Home Reviews

CINEMOOD Portable Movie Theater projector review

REVIEW – When the whole family wants to watch a movie or see the big game together, we gather around the large screen TV in the living room.  When I want to catch a Dota match on Twitch or see the latest Dude Perfect video on YouTube, I use my iPad.  Is there room in our family for a gadget that fits somewhere in between these extremes?  It would need to combine the take-it-anywhere convenience of an iPad with the screen-is-large-enough-for-two of a TV.  CINEMOOD’s Portable Movie Theater (PMT) wants to be this gadget!

What is it?

The PMT is a smart, portable projector.  It’s a projector that turns any smooth, white surface into a screen for watching videos and other digital content.  It’s small and light enough to be very portable.  Want to join a friend on the beanbag and project on the wall?  No problem.  Want to lay on a bed together and project onto the ceiling?  Still no problem.  It’s also smart, which means that it’s more than just a projector.  The PMT has its own operating system that connects to your WIFI, runs apps, and downloads content from the Internet.  Conceptually, it’s very similar to an AppleTV or a Roku, but it uses a projector instead of plugging into your TV.

I think the PMT has two target audiences in mind.  First, it’s clearly aimed at little kids.  It’s small, light, and easy for kids to take anywhere without any cables, and it comes pre-loaded with content geared towards little kids.  Second, it’s also aimed at couples or friends who want to spontaneously enjoy a video together from traditional sources like YouTube, Netflix, and Amazon Prime Video.

What’s in the box?

  • The projector
  • A micro-to-USB cable with wall charger
  • A rubber stand for holding the projector steady
  • A manual with 6 pages of English instructions

Hardware specs

  • 3 in x 3 in x 3 in
  • 0.5 lbs
  • Internal, rechargeable, non-replaceable battery with up to 5 hours of battery life
  • 3.5mm audio support
  • 16 GB of internal memory, though only 6.8 GB are free out of the box
  • 2.4 GHz WIFI and Bluetooth 4.0 support
  • Support for a variety of audio, video, and image formats
  • Screen mirroring (iOS only)

Design and features

Do you remember EVE, the cute little robot that WALL-E met?  The PMT kind of reminds me of her:  small, white, and minimalist.  It’s a slick-looking little gadget.

Installation and setup

The PMT comes charged, but my unit was only about 30% charged, so the first step was to charge it up with the wall charger and USB cable, which I plugged into the micro-USB port.  When it’s charging, a little LED on the side turns red; when finished, it turns green.  The manual notes that I should only charge the PMT while it is off, so once the battery is drained, I won’t be able to use the projector until I charge it again.  The first time I started the projector, it asked if I wanted English or Russian.

Hardware

The PMT itself is a nice bit of hardware, sturdy and well-built, made of white plastic; it seems very durable to me.  The projector is a decent quality for the price.  The colors are reasonably rich and vibrant when I project on the wall a couple feet in front of me; when projecting onto a wall that’s 6 feet away, it’s a lot more washed out.  This projector is not very bright (35 lumens), so I can only use it at night or in a dark room.  The speakers are small and very tinny-sounding, as I would expect from such a small device.  Little kids probably won’t notice this, but adults will want to use a better audio source.  The PMT comes with a 3.5mm audio jack, so I plugged in the headphones that came with my iPhone and got clear and better sound.  Of course, using headphones defeats the point of a device that can be shared with others, so I plugged the PMT into my Soundcast VG5.  These two are a nice combination, as the VG5 not only provides great audio but also acts as a small stand.

It would be even better if the audio could be connected via Bluetooth instead of an audio cable.  Fortunately, the PMT supports Bluetooth audio, and it paired with the VG5 without any problem.

The power button is on the left side near the LED.  I’m not sure what processor is inside CINEMOOD’s projector, but it’s not exactly fast.  When I press the power button (the one with the little red lightning symbol), it takes over a minute to boot up.

On top of the PMT are the navigation buttons.  While in the OS, these are used to navigate through the apps and select content to watch.  When playing a show, they are used to control the volume, fast forward, rewind, and pause.  The only problem I found—and it’s a huge one—is that there’s not really a pause button.  If you hit the center button, it shows the pause symbol, but it actually stops the video; when I click again to restart, it starts from the beginning.  This makes it nearly useless for watching any long content, like a movie, where you might want to pause to get some more popcorn or take a bio break.

