Gadgetory

a few months ago I reviewed the Altec Lansing mini life jacket 3 and I came away very unimpressed but I still get a participation award but I still decided to give the Altec Lansing verso smart speaker a try although they were aiming for something great I feel that execution was pretty sloppy there are some things that I like about the Versa but there are some other things that just fall flat a lot of manufacturers are starting to incorporate voice assistance into their speakers whether you need it or not and the Altec Lansing versa is a rugged Alexa enable smart speaker which will better suit people who are heavily invested into the Amazon Alexa ecosystem and if you use one of the three supported streaming services Spotify Deezer or Napster and if you want to pick the speaker up or any of the other speakers showed off in this video I'll have links or description below check them out because you never know when they're on sale as Altec Lansing puts it the Versa is everything proof its ip67 rated so it's both water and dust resistant and it also floats the outer board of the speaker is made up of two rubber layers that also make the speaker shockproof but unfortunately the metal faces on the speaker gets scratched very easily so if you take the speaker out with you on hikes on a regular basis it's eventually going to show a lot of wear and tear and so it's one of the topic of taking the speaker out with you on a regular basis although the triangular design of the speaker looks good at home and I like how the faceplates play with lighting this speaker isn't the easiest to travel with it's big it's an odd shape and there's no built-in carrying handle or somewhere to attach a clip okay now let's talk about buttons and ports like a lot of other smart speakers on the market the Altec Lansing versa doesn't have an ox jack which to me is a little silly but it does charge via a micro USB port on the side of the speaker there's your power by an a bluetooth button and a star button that is actually used as a mic mute button when the speaker is there Wi-Fi mode and you can cycle through LED lighting modes if you're using the speaker in Bluetooth mode and on top of the speaker you also have your volume buttons and a mic button so you can manually activate your voice assistant obviously if you press the plus or minus bi annual adjust your volume but if you want to skip a track you have to press and hold the plus button and if you want to go back a track you have to press and hold the minus button and in order to play or pause your music you have to press which is a little odd now one of the things that I do like about the Versa is how easy it is to switch between bluetooth and Wi-Fi mode which oddly enough was a problem for the UE mega blast and blast which are also Alexa enabled smart speakers that cost way more than the Versa but actually connecting the Versa to your Alexa account requires downloading three apps and is a hair-pulling process it took me multiple times to get a write which wasn't the case with the UE blast or mega blast or any of the other Google assistant enabled smart speakers I've had and the Versa can only connect to 2.4 gigahertz networks and unfortunately the microphones are on the Versa don't do a good job of picking up your voice I find myself having to speak up and enunciate a lot more so that reversible hear me compared to other smart speakers but if your voice assistant decides to cooperate you can ask a questions control your smart home and if you're signed into one of the supported streaming services Spotify Deezer or Napster you'll be able to control your music playback just by asking allah to turn on the studio lights ok change the studio lights to blue ok what's the current price of Bitcoin one Bitcoin is worth eleven thousand three dollars what's the current price of ethereum one aetherium is worth one thousand forty three dollars now let's talk about tech specs while in Bluetooth mode the verse that can only be connected to a one device at a time and it has a wireless range of 30 feet with direct line-of-sight but unfortunately placed in one wall between the Versa and your phone will cause the signal to stutter I'll take lansing claims of battery life over eight hours but it's really more like five hours and a five hour battery life is way below average for speakers in this price range now when it comes to speaker setup the Versa is rocking a single two inch diameter woofer and an 85 by 45 millimeter passive radiator honestly I feel the Altec Lansing vs. sounds pretty bad for its speaker in its price range my biggest problem with it is that vocalist sound very amazingly the sound stage is very narrow and instrument separation is pretty weak so everything just sounds like it's on the same plane the passive radiator on this speaker does give it a good amount of bass but it will very easily overpower the rest of the song or you just get a lot of reverb in the background the verso does get loud but sound quality takes a huge hit at those higher volumes and I'm making a big deal about this cuz just because the Altec Lansing versa is a rugged speaker it doesn't mean it can't sound good take for example the bose sound like micro this is another rugged speaker that can take everything the Versa can take and it sounds surprisingly good for its size and it also does this while using smaller hardware now you can adjust the EQ on the Versa and it does help a bit but there's only so much eq sentence can do on so so hardware but in order for the EQ sentence to be active on the Versa you need to have the verse and advocated a p-- open and streaming your music through that but if you don't have the app open then your EQ settings go back to default the EQ settings aren't stored into the speaker's firmware at the end of the day I wouldn't recommend picking up the Altec Lansing versa it doesn't sound as good as other speakers at the same or below its price range and using the voice assistant on the speaker isn't as easy as other smart speakers the microphones don't do as good of a job of picking up your voice and you're going to find yourself repeating your commands on a regular basis battery life on this speaker is also below average given the speaker's price range and its sheer size and then there's the triangular shape of the speaker for a record speaker that I assume a lot of people would like to take on the go it's kind of hard to take the speaker on the go if you're looking for a small rugged speaker I highly recommend the bose sound like micro or the JBL flip 4 hey if you enjoyed the video please like and subscribe it helps out more than you realize for more product reviews and deal alerts check out Jim Carrey that net if you want to support the channel pick up a shirt and I'll catch you next time