JBL: OnStage Micro, Spot and Spyro Speakers - Articles / Reviews

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JBL: OnStage Micro, Spot and Spyro Speakers

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Bradford Day
Brian

Jan. 9, 2007

Specifications

JBL: OnStage Micro, Spot and Spyro Speakers

A while back I reviewed JBL's OnStage iPod speaker dock. The glistening white donut was able to pump out room filling sound from its compact size. I went by their Pepcom booth to witness and even smaller OnStage Micro speaker dock for the iPod Nano. The OnStage Micro can be powered by 4 AAA batteries for enhanced portability and up to 24 hours of playback (it also comes with and AC adapter). The OnStage dock is specifically designed for the iPod Nano and includes a thin IR remote control capable of shuffling songs, adjusting volume and browsing your song lists. Although personally I never saw much of a point to using the remote to view song menus as you can't really see the iPod display from across the room in the first place. Also up on the redesign block is the OnStage Radial. The Radial is essentially a perpendicular version of the original OnStage, but it still retains the original's donut-ness.

Also some time back I reviewed JBL's Encounter 2.1 speakers. The Encounters were a cleverly designed alien-like set of desktop satellite speakers (that looked quite X-files like) and a bee hive shaped subwoofer!all in iPod white of course. Well JBL is back at it again with two new designs for their 2.1 systems. The Spot and Spyros 2.1 systems are all about style. And while both speakers are simple plug "n' play 3.5mm input based speakers and will work with either Macs or PCs, the design leans more towards the Mac side of things.

The Spot speakers are dome shaped, futurist designs with swappable skins (JBL call them Wrappers) to add a new level of personalization. On display tonight was a one off design created by a graffiti artist. The Spots come in iPod-like white and gloss black and the large, bulbous subwoofer is complimented by the two smaller half-orb satellite speakers.

The Spyro speakers share the same subwoofer design as the Spot set. But, the Spyro satellite speakers are shaped more like flowers or a four-leaf clover. Integrated into the "petals" of one of the flowers are the light touch volume controls. The 4-point flower design allows the speakers to rest at an angle on the flower stem with shoe lace style covers lining the outside of the wires. Although slightly more feminine in their styling, the Spyro is offered in 4 different colors: white, black, fuscia and retro blue. JBL should be sending us some samples in the near future.

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