On the right side is a rocker button that is used to focus the projector.  There’s also a flashlight button that turns on the projector as a light in case you need to see something in a dark room.  It’s a nice little touch.

The operating system (OS)

The operating system in the PMT is called CINEMOOD OS, and I suspect it’s a version of Android.  It comes with a variety of pre-installed apps, many of which I’ll describe below.  Apps cannot be removed, but unwanted content can be deleted by pressing and holding the check button.  The content remains visible and can be downloaded from the internet at any time.  Deleting the unwanted content frees up space for your own content.

One of the first things that the OS wanted to do is connect to my WIFI, so it can access online content.  In the Settings app, I checked for updates to the OS.  It took several minutes to download and install the current update, and I’m currently on version 4.9.89.

Mobile app

I downloaded the CINEMOOD mobile app from Apple’s app store.  After pairing via Bluetooth, it functions as a remote control, providing the 5 navigation buttons and the focus button as well as a battery indicator.  Pairing was sometimes a problem; occasionally I had to reboot the CMT before the app could find it.

Content

The CINEMOOD organizes its content so that all the kid content is seen first.  I tapped past it until I found the Apps Section and then tapped down to find the YouTube app.  When I started it, I was faced with a dialogue box that said, “You should be logged in your CINEMOOD account for this action.”  I can’t watch YouTube without an account; in fact, a lot of the content on this device is locked out until unless I create an account.

I went back up and found Settings and tapped down to find the Account app.  This brought up the following message:  “Enter your phone number.”  CINEMOOD wants my phone number!?  I tried entering a random number, but they send a text message with a code that I have to enter in order to create the account.  This made me mad.  If I spend hundreds of dollars to buy a gadget, why would they lock me out of parts of it until I give them my phone?  Nothing about a projector requires my phone number to work.  I used My Trash Mobile to enter a temporary phone number and the code that they sent.  CINEMOOD then asked for my email, so I used TempMail to enter a temporary email.  Then it asked for my credit card number.  Seriously!?  The PMT isn’t a home theater, it’s a trojan horse designed to collect my personal information.  At first, I was stuck, because there’s no way I’m giving CINEMOOD my credit card just to set up an account.  Eventually, I found a bit of a silver lining for this storm cloud:  I can use the mobile app to assist with the account creation process.  It makes it easier to enter my phone and email, and it also gives me the option to defer adding my credit card until a later date, which I did.  Now I can use the YouTube app, but it’s a rather limited app.  There’s no home or trending section, and no way to view my subscription.  I can only watch videos about CINEMOOD—I’m rolling my eyes here—or I can search by subject.  There’s no way to sort or filter any of the results, so I pretty have to watch the top hits that are returned.

After watching a couple of videos, I decided to go back and check out the kid’s content.  In the Listen section, there are audio books that are read out aloud to you.  The titles are in the public domain, like Alice in Wonderland and Treasure Island.  There’s also some classical music, like Vivaldi’s Four Seasons, and an assortment of other music and sounds.

In the Dream Time section, there are some items designed to calm a child down before bedtime.  There are some quiet music and something called “themes,” which was music with an animated image that runs for 2 minutes.  There are 10 themes, one is free, but the rest have a lock symbol on them.  If I want to access this content, I will need to pay $1 for each of them.  If the averages hold out, that’ll cost me $9 for 18 minutes of content.  As it turns out, there’s a LOT of content on this device for which I have to pay extra.  I started counting and quit once I reached $400.  Be careful!  If you enter your credit card, your kids could spend hundreds of dollars downloading extra content.

In the Watch section, there’s video content that your kids can watch.  There’s a bunch of short cartoons that will only appeal to little kids and some educational videos.  There’s also a Disney app, which has some safety videos and more educational videos.  To be clear, this device doesn’t have any Disney movies, like The Incredibles or Moana.  The Disney videos that they do have are freely available on YouTube.

In the Read section, there are books for kids to read.  When I select a book, it takes me to a splash screen with Russian words.  It appears as if the app is frozen at this point, but it’s not; the secret is to use the right navigation button to “turn” to the next page in the book.  The books in this section are also in the public domain.

