Audio Unlimited SPK-VELO-001 Water-Resistant Wireless Speakers with Remote
- 900 MHz transmitter sends audio signals without speaker wire
- Weatherproof for outdoor listening
- Speaker can be up to 150′ away from audio source
- Compact & portable with a stylized design (10H x 5W) – 3 Rubber edge Woofer2 Mylar cone Tweeter10 Watt RMS Output9V DC Transformer
- Phase Loop Lock circuitry automatically locks in and keeps audio signal clear and strong.
Listen to music just about anywhere without the hassle of running unsightly speaker wire! The powerful transmitter uses 900 MHz technology to send music through walls and floors to the dual wireless speakers up to 150 feet away. These high-quality, weather-resistant speaker can even be used in wet areas. Enjoy the complete freedom of taking your music or other audio almost anywhere.
Rating: 
(out of 375 reviews)
List Price: $ 169.99
Price: $ 119.00
Home Audio Speakers
Sound, also perceived as the sense of hearing, is an integral part of our lives. Without the ability to hear or reproduce sound we are not complete. Sound is the vibrations that travel through air and can be sensed by our ears. Thus it is a medium of communication. It is used to gather information and knowledge about properties of the environment surrounding us. Sound can travel through air, water, and solids. These help sound waves travel and are known as medium. In normal conditions, human can hear a varied frequency range. But, sometimes we need to amplify the sound output for better quality of hearing. This requires the help of speakers.
Speakers are devices, which convert electromagnetic signals into sound vibrations. Thus speakers are machines that enable us to hear sounds, which have their origin somewhere else. Speakers, also termed as loudspeakers are attached to an audio system, which provides the electromagnetic signals that are then reproduced in the wavelength, which humans can decipher. The loudspeaker is the most variable element in an audio system, and is responsible for marked audible differences between systems.
Home audio systems have come a long way since their inception as just another loudspeaker system. They have become a part and parcel of our every day lives. Today, many versions of home audio systems have evolved into our homes. Technological enhancements have made sure that we can take our audio or sound system wherever we go. As speaker systems are the most important part in the output of sound, they have evolved greatly. Many versions of speaker systems are available in the market today. Depending upon your choice of price and your perception of quality, you can opt for the one that best caters to your requirements.
Speakers are an integral part of any audio system, be it a simple radio or a home theatre system. Home audio speakers are generally multi-drive systems, i.e. they contain two or more drive units. These include woofers, midranges, tweeters, and sometimes horns or super tweeters. A home theatre system is complete only if all the above mentioned add-ons are attached with it to give a theatre-like sound experience. In home audio speaker specifications, the speakers are classified as “N-way” speakers. It indicates the number of bands of different frequency into which the system divides the sound. A 2-way system consists of woofers and tweeters, a 3-way system consists of mid-range speakers with a combination of woofers and tweeters. It depends upon person to person; rather there exists different perceptions towards the quality of sound and thus the drives in a speaker.
If and when you decide upon purchasing a home audio speaker system, you will be spoilt for choice. They come in various ranges of quality and pricing, thus you need to decide carefully what caters to your specific set of requirements. Good audio companies make available a host of choices for speaker systems that can gel with your audio systems. They also provide different designs and creations of speakers that fit into your décor. You can place your systems in such a way that it gives you the optimum output.
20 year electronic security, home audio and surveillance professional. Visit the author’s website at http://www.all-thingselectronic.com/
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Review by Michael H. Kay for Audio Unlimited SPK-VELO-001 Water-Resistant Wireless Speakers with Remote
Rating:
I bought these wireless outdoor speakers for a Mothers Day gift for my wife and I have found them to be either very good or very bad, depending on a few critical factors. Of the 150+ reviews I wish someone had taken the time to figure out the “bad” factors – it would have saved my Mothers Day. Here it is for your information – you decide.
