Why You Can Trust CNET Bose SoundTouch 30 review: A strong Wi-Fi speaker that plays big, but sounds best at moderate volumes
The Bose SoundTouch 30 keeps a good pace for both price and feature count with excellent sound quality -- albeit at moderate volumes.
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For many years Sonos had the DIY wireless multiroom audio market largely to itself, but it's now facing serious competition from...well, pretty much every company you can think of. But perhaps the biggest challenge is Bose, which is also targeting mainstream consumers and has been steadily improving its software to make its systems easier to set up and use. For 2016, Sonos and Bose have new (late 2015) versions of their flagship tabletop wireless audio speakers -- the Sonos Play:5 and third-generation Bose SoundTouch 30 -- both of which cost $500, and are clearly direct competitors. (In Australia, both products retail for AU$749; in the UK, the Bose is £500, the Sonos £429.)
The Good
The Bad
The Bottom Line
It's also worth noting that each of these speakers are part of the the companies' respective "ecosystems" for wireless audio. You can buy more speakers in each family, and expand each system into more rooms in your home. And in each case, prices start as low as $200 (AU$300, £170 ) for the Sonos Play:1 and Bose SoundTouch 10.
So why buy the Bose SoundTouch 30 instead of the Sonos Play:5? Well, the Bose speaker comes with a few features the Play:5 doesn't have: Bluetooth connectivity (in addition to Wi-Fi), a remote, and a presets system that allows you to get your favorite playlists or Internet radio stations up and running instantly.
In terms of sound, the Sonos Play:5 is the better performer, particularly at high volumes. With its pronounced bass and generous headroom, the Play:5 is more of a party speaker.
In its favor, the SoundTouch 30 has a more nuanced and revealing sound. It's also a little more open and has a wider soundstage. The Bose simultaneously aims for both bass punch and enhanced vocal clarity but falls down a little at high volumes, where it can sound aggressive with overly bassy or trebly tracks, and distorts.
Of course, audio is a subjective experience, and if you want something that's a little more exciting and a touch more hi-fi, you may prefer the Bose's sound. But if you're looking for a speaker that you can crank up at parties (and also sounds good at more moderate volumes), the nod definitely goes to the Sonos.
That would be the review in a nutshell, but there's a whole lot more to chew on, particularly if you're looking to build out a multiroom system for your home and are trying to decide between Bose's and Sonos' ecosystems.
Bose's expanded offerings
In the two years since Bose's SoundTouch line first appeared, it has gone through several changes. What began as two tabletop speakers and a portable has become an entire suite of wireless multiroom speakers. Many Bose products, from Wave radios to the company's home theater systems, and even outdoor speakers, now include Wi-Fi and are designed to link up with other SoundTouch system in a multiroom setup.
The Bose SoundTouch range received a makeover in September 2015 with the addition of a new speaker, the entry-level SoundTouch 10, and a few extra tweaks, including the addition of Bluetooth to all the new speakers in the line going forward. While it may seem counterintuitive to add Bluetooth to a Wi-Fi speaker what it does is improve the system's flexibility -- especially when compared against the company's main rival.
Design
The Sonos Play:5 (left) versus the Bose SoundTouch 30
The Bose SoundTouch 30 is a large tabletop speaker at 17 inches wide, 10 inches high and 7 inches deep. Attractively designed, it comes in a choice of white and black finishes (with a matching gray or black speaker grille) and features a black-and-white OLED display in the center of the unit.
The speaker features a black and white OLED screen on front.
On the top live the rubberized controls that include six shortcuts as well as volume, an aux/Bluetooth switch and power -- though, sadly, no mute or play button. The top of the unit is finished in a patterned, carbon fiberlike material. While it's only about a third bigger than the the SoundTouch 20, it's a lot heavier at 18.5 lb (versus 7 lb).
The included remote.
The speaker ships with a remote, which is a welcome addition for a device without a touchscreen and limited controls. The clicker features the same six shortcuts as the app and speaker and these offer the ability to play a preprogrammed radio station or album without too much effort. The remote has an attractive rubberized finish and is a significant step above most credit-card offerings you'll find at the price. (You can also use an Android or iOS app, of course.)
Features
Usability is one of the system's strongest suits. By including six shortcut buttons on both the unit and an accompanying remote control, it's a lot easier to get music playing on the Bose system if you don't have your phone handy. The only thing that the system lacks is a mute or play/pause button which would be useful.
The speaker includes two full-range drivers in a stereo configuration and a single bass woofer. Unlike the sealed Sonos, the Bose features a vertical bass port at the back.
Bose's selection of streaming services is decent and includes three of the "big ones" -- Spotify Connect, iHeartRadio and Pandora. The system also offers support for Deezer and Sirius XM. While the speaker has integration with iTunes there is no Apple Music yet (Sonos has now added it to its list of services accessible via the Sonos app). It's also worth noting that the previous version of the SoundTouch 30 supported AirPlay, but this one does not. Tidal is also missing so far.
The speaker will stream music from your network including file support for MP3, WMA, AAC, Apple Lossless and FLAC. Audiophiles should be aware that like Sonos and Denon's HEOS system it will only support CD-quality files and not 24-bit high-res files. If you store music on your phone, the Bose system lacks the ability to "play from my device" from the Bose app. Instead, you'll need to toggle to Bluetooth to play phone-based music (or any other audio on the phone that's not supported within the Bose app.)