The Scenery section appears to show relaxing videos of various destinations, such as beaches or underwater, but the content is all locked.  The Play section was perhaps the most interesting, as it teaches kids how to create shadow puppets and then displays a white screen for them to practice.  Some of the puppet tutorials were free; others cost money.

Back in the Apps section, there’s an app for Netflix and one for Amazon Prime Video.  At this point, I’m honestly too scared to enter my credentials for these services; I don’t really know if CINEMOOD is intercepting them or not.  Yes, I’m probably paranoid, but given the rest of what they’ve done, I’m unwilling to accept the risk.  There’s also a Telegram app, but I don’t know why I would use the PMT to read my email and two other apps that I’ve never heard of, IVI and Ameba.

The internal content that comes with the PMT is not bad content; it will probably keep your kids entertained for many hours.  Unfortunately, there’s really nothing amazing about it, as you can get all this content (or something similar) for free on the Internet.  If you have cable TV, Netflix, Amazon, Hulu, or even just YouTube, you already have better content available at your fingertips.  By the way, there’s no way to filter any type of inappropriate content from your kids.  If you unlock YouTube, Netflix, etc., your kids will be able to watch anything they can find.

The next source for content is that which you load on the PMT yourself.  There are two ways to do this.  First, you can connect your PMT to your computer and copy files over.  I used the USB cable, the same on that I used for charging and connected the PMT to my Windows 10 computer.  I then copied an MP3, a JPG, a MOV, and an M4V.  All of these showed up in the My Stories app in the My section and could be viewed and played without any problem.  If you use a Mac to copy the files, you’ll need to install Android File Transfer onto your computer.  Second, you can plug a USB drive directly into the PMT.  To do this you will either need a USB drive with a micro USB plug, or you’ll need a female-to-female USB adapter.  I don’t have either of these, so I was unable to test this feature.

The final source of content is from an iOS device.  According to CINEMOOD’s website, if I update the CINEMOOD OS (and I did), then I can use the screen mirroring feature on my iPhone to display content on the PMT.  This is the feature that I’m most excited about, but I could never get it to work.  The screen mirroring on my iPhone can find and connect to my AppleTV with no problem, but it can’t find the PMT.

Android and iOS device both have app stores for their devices, but there’s no equivalent for CINEMOOD OS.  I only get the apps that come with the device, unless perhaps they release new apps that are available with an OS update.

Extra Features

The website says that the PMT should last for 5 hours on a charge, and that’s exactly what I got in my testing.  Keep in mind that the battery is not replaceable, so once it wears out, the PMT won’t work any longer.

The PMT comes with a rubber stand, which can be used to keep its place and adjust the viewing angle.

What I like

  • Slick design
  • Good hardware

What needs to be improved

  • Fix the pause button
  • Remove the account creation process
  • Stop trying to charge hundreds of dollars for additional content
  • Add parental controls
  • Fix iOS screen mirroring
  • Add the ability to remove unwanted apps

Final thoughts

I think the idea of a portable projector that makes it easy to access video content for kids and adults is a great idea.  CINEMOOD’s flaws, however, keep it from realizing this idea.  The lack of a functional pause button alone is a deal-breaker for me.  Their attempts to collect my personal information and get me to spend hundreds of dollars on additional content leaves me not trusting this company or its product.  I’m sorry to say it, but I just can’t recommend this gadget to you.  I think you’d be better off either buying tablets for your kids or using a pico projector that uses the content on your phone, tablet, or Roku stick.

Price:  $349.99
Where to buy: Amazon
Source: The sample for this review was provided by Cinemood.

Filed in categories: Reviews

Tagged: , , ,

CINEMOOD Portable Movie Theater projector review originally appeared on The Gadgeteer on June 19, 2019 at 9:00 am.

Note: If you are subscribed to this feed through FeedBurner, please switch to our native feed URL http://the-gadgeteer.com/feed/ in order to ensure continuous delivery.

Tech Care DS01 9000mAh power bank review

REVIEW – I have too many of those USB-chargable “power banks”. I can’t seem to find one I like. I usually find the biggest one I can find and pack a bunch of cables in a bag, then never use it because I can’t be bothered to fiddle with cables when on a campout in a dark tent. The Tech Care DS01 9000mAh power bank is slim and comes with cables attached. But is it powerful enough?