The Good:
For the price (under $100) the reproduced sound quality of the speakers is very good. The technical details from Amazon are a bit misleading, though. The speaker has a SINGLE, 3 inch rubberized element housed inside the weatherproof enclosure, projecting the sound upward. There is a venturi sound dispersal structure which sends the sound out the sides and top. There is also a low frequency sound tunnel similar to those used in some high end sound systems (you know the ones, very expensive, four letter name beginning with B and rhyming with “nose.”) At 900mhz, the distance is limited. In my ordinary stucco-and-wood two story house, it is about 25-30 feet. By taking the transmitter outside the house the range increased by 3x to 60-75 feet. While the speakers are not truly stereo (they blend the right and left channels into a single mono channel) the sound effect when you’re within earshot of both speakers is quite good. With a high quality sound source like an Ipod, the full range of sound can be heard. When I thought some music sounded “tinny” I ultimately traced it back to source; the source music was the cause. The transmitter is quite forgiving about the input sound level. The printed instruction booklet that comes with the speakers gives good advice (set earpiece volume on source device at two thirds full). The speaker enclosure is well thought out, has two simple mounting eyelets on the back where the surface is flat. No mounting screws are included; you’ll need to provide those yourself if you want to mount on a wall. There are low-profile four rubberized feet on the bottom in case you want to set it on a delicate surface. The brand name (Audio Unlimited) appears as a small discreet logo on the front of the speaker. The transmitter has two transmission channels selected by a switch on the transmitter itself. Tuning between the two offered channels is a snap, just press the button on each speaker and it automatically finds the signal. There is a reassuring blue LED on the front of the speaker to let you know it is active at full power. Using the remote’s Power button puts the speaker in Standby and the LED turns to yellow. To fully power off the speaker you must press the power button on each speaker. The Infrared remote emits a strong enough signal to work in direct sunlight and the infrared sensor on each speaker is a 2 inch oval vrtical window on the front. It works well from just about any angle. Each speaker comes with its own AC power adapter capable of 110-240v input. when loaded with its six C-cell batteries the weight of each speaker is hefty enough to withstand wind gusts or the occasional bump, when not fix-mounted, without toppling over.
The Bad
Each speaker requires 6 (six) C-size 1.5v batteries, not included. The remote needs two AAA batteries (again, NOT included.) If you haven’t bought the C-size battery lately and you’re accustomed to AA and AAA prices, get ready for a shock. The price for twelve good quality alkaline batteries is between 12 and 26 dollars, depending on brand. I bought Ray-O-Vac at $12. Duracell copper top were $26. I had planned to use rechargeable niMh, but at $14 for TWO batteries (you can find twelve on the internet for about $60), I decided to wait to see if I liked the speakers. I do not know if the speakers will actually work on rechargeable – something to check out before you buy those expensive batteries. Rechargeables are only 1.2volt (versus the 1.5v of regular batteries). Batteries last for approximately 16 hours of continuous use.
NOW HERE IS THE REALLY IMPORTANT PART:
If you are surrounded by lots of wireless technology already – wireless telephones, wireless internet, wireless security, wireless garage door openers, wireless mailbox sensors, wireless garage door sensors, wireless iPod headphones, bluetooth headsets, bluetooth printers, keyboards, mouse… THESE SPEAKERS ARE NOT FOR YOU.
I’m a fairly geeky guy who loves his gadgets, and I reasoned that most of my devices operate at or above 2.5ghz and wouldn’t interfere. I was WRONG! by process of elimination I figured out that you need to get up abouve 5ghz to be safe from interference with this device. Remember this is an analog device that translates signals into sounds. Our ears are remarkably sensitive to any interference. And the digital kind of interference doesn’t come across the speakers the gentle hiss of background static; it comes across as sharply (loud) punctuated squeals, cracks and pops. I live on a golf course, and by taking the transmitter and speaker out onto the middle of the fairway behind my house (with a long extension cord for the transmitter) I was able to eliminate all interference. But as soon as I went back near the house, the transmitter needed to be 4-5 feet away from the speakers to eliminate most of the digital wireless interference (it never truly went away unless I was on the fairway, well removed from any human digital wireless technology).
Summary
If you live in a relatively wireless-free world, or all your other wireless devices operate above 5ghz, these are great value for the money – watch the batteries, the cost can quickly overrun what you paid for the speakers.
Review by Sssan for Audio Unlimited SPK-VELO-001 Water-Resistant Wireless Speakers with Remote
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I bought these wireless speakers with some trepidation, and I love them! The sound is good, they work at the advertised distance, and they look cool! I’ve tried many other wireless speakers, and all the annoying hisses and drops got to me and I returned every one.
This one’s a keeper – even at 900MHz frequency, there’s no perceptible interference from other devices, and the sound remained remarkably steady as I moved the speakers from room to room.
On the flip side, a few pet peeves:
- With individual volume controls on each speaker, it’s hard to tell if you’ve got the balance right (this may be moot – see below)
- The transmitter needs plug-in power, not batteries, thus making it less than portable
- The Saitek speakers had one neat feature – the ability to control Windows Media Player functions (pause, skip, etc.) from the speakers and the remote. This is more useful than you can imagine!
