Lightweight Outside, Big Sound On The Inside
BlueAnt X5 Party Speaker
With over 110dB SPL of rich sound and a powerful psycho-acoustic bass extension, the music from an X5 completely fills the room with a thunderous symphony of noise.
At only 4.1kg, an X5 is surprisingly lightweight and extremely portable. It has all the compact perks of a boombox with the guts and sound of a party box.
It also has a handle for easy carrying so you can bring your own DJ wherever you may go.
To really get the party going, the X5 party boxes also offer 5 LED lightshow modes while the music is pumping.
It's got Bluetooth, USB and Aux playback options so nobody misses out on the fun and 20 hours of play time on a charge.
The powerful X5 is a fraction of the price of many similarly powerful party boxes on the market too.
DESIGN
The first thing you notice about the X5 is how light it really is. It's size and impressive subwoofers are deceiving – it's so easy to carry with an inbuilt handle and move around the room.
The speaker is neatly designed with a big plastic-caged speaker and easy-to-navigate buttons on the lid.
Dancing LED lights play when you have music blasting, which is a great touch for an otherwise basic, all-black look.
The controls on the top are simple and effective. With an old-school physical nob, you have greater control on the exact volume playing. It also has USB and Aux playback options tucked neatly under a tab with two microphone Aux options too, with corresponding buttons so you can choose how the music plays.
A basic LCD screen displays the volume number and a Bluetooth symbol as well. There's also the classic play/pause button with skip right and skip left.
The back of the speaker just has a port for the power charger.
While it might be portable, BlueAnt warns the X5 is in no way waterproof and shouldn't be exposed to liquid while playing or charging. This means a beach party with the X5 may be out of the question.
SOUND
Consumers expect big sound from party boxes – which usually retail for around $500+ - but for only $399, the audio quality from the X5 is stunning.
We were lucky enough to be able to pair two of the X5 speakers in ‘duo mode', so the sound was even deeper and richer.
There's little distortion or vibration when the volume is notched up all the way and it really fills the room.
Coupled with the LED lightshow, the X5 really gives off a nice party ambiance.
If you want to geek out over the specifics, the X5 has 110dB+ SPL output of Dynamic HQ Audio, 2 EQ Modes Tuned by Studio Engineers, one 156mm woofer (6.5in), one 59mm tweeter (2.25in) and one Bass vent inverter tube.
It also has something called Psycho-acoustic Bass extension, which gives a fantastic impact to the sound.
We tested out a number of bass-heavy songs and normal party anthems and found great consistency between them all. In duo mode, there was seamless connectivity between the two speakers so zero echoing.
A big plus on the BlueAnt devices is the bass boost button, which a fantastic addition to a party speaker when you really want the sound to travel far and wide.
For such a compact and lightweight party box, the X5 can't really compete with the larger, more expensive boxes which emit deeper, louder sound.
But for a budget $399, you'll be stunned at how good the audio experience really is.
BATTERY + EXTRA FEATURES
The X5 has up to 20 hours of playback time at 50% volume off the charger, whichh is pretty reasonable for its size and price point. It's also standard with its 7.4V 5200mAh battery.
But when dialled up to 100% it only has about 5-6 hours of battery life, so it's probably not ideal to bring out somewhere with no power for a long period of time.
When off the charger, the only indicator of its battery life is four little lights on top, which can be hard to quantify. But portability on the X5 is just an added bonus, I think most usecases would involve it being plugged into the wall at a party.
It describes the wall charger as a ‘rapid charger' and I found it was always juiced to the max after leaving it plugged in for a few hours.
A nice touch with the X5 that really puts the ‘party' in party box is the addition of two wireless microphones plus cables so you can set up the speakers with karaoke.