What is it?

The Tech Care DS01 is a small rechargeable battery pack with a built-in numerical display that shows remaining capacity with built-in Lightning and MicroUSB cables.

What’s in the box?

The packaging is pretty spartan. A thin manual, short microUSB cable, and USB-C adapter are all you get with the battery.

Hardware specs

  • Input: 5V, 2A
  • Output: 5V, 2.1A
  • Size: 4.1 x 2.6 x 0.4 inches
  • Weight: 6.01 ounces

Design and features

This particular battery pack can fill up via microUSB or Type-C inputs.

There are three outputs: Your standard USB-A connector, plus one Lighting and one microUSB connector.

Here’s a shot from the top side. (L-R): MicroUSB, Type-C input, and USB-A output. (The percent display looks odd because of the camera’s shutter speed.)

The Lightning and microUSB cables are permanently attached to the sides with flat, flexible cables. They’re quite bendy! No more forgetting to pack a cable.

 

Setup

Simply charge the battery to full via microUSB or Type-C until the display reads 100%. There are no physical buttons on the battery, so I’m not quite sure how the display knows when to turn on. A little shake is all it takes to wake the display.

Performance

Nearly everything I travel with can be recharged via Lightning (iPhone) or microUSB. Here’s the battery plugged into an iPhone…

…and my digital camera.

Once again, the percent remaining display is hard to photograph!

What I like

  • Small
  • Built-in cables you can’t lose
  • Percent remaining display
  • No physical buttons

What needs to be improved

  • 9000 mAh may not be enough for some.

Final thoughts

After two camping trips with the Tech Care DS01 9000mAh power bank, I left my bigger, bulkier batteries at home. It charged up my iPhone XS just fine over a three-day campout with charge to spare. I love the digital readout and never losing a charging cable again.

Price: $29.99
Where to buy: Amazon
Source: The sample of this product was provided by YPLANG/Tech Care.

Filed in categories: Reviews

Tagged:

Tech Care DS01 9000mAh power bank review originally appeared on The Gadgeteer on June 19, 2019 at 8:00 am.

Note: If you are subscribed to this feed through FeedBurner, please switch to our native feed URL http://the-gadgeteer.com/feed/ in order to ensure continuous delivery.

Townew self-cleaning trashcan review

CROWDFUNDING REVIEW – We now have robots that can vacuum and mop our floors and cat litter boxes that are self-cleaning. So it’s high time that we have a trashcan that can clean itself as well as open and close with a wave of your hand. The Townew trashcan has those features and is now seeking funding on Indiegogo. They sent me a pre-production unit to check out. Let’s take a look.

What is it?

Townew is a small white plastic trashcan that opens and closes with a wave of your hand and seals the bag with a press of the button so that you never have to get icky gunk on your hands or smell nauseating garbage smells.







Why do I like it?

I like this trashcan because it’s controlled by waving your hand over the sensor on top. When you do, the lid opens so you can deposit the trash and then the lid automatically closes again in a few seconds.

When the bag is full, you can press and hold the button on the front and it will lift and seal the bag shut for you. When you lift out the bag and shut the lid, it automatically installs a new bag in place that is ready to use.

I also like that trashcan has a rechargeable battery which allows you to use it for up to a month between recharges. You can also just leave it plugged in too.

As mentioned, they sent me a pre-production unit to try out and it worked just fine. The only thing I noticed is that the lid shut about 3-4 seconds after it opened. That doesn’t give you a whole lot of time to scrape garbage off a plate and since the trashcan doesn’t have a motion sensor to tell if you’re still dropping items, you could make a mess if the lid inadvertently shut on you.

Considerations before pledging

First of all, the Townew trashcan is small. In my opinion, it’s better suited as a bathroom trashcan instead of a kitchen trashcan.

Another thing to keep in mind is that you can’t go to your local Walmart and buy new bags for it when you run out. The Townew trashcan has a special plastic ring that holds 25 bags. This whole ring has to be replaced with a new one when you run out. Pricing for refills hasn’t been announced and there is some worry that if the company folds, you’re left with an automatic trashcan that won’t work after you run out of bags. FYI, if you buy a Townew through this campaign, it comes with 3 refill rings.