Also, I discovered one dirty little secret – that there’s no Left and Right channel with these speakers. In other works, sound is not in stereo! This is a bummer (-1 star).
Other than these issues, I think this one’s a winner.
Review by Jordan Weinstein for Audio Unlimited SPK-VELO-001 Water-Resistant Wireless Speakers with Remote
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I purchased these speakers for my screened-in porch, and planned to mount them high on the wall. My thinking was that I could use the remote to turn them on/off. But when you turn them off (on battery power), they stay on standby for about 10 minutes, and then shut off completely – meaning that they don’t respond to the remote. This means that I then have to get up on a stool and press the power button manually for each spearker… which isn’t a very good system.
Sound quality is good though – just disappointed about the remote functionality.
If you don’t need to be able to turn them on/off remotely, these are good speakers.
Review by Samantha Mccormick for Audio Unlimited SPK-VELO-001 Water-Resistant Wireless Speakers with Remote
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I bought these speakers about 6 months ago and am extremely pleased with them. They are my 5th set of wireless speakers for my home. We live in a house constructed from concrete block, so running speaker wire is a big problem, even attaching cable covers to wires.
All the previous wireless speakers we tried gave weak or poor sound or stopped working shortly after installation. I love my Sirius satellite radio – have it in the car, on-line at the office and at home. The speakers are simply plugged in to the headphone output on the PC (too lazy to move the unit and plug them into the back speaker output).
In desperation, I finally decided to spend a little more (gulp) on these speakers – I can say they are totally worth the money. I have them in our kitchen which opens onto a covered porch (lanai). One speaker points into the kitchen, the other points to the porch. They have been working flawlessly for about 6 months (except the remote, which I am getting to), even with the one outside exposed a to very warm (>100 degrees) and humid environment.
Considering that we have to replace our stainless steel trashcan every 8 months or so due to rust, and scrub our flatware about as often, the fact that these speakers can stand up to humidity over the long FL summer speaks highly of the engineering of these speakers.
Now, the remote. Worked great for one day. . Now I can’t change the volume from the remote. Nothing happens. Changed batteries, turned system on and off, etc, all the ususal tech things. Nothing.
Haven’t contacted the company, because I decided I didn’t care enought to take the time. There may be a simple solution or the company may be willing to replace a non-working remote. Right now, I don’t mind walking over to the speakers and manually adjusting the volumes.
4 stars is because of my remote problem. As I said, the company may be responsive to this problem, but I haven’t given them the chance to show their support.
Addendum:
Boy, do I feel stupid. After writing this review, I picked up the remote to prove to myself that the remote doesn’t work. Ooops! Now the remote does work, all of a sudden, months after it stopped working. I swear, I have witnesses to the remote not working to change the volume!
So, WTF?
I have also emailed the tech support and cables unlimited to inquire about my mysterious remote.
Samantha McCormick
Cape Coral, FL
Review by Robin for Audio Unlimited SPK-VELO-001 Water-Resistant Wireless Speakers with Remote
Rating:
We use our Macbook in our Kitchen for all our music. We have many playlists including radio stations and programs such as NPR. The problem is that the little computer speakers just don’t cut it. Especially, if we want to host parties and/or use it outside on our large deck.
I figured I’d just go to Best Buy/Circuit City and purchase some wireless speakers, but CC said they don’t carry any instore (only on their website), and the ones at BB were not very attractive. They either looked like tiny computer speakers or were huge and bulky.
This set from Amazon looked attractive and the reviews seemed positive enough I figured I’d give it a try. When they showed up the other night, I was very pleased. Setup was literally as easy as just plugging things in. Plug the base station into a power outlet, then the other cable into the headphone jack on the laptop (it also includes RCA type jacks to plug into a home theater receiver). Then plug the speakers into a power outlet (or put several batteries into each speaker). Then just power on. There are holes on the back of the speakers to mount to a wall (haven’t done this yet).
The speakers have a very nice sound, and decent volume. We hosted a Christmas party and had the music up very loud on several occasions and the sound was very good. We never had static once.
My parents have a set of wireless speakers they purchased a couple of years ago and they constantly have static and have to fine-tune each speaker frequently to filter out the static. Not so with these. The technical specs mention they lock onto the signal and adjust as necessary, and this appears to work fantastic.
Some of the other reviews have been disatisfied with the remote. I haven’t used the remote though, so I can’t comment there. We adjust the volume by using the remote that came with our Macbook laptop.
Excellent product, great price.