Sonos Roam Bluetooth speaker release date, features, specs, price

Sonos typically launches a couple of products a year. In 2020, this was the Sonos Arc soundbar, the updated Sonos Five and the third-gen Sonos Sub. In 2021, the first product to come from the company is a portable Bluetooth speaker, called Sonos Roam.

There are still rumours circulating around Sonos entering the headphone market at some point - which you can read all about in our separate feature - but here we are focusing on everything you need to know about the Sonos Roam, including what features it offers, how much it costs and when it is available.

Release date and price

• Pre-order from 9 March
• £159/$169/€179
• Available 20 April 

Sonos announced the Sonos Roam during a special event on 9 March. The portable speaker is available to pre-order on the Sonos website from 9 March and it will be on sale from 20 April, 2021.

The Sonos Roam costs £159 in the UK, $169 in the US and €179 in Europe.

This makes it significantly cheaper than Move - the company's other Bluetooth speaker - which is £399/$399. It is also slightly cheaper than the Sonos One SL, marking a new entry point for Sonos speakers, if you ignore the Ikea Symfonisk range.

Design

• Triangular prism
• Very portable
• Fully waterproof

The Sonos Roam is a triangular prism shape. It measures 168 x 62 x 60mm and weighs 0.43kg, which makes it significantly more portable and lighter than the Sonos Move. You can read our separate feature comparing the two speakers directly.

As you would expect, it follows similar design traits to the current Sonos portfolio, with controls on the top, very small holes making up the speaker grille for a clean look and black and white colour options, which is standard for Sonos. We'd love to see some special edition colours at some point though - like Sonos offered with its limited edition Sonos One Hay collection. 

It's worth mentioning that the Roam does deter slightly from other Sonos speakers in that it offers raised tactile controls rather than capacitive controls.

Falling into the UE Boom 3 and Megaboom 3 category - both of which are waterproof - the Roam is IP67 rated for dust and water. It means you can submerge Roam in up to 3ft of water for 30 minutes. It can also handle sand and dust, like Move, and it should also be able to withstand drops too.

The Sonos Roam can be positioned horizontally or vertically. The bottom of the Sonos Roam, when vertical, is smooth and has no distinguishing buttons or features. There's one power/Bluetooth button on one side next to the USB-C port and there are also some small circular feet on one side to help the Sonos Roam sit properly when positioned horizontally.

Hardware specs

• Bluetooth, Wi-Fi 
• 10-hour battery
• Two class-H amplifiers, tweeter, custom racetrack mid-woofer

The Sonos Roam has Bluetooth 5.0, as well as support for Wi-Fi 5 (802.11ac) and it will automatically switch between the two. The Sonos Move requires you to use a button to switch between the two modes so the Roam should deliver a more seamless experience when bringing it in and out of your home.

There's a rechargable battery under the Roam's hood, which is recharged using the USB Type-C port, or via a Qi compatible wireless charging dock. Sonos has its own official wireless charging dock available to buy separately, which the Roam will magnetically snap onto. Otherwise, a USB Type-C cable is included in the box but not the power adapter.

The battery is said to last 10 hours - one hour less than Move - or 10 days in sleep mode. When music stops playing, the Sonos Roam will go into sleep mode automatically and Sonos said it takes less than a second to wake it back up. The power button is positioned on the back of the Roam, and this button can also be used to activate Bluetooth and wake up Roam when in sleep mode. Holding it for five-seconds will turn Roam off.

In terms of audio hardware, there are two class-H amplifiers tuned to the drivers and speaker's acoustic architecture, along with a tweeter, a custom racetrack mid-woofer and a high-efficiency motor to increase power and range.

There's also a far-field microphone array that uses advanced beamforming and multi-channel echo cancellation.

Features

• Sound Swap
• Google Assistant/Amazon Alexa
• Automatic TruePlay

Sonos Roam has both Google Assistant and Amazon Alexa on board like the Move - though you'll have to choose between them rather than use both at the same time, which is the case for other smart Sonos speakers. An LED light on top of the Roam above the microphone icon will let you know when the mic is on or off and Roam is listening and there is an LED above the Sonos logo to indicate power.

Roam also offers Auto Trueplay tuning - again like Move - to automatically tune its sound to its surroundings. It uses spatial awareness to adjust the sound for the speaker's orientation, location, and content. Auto TruePlay tuning has been improved for the Roam compared to Move though, working over both Wi-Fi and Bluetooth rather than just Wi-Fi, though Move is being updated to offer this too. You can read more about Auto TruePlay in our separate feature.

There's also AirPlay 2 support and Roam has all the features that come with other speakers in the Sonos system, like support for over 100 music services, easy grouping, stereo pairing and control through voice assistants like Google and Alexa. Like Move though, Roam cannot be used as surrounds with the Sonos Arc or Sonos Beam, and it can't be bonded to the Sonos Sub either.

The Roam does have an additional feature over other Sonos speakers though - as well as being able to automatically switch between a Bluetooth speaker and Sonos speaker - called Sound Swap. This is an extension of the feature that allows Sonos users to press and hold the play/pause button to bring that speaker into an existing group.

Pressing and holding the play/pause button on the Roam will bring the Roam into a group with other Sonos speakers already playing, or continuing to hold will transfer the music on the Roam to the nearest Sonos speaker. This is done using an ultrasonic frequency, with the strongest signal determining the closest speaker. You can read more about Sound Swap in our separate feature.

Sonos Roam portable speaker rumours: What happened?

Here is everything we heard about the Sonos Roam before its launch.

8 March 2021: Sonos Roam will have more features than Sonos Move, like Sound Swap

The Verge reported a number of extra features coming to the Sonos Roam, including Sound Swap, the ability to use Bluetooth and Wi-Fi at the same time and offer an IP67 rating.

4 March 2021: Sonos Roam is the new portable speaker to be launched next Tuesday, according to major leak

The Verge revealed some key features, the name and some images of the next Sonos speaker in a huge leak.

collection:

The Verge leak

17 February 2021: Sonos event confirmed for 9 March, headphones or Bluetooth speaker incoming?

Sonos sent out invites for a special event on 9 March. The invite doesn't give much away, though suggests it will be a product that can be taken on the go so perhaps the smaller Bluetooth speaker or headphones that have both appeared in leaks are possible.

11 February 2021: Sonos confirms it'll launch a new product in March after Bluetooth speaker surfaces

Sonos CEO Patrick Spence announced his company is preparing to release a new product in March 2021 during an earnings call. 

5 February 2021: Sonos FCC filing suggests another Bluetooth speaker

An FCC filing from Sonos suggests the company is working on another portable speaker with Bluetooth.

collection:

FCC filing images

from Pocket-lint https://ift.tt/2Z4qXaT
via IFTTT