Where can I find more info?

The Townew campaign ends on 7/18/19 they have already met their funding goal of $14,893. You can pre-order a Townew starting at $59. After the Townew campaign ends, rewards are estimated to start shipping in September 2019. Visit their Indiegogo page for all the details.

Filed in categories: Reviews

Tagged: , ,

Townew self-cleaning trashcan review originally appeared on The Gadgeteer on June 18, 2019 at 5:40 pm.

Note: If you are subscribed to this feed through FeedBurner, please switch to our native feed URL http://the-gadgeteer.com/feed/ in order to ensure continuous delivery.

Holy Stone HS700 FPV Drone review

REVIEW – Lately I’ve been having fun reviewing drones and that fun isn’t over because I have another drone review for you today. This is my third one from Holy Stone. It’s the HS700 FPV Drone and it’s currently their most premium model. Let’s take it for a spin (and hopefully not a crash!).

What is it?

The Holy Stone HS700 FPV is a first-person view drone which you control with the included handheld remote controller and an Android or iPhone.

Hardware specs

Drone
Motor: Brushless Motor 2204 1500kV
Max Flight Height: 120 m
Max Flight Distance: 800-1000 m
Max Flight Speed: 25 km/h
Max Flight Time: 20 min
Battery Capacity: 2800 mAh
Charging Time: 7 h
Weight: 370 g
Size: 220 x 220 x 155 mm

Camera
Effective Pixels: 2 MP 1080p
Lens: 120° Wide-angle
Gimbal: 90° Manually Adjustable
Photo Size: 1920 x 1080
Video Resolution: 1080P@25fps

Remote Controller
Remote Control Range: 1 km
Transmission Frequency: 2.4 GHz
Battery: 1.5 V AA x 4

WiFi Mode
WiFi Live Stream Range: 400 m
WiFi Live Stream Frequency: 5 GHz

What’s in the box?

  • HS700 Drone
  • Remote Controller
  • Drone Battery
  • Propeller x 8
  • Landing Gear x 2
  • Camera
  • Camera Holder
  • Phone Holder
  • Balance Charger
  • Charge Transfer Box
  • USB Cable
  • Screwdriver
  • Propeller Spanner
  • Pouch
  • Logbook
  • Manual

Design and features

The HS700 FPV drone isn’t large and isn’t small, it’s jussssssst right. Seriously though, the plastic white (also available in black) body isn’t small enough that you will take it with you everywhere you go and isn’t so large that you’ll never want to take it with you.

It has a power button on the top along with the Holy Stone branding and quad propellers which you have to put on yourself. Don’t worry, it’s not hard as long as you pay attention that you put them in the right spot as there are 2 types of propellers.

Unlike the Holy Stone HS120D drone that I reviewed earlier this spring, the HS700 doesn’t have a built-in camera that you can pivot with the handheld controller while the drone is in flight. Instead, the HS700 comes with an action camera and a shock absorbing holder that you attach to the bottom of the drone. According to Holy Stone, the holder should hold most action cameras (it’s GoPro Hero 2/3/4 compatible). I wasn’t able to test that claim and just tested the drone with the 1080P camera that comes with the drone.

The back end of the drone is where the battery is housed. From what I understand, older versions of the HS700 required you to snap in the battery to power on the drone and remove it to turn off the drone. This isn’t true of the version of the HS700 which was sent to me as the drone has a dedicated power button on top.

The battery is larger than other drone batteries that I’ve tested so far and it charges with an odd looking two-piece charger that has 2 bright LEDs that let you know that the battery is connected to power and the status of the charging activity.

The first gotcha that I ran into was charging the battery because it can take 5-7hrs. No, that wasn’t a typo. It takes FOREVER to charge the HS700’s battery using the included charger and what’s worse is that for that 5-7 hour wait, you’ll only be rewarded with a 15-20 minute flight time. Ouch. For that long of a wait, I would have liked to see Holy Stone include 2 batteries with this drone instead of only 1.

A handheld remote control is included with the HS700 and is it just me, or is this remote smiling at me?

The remote controller has all the features you would guess should be available including one button take off / landing, video / image capture, etc. There’s also a small display that shows the status of the battery charge for both the drone and the remote controller, along with info on altitude, and GPS connection info.