If you want to add an external sound source the Bose offers a 3.5mm aux input, and the system can transmit this and Bluetooth sources to other speakers in your house.
Setup
The speaker and the system it sits within is controlled via the SoundTouch app, which also features the same six shortcuts seen on the speaker and remote. As far as multiroom apps go, it's one of the better ones and places all the key functions front and center. As noted, the app started out a little rough around the edges, but has steadily improved -- and continues to get better.
One of the most welcome changes Bose has made is in the setup of the speaker. When the SoundTouch range was first introduced you needed to connect each speaker to your PC via a USB cable, and this was light years behind Sonos' wireless system. While the improved routine is still not as elegant as Sonos' -- you need to press the "2" and "Vol-" together to put the speaker in setup mode -- it's still preferable to what preceded it.
Unlike the Play:5, which now comes with both tone controls and a room correction feature, the Bose speaker only comes with a bass control. We'd have liked to control the amount of treble, but the ability to ratchet down the bass actually came in handy during our tests.
Setting up streaming services was pretty straightforward. In most cases just input your user account info (and password) for each app and you're good to go. But in the absence of streaming from your phone we found adding network libraries more challenging. For instance, we initially had difficulty adding music from a Twonky server on a networked laptop (it simply wouldn't find it), while the Sonos system had no problem.
In the end we had to install the SoundTouch software on that laptop and tell it to look for an "NAS," even though it was just software running on the same machine. All that said, Bose's primary customer for this system probably isn't the person who has a networked music library or the hard-core audiophile. It's targeting people who want a system that's simple to set up and use and is most likely tapping into a music service such as Spotify, Pandora or Internet radio.
Performance
While we found the original Bose SoundTouch 20 to be more neutral sounding than the original Sonos Play:5 this time around the roles are reversed. The bigger SoundTouch 30 III is the more exciting of the two flagship speakers. At low to medium volumes, it sounds magnificent with plenty of oomph from the bass woofer.
The speaker's upper-mids emphasis helps if you're using this as a speaker for your TV (yes you can do that using the audio input). Vocals (dialogue) are crisply delivered and easy to decipher. There's a definite "notchiness" to the speaker's response that emphasizes the sibilants in speech or the breathiness in a sax player's noodlings. That breathiness combined with the speaker's onboard processing gives the Bose an openness that the the Sonos Play:5 doesn't have.
With the volume slider set to 2/3 or less, the Bose can sound big and lush, especially with huge atmospheric tracks like Dead Can Dance's "Yulunga." Lisa Gerrard's Middle Eastern-inspired melody soared beyond the confines of the cabinet to fill the small CNET listening space,and the egg shakers that flank her appeared to come from a foot away from each side of the box.While this wasn't a true stereo image, it was a very good approximation of one. The bass slams of the large drums that appear midway through the track didn't upset the balance of the song -- as long as you didn't turn it up any louder.
Compared to the more neutral Yamaha NX-N500 monitor speakers, the bass of the Bose SoundTouch 30 sounded overemphasized -- which was apparent when listening to King Crimson's "Walking on Air" via Radio Paradise -- the bass notes tended to overhang or sit a little too long.
This bass preponderance had a negative effect on performance at higher volumes--just over the 60 percent mark-- with our test bass track, "Life," by the Beta Band. At around two minutes and 30 seconds the song features a slow descending bass line and the Bose displayed audible port noise, or distortion, from the very first note of the progression. In comparison the Sonos' bass sounded patchy, but at least it was able to replay without distorting. Turning the Bose's bass down to 7 from the default maximum 10 removed the speaker's audible distortion. However, making this change caused the speaker to sound thinner and less involving with other music than the Sonos. As a result, you might need to experiment to find the level that works for you.
Next we tested Bluetooth connectivity. It was fine for streaming processed pop or country music but when faced with a metal track such as Metallica's "Enter Sandman," the sound was on the verge of falling apart (although Bluetooth streaming has improved over the years, you're still dealing with compression issues). While the upper-mid emphasis meant the middle section with the child's prayer did come from outside of the speaker boundaries, the cymbals became thin and distorted, like a rainmaker instrument.
Happily there were zero problems with synchronization when listening to both a SoundTouch 10 and a SoundTouch 30 in a simulated house environment. Both speakers were perfectly in sync. Maybe this bodes well for adding the ability to pair two speakers in stereo in the future? (With Sonos, you can create left/right stereo pairs with two Play:5 or Play:1 speakers, for example -- no such feature exists with Bose yet).
An improved wireless speaker
If you're looking for a large speaker that could become your main stereo system, and like your music on the less boisterous side you may find the SoundTouch 30 to have the pep that you need. It can sound sound much bigger than you'd expect and pick out details in music that its competitors will miss.
However, at higher volumes things can get out of hand. When it came to more aggressive music, the speaker failed a couple of the tests that the Sonos Play:5 passed. With that in mind, we'd urge metal-heads, EDM and hip-hop fans to pursue the Sonos. But for jazz, classical, R&B and more standard pop and rock, the SoundTouch 30 is well suited.