• Wireless range of up to 10m
• Battery life of up to eight hours
• 1.3kg

Good looks can be deceiving and this was unfortunately true for the Bose SoundLink Wireless Mobile speaker. Sporting a beautiful brushed metal grille and a simple but classy design, this portable Bluetooth speaker scores high in the looks department.

Weighing a hefty 1.3kg and the size of two CD jewel cases put side by side, it is much bulkier compared to other Bluetooth speakers.

While the SoundLink produced better sound than the average wireless speaker, it did not deliver the sound quality that I would expect from one with such a steep price tag.

Mid-tones came across a little too stiff. While the treble notes were clear, I felt that they sounded a tad too shrill for my liking. The bass notes disappointed me the most. They lacked the richness and punch that I have come to expect from the Bose brand.

Bose SoundLink Wireless Mobile Speaker
This wireless speaker can play music through a wireless connection from any Bluetooth device.

Connecting a device, such as an iOS or Android smartphone to the SoundLink was a fuss-free, one-step affair.

For devices that do not support Bluetooth, the SoundLink has an auxiliary 3.5mm audio-in jack.

I did not notice a significant difference between the sound quality of a track played via the Bluetooth connection and the auxiliary-in connection.

This SoundLink Wireless Mobile Speaker can be plugged to a power source or rely on its built-in Lithium-ion battery. The rechargeable battery stores enough juice for about eight hours of music playback and takes about three hours to fully charge.

This feature makes it great for longer getaways when you have no access to a power source.

Its weight and large size do not make this Bose SoundLink Wireless Mobile Speaker suitable as a travel speaker as well.

Click for more on Bose SoundLink Wireless Mobile Speaker.

Flashing a diamond ring is all good and well, but if it’s too puny to see, what is the point? This seems to be the mindset Archos was in when it forged its mammoth 705 Wi-Fi portable video player. If you like your mobile audio and video served up in super-sized portions, open your eyes wide because you are about to be dazzled. Unfortunately, open your wallet, too, as this gem doesn’t come cheap, especially after shelling out extra for accessories you’ll actually want.

When you see how the 705 sparkles, though, you will understand why. Above all else, the 705 is gigantic (4.96 x 7.05 x 0.775 inches [HxWxD]) by mobile device standards. A 7-inch touchscreen display (800 x 480) lets you view movies, home videos, and photos. You can also watch TV you record using a DVR (digital video recorder) function which complete with personal TV guide that saves programming straight to the player. You also get a full-fledged digital audio player, two integrated speakers, and a palm-sized remote. Further, an integrated kickstand means you can set the 705 down, and the 3.5mm headphone jack doubles as a composite video out port to display images on a TV.

Need more bling for your money? No problem. The 705 also displays PDFs, plays Flash-based games, and has an excellent user interface and file browser to navigate content. Better, the 705’s built-in Wi-Fi is actually useful, letting you stream audio and video from a networked computer; whip around the Web via a Flash-supporting Web browser; and download movies, TV, and audio from Archos Content Portal. More bling? How about two built-in USB ports? I connected a digicam and moved photos and video to the 705′s hard drive. And then there’s the 705′s arguably most alluring trait: the scores of audio and video formats it supports, including MPEG-4, AVI, WMV, DivX, H.264, MPEG-2, MP3, WMA, protected WMA, WAV, AAC, and AC3.

What is not to like? Well, the 705′s size and heft drastically reduce your mobile-use options. An included carrying case indicates that tucking the 705 in a pocket isn’t happening. Operating the 705 is almost always a two-handed job. Worse, there is that issue of spending more money to fully utilize the 705′s features. The DVR feature, for example, requires Archos DVR Station Gen 5 dock. Browsing the Web requires an Opera Web browser plug-in. H.264 and MPEG-2 support also requires separate plug-ins. Even displaying the 705′s image on a TV requires a proprietary A/V cable.