The remote control is powered by 4 AA batteries and unfortunately, batteries are included so you will have to take a trip to the store to buy some before you can take your first flight. But that’s ok because you’ll probably need to kill several hours waiting for the drone battery to fully charge!

Let’s fly!

If you watched the video, you can see that as long as you’re not moving, the video is pretty good and relatively stable for a drone that does not have image stabilization. But once you start moving in any direction, you will notice that the video becomes shaky.

Flying the drone is pretty easy and I managed to only crash it one time over the many flights that I took with it 😉 That crash was due to flying it into a tree branch because I miss judged just how fast this little drone can fly and that’s something that you’ll want to keep in mind if you end up buying one.

I tried the features such as one button take off, landing, rotating around a subject, and the follow me feature which you can see at the 4:28 minute mark in the video above.

What I like

  • Easy to fly
  • Fast flier
  • Follow me feature works well

What needs to be improved

  • Drone battery charge time is much too long
  • Include batteries for remote control
  • Needs obstacle avoidance feature

Final thoughts

For the price, I think this drone should include an extra battery, or a faster charger, and an action camera with 4K capability. Without that, I think it’s a bit overpriced.

As far as flying and video quality, I enjoyed testing and flying the Holy Stone HS700. I think it’s a nice drone if you don’t mind the extraordinarily long time that it takes to charge the battery and you realize that the video quality is good but not mind-blowingly good.

Price: $284.99
Where to buy: Amazon
Source: The sample for this review was provided by Holy Stone.

Filed in categories: Reviews

Tagged:

Holy Stone HS700 FPV Drone review originally appeared on The Gadgeteer on June 18, 2019 at 10:00 am.

Note: If you are subscribed to this feed through FeedBurner, please switch to our native feed URL http://the-gadgeteer.com/feed/ in order to ensure continuous delivery.

JBL PartyBox 300 Bluetooth Speaker review


REVIEW – I am an Audiophile! And while I love to sit in my listening environment and enjoy my main stereo, I love to listen to music even if it is not exquisitely reproduced via class A equipment. One way to always have access to music is via portable Bluetooth speakers. In most cases, I use one in a room without a music system, and while I do enjoy most of the Bluetooth speakers I own, I have always felt that they are small and lack the kind of presence in sound that I am looking for. I also find that when I want to use them beyond listening to music via my smartphone or tablet, they lack any really useful connectivity options. Enter the JBL PartyBox 300 Bluetooth speaker!!

What is it?

The JBL PartyBox 300 Bluetooth speaker is a music streaming speaker with reactive party lighting included. It features Bluetooth connectivity that also allows you to pair two compatible speakers together, or you can daisy-chain multiple speakers and systems with the RCA audio output. It provides connectivity that includes RCA and 1/8″ audio inputs, a USB input for playback from compatible drives, and dedicated 1/4″ microphone and 1/4″ guitar jacks. The speaker driver design includes two 6.5″ woofers and three 2.25″ tweeters that deliver up to 120W of RMS power. It has built-in handles, an included 12V car adapter and a built-in 18-hour 10,400 mAh battery.

What’s in the box


1 x JBL PartyBox 300 Bluetooth Speaker
1 x Quick User Guide
1 x AC Power Cord
1 x DC Cable

Design and features

Specifications
Power Output: 120 W
Drivers: 2 x 6.5″ Woofers; 3 x 2.25″ Tweeters
Frequency Response: 45 Hz to 18 kHz
Signal to Noise Ratio: 65 dB
Impedance: 4 Ohms
Bluetooth Version: 4.2
Supported Bluetooth Profiles: A2DP, AVRCP
Bluetooth Transmitter Power: 8 dBm
Bluetooth Transmitter Modulation: π/4 DQPSK, 8DPSK, GFSK
Wireless Range: 33′ / 10.1 m
Inputs: 1 x Stereo 2RCA (Audio); 1 x 1/8″ (3.5 mm) Stereo (Audio); 2 x 1/4″ TS (Audio); 1 x USB Type-A (Audio)
Outputs: 1 x 2RCA Stereo (Audio)
USB Power Output: 5 VDC at 2.1 A
Battery Capacity: 10,400 mAh
Battery Chemistry: Lithium-Ion
Battery Voltage: 7.2 V
Expected Battery Life: 18 Hours
AC Input Power: 100 to 240 VAC, 50 / 60 Hz
DC Input Power: 12 VDC at 8 A
Power Consumption: <2 W
Dimensions (W x H x D): 12.2 x 27.2 x 12.6″
Weight: 34.8 lb

Features

  • Powerbank
  • Lightshow
  • Bluetooth
  • 3.5 mm audio cable Input
  • Auto-power off
  • Karaoke function

Through the front grille of the speaker, you can see the drivers, and there is a JBL logo badge in the middle of the grille.

