Review: Apple Computer iPod Hi-Fi Speaker System

The best previous iPod speaker systems have gone out of their way to match and accentuate the iPod’s design – for instance, Altec Lansing contracted outside designers IDEO to create the beautiful, tubular inMotion iM7, and JBL recently debuted the domed, shrine-like On Time, which reportedly was in the works for at least a year and a half. Apple’s approach to the design of iPod Hi-Fi is different, and frankly less impressive: in essence, it has enlarged the glossy white plastic iPod Dock it released in 2003, turned it on its side, and placed three speakers inside a black fabric grille on its front. Viewed from the front, it is pitch black, and looks basically identical to the center-channel speaker of a home surround sound system; its white plastic body is only visible when viewed dimensionally. The iPod sits on top in a resizable Universal Dock well, rather than in front, as with most competing systems. Markings on the unit are few and far between; there’s an Apple logo on the back, and an iPod logo on the unit’s gray rubber bottom. Visually, this design is consistent with the company’s earlier products, but it’s neither sexy nor groundbreaking. At best, it’s neutral, and at worst, it looks old-fashioned. Unlike the now iconic iPod, many people will dislike it.

Because of its boxiness, iPod Hi-Fi’s 17.0″ by 6.6″ by 6.9″ measurements make it look considerably larger than the similar 16.5″ by 6.5″ by 6.5″ iM7 tube, but Apple uses a larger chassis for a reason. Altec’s design uses two 3-inch midrange drivers and a 4-inch subwoofer to provide most of its power – note the word “most” – while Apple includes two 3.15-inch midrange drivers and a 5.12-inch subwoofer, providing more muscle across the frequencies it covers.

Larger speakers don’t tell the whole size story, though: iPod Hi-Fi uses a stiffened, double-wall enclosure with individual cabinets for the midrange drivers, and two ports (large front holes) to enhance its bass.

This was done to give the system presence and high-volume clarity that cheaper and smaller systems may lack. Together with the system’s internal power supply, Apple’s heavy plastic box and drivers consequently weigh in at 14.5 pounds without batteries (versus iM7’s 8 pounds), and 16.7 pounds with six D-cells inside(versus iM7’s 11 pounds). It’s not light, or portable enough for air travel purposes, but two total handles on its sides allow it to be lifted and carried from room to room or outdoors without much effort. Unlike the front-docking iM7, we wouldn’t advise keeping your iPod docked on top while transporting iPod Hi-Fi – just in case you lose your grip.

Apple’s box is black and white and fairly large, but thanks to a handle on top, it’s not as difficult to carry as we’d expected. The first thing you’ll discover inside is a second box, black in color, with two separate compartments: one holds an Apple Remote (iLounge rating: B), manuals, and seven of Apple’s Universal Dock Adapters for use with iPods 3G, 4G, and mini; the other contains a power cord and the three most recent Dock Adapters for iPods 5G and nano. There are no audio cables or international power blade adapters inside.

It’s no great shock that Apple’s kept iPod Hi-Fi’s controls incredibly simple: the only two buttons on its body are capacitive (touch-sensitive) plus and minus circles on top, directly in front of the Universal Dock. There’s also no power switch. If you want to hear music, you connect an audio source and press play. The included Apple Remote, described more in the review above, features six total buttons: volume up and down, track forward and backward, play/pause, and “Menu.” A single light on the unit’s bottom right corner flashes green to signal receipt of a command it can follow, and orange for a command it can’t follow. That’s it.

