DLO Portable Speakers for iPhone

(Review) - DLO continues to focus on Apple’s core products, the iPod and the newly announced iPhone (compared to the iPod, at least). This time, the company has a set of speakers for the iPhone that should prove to be interesting, if not in functionality, then surely in looks.

Unlike a lot of other speakers, the Portable Speakers for iPhone can be rolled up into a ball-like shape to make them, well, portable. Both cups come together and get attached to a rubber base. It’s an intuitive design, and it certainly makes them easier to carry from one place to another. To play them, you pop open the speakers, spread them apart, attach a 3.5mm cable to any music player and rock out. Yes, DLO’s Portable Speakers for iPhone work with any digital audio player that’s available in the market. However, there’s a dock for your iPhone on the speakers, although you would have to place the unit horizontally.

The Portable Speakers have both power options: batteries (4x AA) or direct, which is nice. Once everything is connected, just flip the on/off switch to get the music going. That’s about all there is to the speakers.

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There’s no sleek user interface, no manual controls, nothing. You must control everything through the iPhone. On the other hand, you can turn the speakers into a speakerphone should you choose to. Also, you can’t charge your iPhone while it’s playing music. If anything, that’s the key drawback. We would’ve understood DLO’s intentions of blocking this feature if the speaker was on batteries, but with direct wall power, why not? It’s silly to drain your phone out just because you want to listen to music. That’s something you’ll have to keep tabs on your own.

Overall, the speaker quality is very good. We loved it. There lows, mids and highs were relatively clean with little static noise in the background. The audio output was warm and deep. The bass reproduction was solid, too, surprisingly enough. However, the speakerphone conversion was substandard at best. We would recommend sticking with music playback and simply ignoring the fact that it even converts into a speakerphone. It’s just not worth it.

For $39.99, it’s a justifiably simple product, but it’s great. DLO has yet another winner in its hands, and congratulations to them for the win. Next time around, though, see if you can add a few more features to it. It’s a solid product at a reasonable price tag and is certainly worth a consideration if you are in the market for a set of cool looking speakers.

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