AirPlay or Bluetooth for home use wireless speaker?

Technology and Internet
#1

I wanted to post about the Wirecutter’s pick for best AirPlay speaker in the news this morning, but then thought I might open it up for further discussion.

Obviously, you’d probably prefer Bluetooth for a truly portable, bring-anywhere speaker seeing as it doesn’t need any other infrastructure for it to work. But for a wireless speaker that’s mostly used at home, maybe moved from room to room occasionally, would you prefer AirPlay or Bluetooth?

I’m not in the market for anything, but I just wanted to hear some other opinions on this. Has anyone used both?

#2

We have a bunch of AirPlay stuff in our house and love it:

2 x Pioneer A1
1 x Pioneer A3
iHome iW1
Yamaha Receiver (V473)

The A3 and the iHome have built in batteries so can move about the place as needed. The Pioneer has a “Wireless Direct” mode so you can connect directly to it if you’re out and about away from you home network (or there is always a good old fashioned USB cable :P) (The iHome requires a local network or USB connection AFAIK).
I’ve never taken the speaker outside the house so haven’t had a need to test the wireless direct, but I know it’s there if I ever need it.

I wouldn’t mind another unit to replace my slowly failing clock radio, but I’m being picky and want DAB+ and AirPlay.

Living in an Apple ecosystem the AirPlay just appeals far more than Bluetooth.

edit: It’s worth adding that JB still have the A1 and A3 listed as available too :slight_smile:

#3

I picked a Logitech UE Boom up about a year ago. It’s not AirPlay, but is a pretty rugged bluetooth speaker and it’s seriously loud. It also has a mic built in, so you can use it as a speakerphone.

Ideally, I’d love to kit the place out with AirPlay speakers, but I can’t justify the cost.

#4

I use the Pioneer A3 as well, JB have them on special constantly. The A3 was $199 last week, pretty good for that price.

The Bose Soundlink Mini is also good , it as a line in so if you have an Airport Express you can hook up Air Play

#5

I have the Mini Boom and it’s nice. Bluetooth stuff also has the advantage of being portable.

#6

Bluetooth here.

I have a Jambox for portableness and for music in the home I use bluetooth to my Sony CT660 sound bar.

Main disadvantage of bluetooth is juggling which devices have bt enabled so that the players don’t connect to the wrong ones. Otherwise it’s not bad. Especially considering the soundbar receives AAC over bluetooth.

#7

AirPlay here, pretty much every ‘zone’ in our house it setup for AirPlay with all the media stored on a central computer and controlled using iTunes Remote.

If I need anything portable I’ll simply use a spare Aiport Express and the appropriate speaker system. It can be a bit clumsy and isn’t quite as nice as some of the Bluetooth solutions (damn that Logitech boom box one looks good) but I’ve never ran into issues with the setup including running an entire presentation at a venue who had the audio system (proper mixing desk setup) at the front and the projector connection down the back (I’d say it was planned to have it all at the back but that hadn’t happened).

#8

I personally prefer AirPlay over Bluetooth, although I use both quite happily.

I have a Bose Soundlink Mini in the kitchen which replaced an older Panasonic radio/CD/30pin dock unit. Went for the Bose because it’s small, portable and wife can use it with her HTC One quite happily.

For the lounge room I have a Yamaha receiver which has AirPlay built in, as well as the ATV.

#9

While I’m sure it’s a good piece of equipment, that’s the most obnoxious product page I’ve ever read. Speakers need to sound good, dammit, not be TOTALLY EXTREME PARTY ALL THE TIME YEAH WOO.

1 Like
#10

That’s what all the cool kids are like these days. Get with the times, man.

#11

Lol, I didn’t even wait for the page to load before copying and pasting the URL. Just went and had a look…and I totally agree!

Although I did discover that there’s a firmware update for the Boom that gives it an alarm clock function, which is weird.

#12

My lawn: get off

(any way of getting rid of the 20 character limit on posts? It impedes succinctness!)

20 character minimum on posts — yay or nay?