There are two ways to use iPod Hi-Fi. First and most obviously, it works as a dockable iPod speaker system, which you customize using the included Universal Dock Adapters. Unlike some other Universal Dock-laden accessories we’ve tested, Apple’s Adapters fit properly and come out easily when you want to change them. Because the system is so large, it looks best with a full-sized iPod on top; the nano looks comparatively slight on top of such a huge enclosure.

iPod Hi-Fi’s behavior varies a little depending on the iPod that’s connected. Fifth-generation iPods and nanos are capable of “volume mirroring;” their on-screen volume levels are reflected in Hi-Fi’s output level, and controlled by the included Apple Remote or the unit’s volume buttons. These iPods (and presumably, future models) also call up a special Speakers menu, described below, which lets you make Hi-Fi-specific tweaks to each iPod’s screen and sound output. Other iPods – 3G, 4G, and mini – lack the Speakers menu, and the volume controls instead command only the Hi-Fi’s internal amplifier, without adjusting those iPods’ internal volume settings. The Apple Remote properly controls track forward/backward and play/pause features for all of these iPods.

That brings us to the second way to use iPod Hi-Fi – connecting an audio device to one of only two ports on its back. Apple’s single audio port automatically switches between analog and optical (S/PDIF) audio, depending on the type of cable you connect – again, neither is included in the package. Dock Connector-less iPods such as the shuffle, 1G and 2G can be connected with an analog audio cable, while fiber optic-ready audio devices such as Apple’s AirPort Express can be connected with their own, more expensive optical cables. Hi-Fi will automatically play music from this audio port if no iPod is docked on top, or switch between two active sources when you press and hold the Menu button on the Apple Remote. As with 3G, 4G, and mini iPods, the Remote’s volume controls change Hi-Fi’s amplifier settings rather than the output of the connected devices, but here, track forward/backward controls don’t work, and the play/pause button only mutes the system.

As a side note, iPod Hi-Fi also operates in two different power consumption modes – one when the included power cable is attached to the second of its two rear ports, and a low-power mode when it’s running off of D-cell battery power. You use a coin to open a locked panel on the enclosure’s rear bottom, pop six D-cells in, and reseal the panel. We were surprised to see the system run for roughly 10 hours on one set of batteries; our iPod was fully charged and set to 50% volume, enough for the Hi-Fi to be heard even when pointed at a different wall and through a closed door.

Apple has done a few interesting things with its low-power mode. Unlike most iPod speaker systems, Hi-Fi will actually supply some recharging power to the iPod even when it’s running off of batteries, but it does cut off the juice at some point. In order to try and reduce speaker power consumption, it automatically drops to a lower volume level as soon as it’s unplugged, allowing you to re-adjust upwards if you desire. Finally, it drops from a 108 decibel peak volume to 102 decibels, which is actually a noticeable and significant (logarithmic) reduction, but one that will only be evident if you’re really blasting music. If you think this will affect your personal use of the system, we hope you have a great relationship with your local police (or other noise ordinance enforcers).

Most of our testing with iPods and the AirPort Express worked exactly as one would expect from the descriptions above: both types of devices sounded clear when connected properly to the Hi-Fi, which puts out very little amplifier noise, and the Apple Remote worked very well by Infrared remote standards. We had no problem whatsoever controlling Hi-Fi at a 30-foot distance under normal (non-fluorescent/incandescent) lighting conditions, even when its IR sensor was obscured by its fabric front grille. Its status light was easy to see, and because it remains black most of the time, visually unobtrusive. iPods charged on top without incident, regardless of whether the power cable was connected or disconnected. In short, it works pretty much as expected.

Other than the limitations of the Speakers menu option discussed below, there were only four semi-disappointing control-related issues we experienced during testing. First, and as we’ve noted in many earlier reviews, Infrared technology is far less than ideal for speaker systems with significant power: even at 30 feet away, iPod Hi-Fi can be turned up loud enough to sound like it’s right next to you, and you may well want to control it from a room or porch away. Unfortunately, Infrared can’t pierce walls or reach 60+ feet distances, so an RF (radio frequency)-based remote like the ones included with systems like JBL’s On Stage II (iLounge rating: B+), Klipsch’s iFi (iLounge rating: B+) and Monitor Audio’s i-Deck (not yet released in the U.S.) would have been a better match here.