Despite the additional cash and any numbness your arms may experience carrying this lug around, the 705 is still an undeniable multimedia juggernaut. The 80GB model stores 100 movies, 800,000 photos, or 45,000 songs, and the 160GB model doubles these amounts. The stellar format support meant there was little in my media library the 705 couldn’t handle. And although the 705′s performance isn’t quite as massive as its other features, it’s certainly above average. Most disappointing was the touch screen’s responsiveness. The integrated speakers output was also a bit flat, though a five-band equalizer and bass boost feature help matters. The 705′s screen produces lively, accurate colors, but it wasn’t as responsive or sharp. Web browsing, however, was quick and extremely satisfying from all hotspots.

Ultimately, you could easily spend $500 to utilize all the 705 WiFi’s capabilities. Whether it’s worth it depends almost entirely on how much you value hauling around dozens of movies you can watch on a screen that won’t put your eyes into squint mode. Factor in the stellar Wi-Fi performance, and it’s not difficult to reason why multimedia nuts will want to add this jewel to their collection

Click now for more details: Archos 705 Wi-Fi Portable Media Player

Sure you’re waiting for media-streaming devices to catch up to 802.11n, and the Linksys DMA2200 Media Center Extender does it in style, geek style, that is. The box isn’t particularly attractive, but the dual-band Wi-Fi radio inside that’s capable of operating on either the 2.4GHz or 5GHz frequency bands.

The built-in DVD player that is capable of scaling standard-def DVDs to 1080i. The wireless connection stumbled when tried to stream HD video with 5.1-channel audio attached, however, and it broke down completely when moved the extender into a more enclosed area of the cabinet.

Aside from delivering the familiar Windows Media Center user interface, the primary advantages that devices like the DMA2200 offer are support for PCs equipped with CableCARD digital tuners and hooks to online media content offered by the likes of Comedy Central, Showtime, and the Discovery Channel.

Unfortunately, the user interfaces most of those services offer to be utter crap. The ability to pause playback on one media extender and resume it on another, on the other hand, is a slick benefit.

Unlike the less-expensive Xbox 360, this new class of extender freezes out Windows XP Media Center users altogether. Your host PC must run Vista Home Premium or Vista Ultimate. In fact, aside from the wireless feature and the consumer-electronics form factor, there is not a whole lot here that would lead to recommend the DMA2200 over Microsoft’s gaming console, especially if you’re into games.

Streaming 1080p video on a wireless network is compelling; being forced to use Vista to do it isn’t.

For more, click Linksys DMA2200 Media Center Extender

Creative is a little late to the wireless music-streaming party, but the company comes with a gift its competitors can’t match: the X-Fi Crystalizer technology lifted from its X-Fi soundcard line.

The Xmod Wireless base station captures your PC’s audio stream and transmits it to a remote receiver. The system relies on your PC’s media-player software, which means it can stream any track your media player is capable of playing, including WMA Lossless, FLAC, and DRM-protected songs.

The transmitter receives power and audio from your PC over a USB cable, but it’s also equipped with line-level RCA jacks. A 1/8-inch stereo jack enables you to plug in a set of local speakers. The receiver is powered by an AC adapter and has line-level RCA and 1/8-inch outputs. Both modules have buttons for play/pause, track forward, and track back as well as a large volume-control knob, so you don’t need to hunt for the simple included remote to control the devices.

The Xmod Wireless costs $120 more than Logitech’s Wireless DJ, but it can’t match that player’s awesome remote (which displays your track list and current tune on its LCD). On the other hand, the Xmod sounds considerably better than Logitech’s product and it can stream to multiple receivers (a feature Logitech promised but never delivered). The Xmod wireless costs $70 more than a Squeezebox, doesn’t rely on your wireless router, and is much cheaper to expand to a multizone system. But it lacks that device’s excellent display and it can’t stream Internet radio.

And then there’s the Sonos Digital Music System. For its price, you could buy three additional Xmod receivers and have $160 left over to buy music. But all the Xmod receivers will play the same music, the system can’t be expanded beyond four zones, and each receiver must be within 100 feet of the transmitter. The Sonos comes with that brilliant remote control, supports up to 32 zones and can stream independently to each, and operates on a wireless mesh network that delivers substantially greater range.