On both the top and bottom of the speaker, there is a handle that makes it easy to lift and carry the speaker. On the top back of the speaker, there is a cluster of ports that represent all of the physical connectivity that is available on the speaker.
Top row (left to right): DC port, USB input port, Auxillary port, L/R Channel Selector, L&R Volume Controls
Second row (left to right): AC power jack, RCA input jacks, RCA output jacks, MIC input, Guitar input

Both sides of the speaker are the same, with a carbon fiber look and rubberized feet that allow you to safely place the speaker on either side.


Performance

This speaker is impressive to look at right out of the box. Removing it from the box was my first surprise since while it is not very heavy, it does have quite a bit of weight to it. It is solidly built. Using the included AC cord, I plugged it in and it started to charge. Since it has an AC cable, you can play the speaker while it is charging. On top of the speaker, as shown below, there are touch buttons that represent the main controls. The pictures and charts below show the layout of the buttons, their functions, and the LED status indicators and values.





On top of the back of the speaker, the connection options are clustered into one panel. They offer more connectivity than I have ever seen on any Bluetooth speaker, and they make this speaker versatile enough to be the go-to device that would fit many needs.

You can also plug in a USB drive to this speaker to play music. The following chart shows the compatible music formats:

Important Note:
The video below shows the speaker’s display lights in action:

I have been using this speaker almost every day and listening to various genres such as easy listening, reggae, etc and of course my primary favorite – smooth contemporary jazz. This speaker handles any genre pretty well, and I love connectivity options that even have me hooking it up to my projector at times.

I plan to take it to some of the BBQs that I will attend this summer so that we can finally enjoy music without worrying about power sources or running out of power. And, even though playing the speaker for a long time at a high volume may reduce the amount of time the battery lasts, I am very sure that it will still have power way after the BBQ is over. Its size and power allow it to provide adequate sound for a noisy large gathering, and it is not so heavy that I can’t grab it and run if the skies open up and “rain on our parade”.

Since it has so many connectivity options, I think some Karaoke is in order for this year’s events.

What I like

  • The build quality
  • The sound
  • The built-in battery for complete portability
  • The included DC cable
  • The light display options
  • The rock solid Bluetooth connectivity
  • The built-in handles
  • The connectivity options

What can be improved

  • For me, absolutely nothing – Maybe some waterproofing for my mischievous kids 🙂

Final thoughts

When I first saw the JBL PartyBox 300 Bluetooth speaker, I was very eager to try it. From the first time I saw the pictures, I kept looking at them over and over again. I did see it in my mind as a bit smaller than it is. I preferred a larger speaker, so I was pleasantly surprised that it is a great size. The speaker is built like a tank and the sound is great. I especially like how it handles my favorite music genre – smooth jazz. The battery seems to last forever and the option to choose between various light displays or to turn it off completely is a plus. Then there is the connectivity that allows you to use this speaker for so many different scenarios. While I have not yet hooked it up to my electric guitar, I am expecting it to shine just as it has in every other way. And to think that I can add a MIC and complete my performance, or host a Karaoke session, is something I am really looking forward to. I absolutely love this speaker, and I highly recommend it and give it two thumbs way up!!

Price: $449.95
Where to buy: JBL Website and Amazon
Sample: The sample for this review was provided by JBL.

Filed in categories: Reviews

Tagged:

JBL PartyBox 300 Bluetooth Speaker review originally appeared on The Gadgeteer on June 18, 2019 at 9:00 am.

Note: If you are subscribed to this feed through FeedBurner, please switch to our native feed URL http://the-gadgeteer.com/feed/ in order to ensure continuous delivery.