Second, Apple’s choice to simplify Hi-Fi’s controls and features has a number of predictable consequences: you can’t toggle playlists or albums as you can with certain other iPod remotes, for example, so your interactions with the iPod are either limited or achieved at close distances.

We do like the look and feel of Apple’s Remote a lot, but it’s up to you to decide whether it’s adequate for your needs.

Third, iPod Hi-Fi’s simple port design has a consequence: it’s woefully under-equipped by comparison with even inexpensive iPod speaker systems. Though none of the iPod-specific alternatives we’ve tested includes an optical audio input port like iPod Hi-Fi’s, most of them offer a perfectly serviceable analog audio input and at least a couple of other ports, such as a video output, a Dock Connector pass-through, or a USB port for data synchronization. While we can sort of understand the absence of the data ports – assuming you won’t want to keep iPod Hi-Fi next to computer, such as a Mac mini – the lack of video-out makes less sense, especially since Apple pitches Hi-Fi as something you should place next to an LCD TV.

Our fourth and least important discovery was AirPort Express-related, and not the Hi-Fi’s fault per se. When used with iTunes or Front Row software, AirPort did a perfect job of playing back plain audio tracks though iPod Hi-Fi, but wouldn’t play back the audio portions of videos that were playing on our host computer. For the moment, this is a very minor issue, but it might matter if you’re planning on using Hi-Fi with a wireless iTunes library rather than one connected directly to the unit.

Apple has famously kept the iPod’s on-screen interface as simple and streamlined as can be: even when it has recently added features to the main menu, they now appear and disappear depending on whether their specific accessory is attached. So even though the company surreptitiously added a new Speakers option to the iPod 5G’s and nano’s main menus in its January 10 firmware update, it was inaccessible until now, and doesn’t work with other companies’ speakers, either. Plug these iPods in to Hi-Fi and the word Speakers appears; pull them out and the option is lost.

The Speakers menu lets you make small tweaks to the docked iPod’s sound and screen for Hi-Fi purposes without diving deeper into the iPod’s Settings. Your first option is Tone Control, which has only three settings, said to be customized for Hi-Fi’s drivers: Bass Boost, Normal, and Treble Boost. A preview of each sound is available when you roll over them in the Tone Control Menu. You can’t boost both bass and treble at the same time, or access deeper iPod EQ settings from this menu. The Boosts aren’t profound, but you can hear them. We’ll note only briefly that Apple continues to lag behind most major audio players in providing user-controllable equalization for both the iPod and its speakers. Options such as the iM7 permit independent, incremental bass and treble adjustment, while Klipsch’s iFi and others permit incremental subwoofer-level bass tuning. We continue to prefer and hope that Apple will add simple graphical equalizers to iPods, mirroring those in iTunes.

Next is a Backlight option, which now allows you to have the iPod’s backlight stay off, switch on briefly whenever a key is pressed, stay on whenever the iPod’s playing, or stay on at all times. This is different from the iPod’s standard Backlight Timer feature, which keeps the screen on or off for a set number of seconds (2, 5, 10, 15, 20, or always); the latter two new options shouldn’t be used if the Hi-Fi’s running on battery power.

Finally, there’s a choice called Large Album Art, which lets you dedicate most of the iPod’s screen (with an all-black background) to album art while it’s playing through Hi-Fi. It’s the same art you get from pressing the iPod’s center button several times during song playback, but it does look nice against black – similar to Apple’s Front Row software for the Mac. Other speaker makers should have access to this feature, though it annoyingly needs to be interrupted (with an extra button press on the iPod’s face) to access the iPod’s menus.