If music alone isn’t enough for you, some players can stream video and show pictures thru wireless connection as well. These multimedia boxes let you send almost any video or still images that are stored on your PC to your TV set without needing to run cables in between. In this post, we will look at devices that able to progressive-scan DVD as well, so they can replace a regular DVD player in your home theater setup.

D-Link DSM-320RD

A step up from the audio-only DSM-120, the DSM-320RD has excellent audio quality and supports a broad range of music formats, including Live365 and Radio@AOL. It also has a 5-in-1 card reader. But the photo and video playback quality was mixed, mainly due to the inherent limitations of a TV screen versus a PC monitor.

Unless you have an HDTV set and an HD-capable streamer like the Buffalo unit, your digital photos will be reduced in resolution to about 720 by 480, and their edges might be cropped. That said, navigating to photo folder and selecting pictures for display via the player was simple, and a slide show-creation feature lets you choose accompanying background music.

Video files don’t share the transfer troubles of still images. Most standard-format videos that you might store on your PC are already in the right aspect ratio and resolution for your TV, and the D-Link’s playback quality was similar to system monitor. Its major drawback for video is its lack of high-definition output. Also, as with the DSM-120, the remote control is small and overly sensitive buttons.

Buffalo LinkTheater

The Buffalo LinkTheater audio quality was excellent, and the product’s ability to display album artwork embedded in MP3 files was good too. On the video side, the player supports the popular DivX format. Finally, if you have an HDTV, the unit’s high-def mode delivers higherquality photo and video playback than the DSM-320RD, a big plus.

However, the LinkTheater’s lack of HDMI or DVI connectors, given that it supports HDTV. The model could benefit from WPA support as well, which the DSM-320RD has.

Slingbox and TiVoToGo

If you want to watch TV on your PC in another room, check out Sling Media’s Slingbox or TiVo’s TiVoToGo. With the free TiVo Desktop software, the TiVoToGo feature lets Series 2 TiVo owners use a $50 USB 802.11g adapter to pull shows from the TiVo to any PC on their network. You can also burn programs to DVD, or save them to your laptop to watch on the road.

The Slingbox goes even further, letting you send video from almost any source ; including cable, satellite, DVD, VCR, and TiVo or another digital video recorder directly to your computer. What’s more, your PC can be in the next room, or anywhere it can access the Internet, say, in a Bangkok hotel room.

You have to add a standard 802.11g Wi-Fi ethernet bridge to make the Slingbox wireless and image quality is less than what you’ll get on a TV. But you can view both live and recorded video from afar in real time.

Wi-Fi: It’s not just for laptops anymore. With these products and tips, you can cut the cord when making phone calls, streaming music or video, sharing files, and more.

If you think your wireless network is good only for using a laptop in the living room, think again. A slew of new Wi-Fi peripherals promises to send your music, movies, pictures, and even phone calls flying from room to room, no cables required. These days, we’re seeing products for just about any task that might benefit from going wireless.

Not surprisingly, some of the newcomers don’t live up to the hype. In this series, we checked out 12 of the latest cordless creations in several categories to determine which products are good mates for Wi-Fi and which still need some work.

Wireless Music Player

Today’s Wi-Fi enabled streaming music players let you access your entire digital music collection from any room in the house. The ones we tried were by far the most consumer friendly, mature, and useful of the Wi-Fi peripherals we evaluated here. Each allows you to plug in your powered speakers or hook up to a tuner with standard cables, so you can play music on your existing stereo. The devices can also bypass your PC to play Internet radio stations, and you can set up multiple units to play tunes from one PC.

We took a look at three popular players: D-Link’s DSM-120 MediaLounge Wireless Music Player, Roku’s SoundBridge M1000, and Slim Devices’ Squeezebox version 3.

The SoundBridge and the Squeezebox have slick interfaces, great sound quality, and robust features. Though the Squeezebox’s extras make it our favorite, the SoundBridge and the MediaLounge have the digital rights management (DRM) support required to play Napster and Rhapsody files.

