Even if a speaker looks like it went to Navy bootcamp, it probably lacks splash or dust resistance, which is essential for outdoor use, and it will be too ugly or blaring to use indoors, out of picnic season.The Bang & Olufsen Beosound A5 Speaker. Courtesy Bang & OlufsenHowever, the Danish high-end speaker and TV company Bang & Olufsen may have cracked it with their Beosound A5, a portable speaker with none of these flaws. Well, except that it’s fairly heavy, even for its compact package. Oh, and that saying it’s “not cheap” is polite understatement.The light brown “Nordic Weave” version is the “cheapest” at $1,099, the beautiful black “Dark Oak” unit I tried was $1,299, and the gorgeous all-metal “Spaced Aluminum” version is $1,499. You can buy a great MacBook for that money — which also comes with great speakers.The Bang & Olufsen Beosound A5 Speaker. Courtesy Bang & OlufsenBut given that no competitor is close to it for features or looks, it is hard to complain. If you are in the market for this kind of product, and want the absolute best, it may cost a lot of money, but it is probably worth it.To start, the looks. Where most mobile speakers are black plastic monstrosities, the A5 is a sort of tech wicker basket with a beautiful combination of wooden paneling and aluminum surfaces, and an easy carry handle on top. It is not just better looking than any other IP65-rated water and splash-resistant speaker, but it looks better than any at-home smart speaker — and it sounds better too. The A5 reminded me that technology need not look boring or hyper-utilitarian; t’s an elegant piece of home decor that is also a great tech product, built so sturdily that you never worry about it being damaged.The Bang & Olufsen Beosound A5 Speaker. Courtesy Bang & Olufsen If it did not sound good, the looks would be for nothing, but thankfully, it does. The soundstage is wide with superb instrument separation, its bass is deep and heavy without being over-dominant or rumbly, vocals are crisp and bright, and it adapts to the shape and echo of your room, so it always sounds fantastic, playing in an even 360 degrees from the speaker. Additionally, because it is built for the outdoors, there is no room this speaker cannot fill with sound — it gets astonishingly loud. In my indoor testing, I rarely listened to it at over 20 percent volume, and outdoors, at peak volume, any distortion is undetectable.The Bang & Olufsen Beosound A5 Speaker. Courtesy Bang & Olufsen For outdoor dining or reading by the beach, there is no better speaker experience. It has every nice feature you could imagine, from a wireless phone charger on top, to Bluetooth, Chromecast, and direct Tidal WIFI streaming support, and even buttons to play preferred radio settings. The app is also extremely intuitive, and the battery life is rated at about 12 hours if listening at moderate volume without wireless charging turned on, and two can be paired together to provide a stereo audio experience.As I say, it is basically a flawless product in the category, but it has to be for the price. If you are just looking for a speaker to play background music when you are camping and you do not care about high-definition audio quality, designer looks, and fancy gizmos, there are many options for almost $800 less that will do the trick.The Bang & Olufsen Beosound A5 Speaker. Courtesy Bang & OlufsenBut if you want the best in everything — the best audio quality, the best design, the best build quality, and absolutely no compromises — then the Beoplay A5 is the wireless speaker for you.

Bang & Olufsen’s Beoplay A5 Wireless Speaker: Ridiculously Expensive but Worth It

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