There may be no phrase as loaded in the audio world as “audiophile-quality sound” – marketing talk intended to convince typical listeners that serious music lovers would endorse their products. In fact, audiophiles are a cantankerous bunch, squabbling far more than average people over what constitutes good sound, and rarely agreeing. Some refuse to listen to iPods at all on the grounds that MP3 and similar compression perceptibly ruins the quality of music, and some claim that hardware or software omissions (namely equalization and bass) render iPods less than “audiophile-quality” as playback devices. Additionally, many have taken issue with Apple’s sale of low-bitrate (128Kbps) songs through the iTunes Music Store, noting that customers are paying CD single prices for lower-than-CD-quality tracks. In sum, these audiophiles would and have argued that the very concept of “iPod Hi-Fi” is laughable, from the content to the software and hardware.

Apple isn’t deaf to these views, but it also hasn’t knocked itself out addressing them – presumably because most of its customers either don’t care, or haven’t complained enough. In recent months, it adjusted its latest iPods to reduce some, but not all, of the audiophiles’ sound quality gripes. The company’s biggest “audiophile” concession to date was in the middle of 2004, when it unveiled a new, relatively high-bitrate audio compression format called Apple Lossless Audio. Lossless files are designed to preserve true CD sound quality in tracks that are typically 30-50% smaller than the CD originals, such that a single 700 Megabyte CD could conceivably fall to 350 Megabytes in size. If you do the math – or own an iPod without a hard disk – you’ll understand why this format isn’t hugely popular; even the largest 60GB iPod will hold a not-so-whopping 180 albums rather than 1800, with a 1GB nano holding around 3 albums.

In order to address the concerns of our varied readership, we always test headphones and speakers with a combination of Apple Lossless test tracks, iTunes Music Store files, and our own ripped music, ranging in bitrate from 112Kbps to over 1000Kbps, just to see how they handle the files. We also test with a wide variety of music, ranging from bass-heavy hip-hop to instrumental, Bhangra, techno, Jazz, Rock, and Latin music, trying to get a good sense of how different popular genres play out.

Here’s the part that should concern you: the better a listening device is, the worse the low-bitrate files typically sound, meaning that if you’re listening to iTunes Music Store or self-ripped files through iPod Hi-Fi, you’d expect to hear more of their flaws – just as we did in our initial auditioning at Apple’s event in Cupertino. Conversely, good speakers will typically let you hear more detail, particularly sound staging, in the high bitrate recordings – Apple Lossless, MP3s encoded at 192Kbps or higher, and AAC files at 160Kbps or higher. Another way to look at this – the opposite of how most audiophiles would do it – is to suggest that you don’t need expensive, “hi-fi” speakers if you buy low-bitrate iTunes Music Store songs, or don’t encode your music at high bitrates. Apple could increase demand for superior solutions by offering better-quality recordings through the iTunes Store.

We have mixed news to share on the iPod Hi-Fi’s audio performance: as suggested at the beginning of this review, it’s certainly better-suited to specific applications than some of the best iPod speakers we’ve already tested. In short, if you’re looking for a room-filling, one-piece speaker system like Bose’s Wave Music System, or a more controlled alternative to Klipsch’s iFi, iPod Hi-Fi should be on your short list. But if you’re not in need of high-volume, high-detail performance, and instead want something that delivers balanced sound at close distances and solid sound at further distances – features we strongly believe iPod users prefer – you’ll be better off with Altec’s inMotion iM7 or Bose’s SoundDock.

The preceding conclusion requires some explanation, and we must note that we didn’t reach it lightly: in addition to hearing iPod Hi-Fi in Apple’s four demonstration rooms, and trying our own unit independently without crowds or competing speaker options, two of iLounge’s editors ran Hi-Fi through a battery of comparative tests, placing it against four other speaker systems in head to head comparisons. We passed on comparisons to pricey but otherwise not comparable systems like Tivoli’s iSongBook (iLounge rating: B+), as well as less impressive systems like Klipsch’s iGroove (iLounge rating: B) because they’ve been done better by our top options. Here’s what we heard.

Even by comparison with Klipsch’s iFi (above), which was previously the iPod’s top speaker system for high-volume, high-bass performance, iPod Hi-Fi does an excellent job of maintaining a significant level of original audio detail at peak listening levels.