D-Link DSM-120

This stylish music streamer has a digital optical output jack for higher quality audio with compatible receivers, as well as standard analog outputs and support for most unprotected music formats. It doesn’t handle iTunes AAC files, but it does support Windows DRM-10 audio playback, as well as protected Napster and Rhapsody music, via Windows Media Connect. A USB port on top lets you play tunes from a flash drive, and you can install a 2.5-inch hard disk. You also get an alarm clock feature, which will play music on cue from an installed (not a flash) drive.

A few things left us less than tingly, though. The companion PC software for music-folder and playlist setup isn’t very friendly, and the number-pad remote control makes entering song titles or other alphabetic information painful. Also, Live365 is your only Internet radio option.

Roku SoundBridge M1000

The SoundBridge, a sleek player with a big, bright fluorescent display. It has digital optical and coaxial outputs, and it supports Windows DRM, iTunes, and unprotected AAC music formats.

Interestingly, the SoundBridge has no PC software to install. Instead you use Windows Media Connect, or one of several popular software music players including iTunes, Musicmatch, Napster, and Rhapsody in its music-sharing mode. Or you can use Roku competitor Slim Devices’ excellent open-source Slim-Server software, which includes support for FLAC and Ogg Vorbis playback.

The SoundBridge’s visual display is nice, excellent Internet radio interface, and wide range of supported stations, including Rhapsody. But as with its MediaLounge counterpart, its remote control could use text-entry buttons.

By the time you read this, Roku plans to ship an alarm clock version of the SoundBridge, the R1000 with 18 Internet radio presets.

Slim Devices Squeezebox

The elegant Squeezebox device uses 802.11g Wi-Fi, and is the only one of the three to support WPA encryption, the more-secure successor to the WEP encryption in the other products. An alarm clock and a headphone jack make the Squeezebox a fine bedside companion.

Getting the SqueezeBox to work with the convenient remote (which has an alphanumeric keypad for easier navigation) took just a few minutes; on the PC side, the useful SlimServer software was simple to install and set up.

[tags]Wireless Music Player, D-Link DSM 120, Slim Devices Squeezebox, Roku SoundBridge M1000[/tags]

The startech MP3 Airlink lets you send music across your home without making your floor look like a snake pit. The 2.4-GHz transmitter and receiver are two nearly identical 1- by 3.1- by 3.1-inch (HWD) plastic boxes. Each box has its own wall-wart AC power adapter, and the system comes with two sets of RCA-to-3.5mm cables and one 3.5mm-to-3.5mm cable.

Overall, the AirLink’s sound quality and ease of use is impresive. It has a significantly clearer signal than Bluetooth-based products. But if you have a lot of interference in your space from other devices that use the 2.4-GHz frequency band (Bluetooth headsets, microwaves, some RF remotes), the AirLink may disappoint.

With a dead-simple setup and a price that won’t hurt your wallet, this is an excellent wireless music system. If you don’t, you’ll find this is a very useful, and affordable product.

[tags]Wireless MP3[/tags]

Store your entire CD collection on a 40-GB hard disk and listen in every room. Looking like a super sleek plasma screen music to up to five Station units in any room you want. Everyone can set-up their very own playlists or select albums of their choice, and with a remote control it’s pure joy to operate. Philips legendary audio quality is enhanced with an innovative Super Sound Panel with deep bass and clarity for pitch perfect grooves. Even if you’re no audiophile, you can’t deny the high cool quotient. A must have for every living room.

Click to view details.

If you just want to be able to wirelessly stream music from your PC to your powerful boom box in another room, the NETGEAR Wireless Digital Music Player will be able to sing to your tune in wireless 802.11b/g style. It can even make your stereo system churn out tunes from Internet radio stations worldwide.

Website : www.netgear.com

With so many features being orchestrated under its hood, including an integrated web browser and component video connections, the neuston Virtuoso MC-500 Media Center is indeed a virtuoso at realizing your media on TV. A myriad of file formats, including QuickTime (3ivx encoded), OGG and animated GIG files, are all supported. The whole unit is really slim too.

Via Product Page from neuston.com

Other related product:

HP Pavilion Media Center M8000N Desktop PC (AMD Athlon 64 X2 Processor 5200 Plus, 2 GB RAM, 500 GB Hard Drive, SuperMulti DVD Drive, Vista Premium)