Hands-on Review: HUAWEI Sound X: The interactive speaker co-engineered with Devialet is set to revolutionize your audio experience!

Huawei had recently released its all new HUAWEI Sound X, the brand’s interactive speaker co-engineered with French audio brand Devialet. A speaker brand based in France, Devialet, has carved out a strong reputation, due to its premium, High-Fidelity products. Devialet devices are marked by their flamboyant design, powerful and immersive bass, impressive audio quality, and often prohibitive price. The new speaker, is a result of a collaboration which combines Devialet's acoustic design with Huawei's advanced tech. Here is an in-depth look at the HUAWEI Sound X.

Devialet Dual Subwoofers

Despite its compact build, the Sound X can deliver thunderous bass, thanks to its dual 3.5 inch Devialet subwoofers with 60W bass power. However, they can still hit amplitudes of up to 20 mm, so you can hear, feel, and even see the vibrations.

 For speakers, especially ones with powerful bass units, the body can shake or even move when playing music. This issue is best addressed with a symmetrical design. The Sound X pushes this design to the extreme, as all of its speakers are symmetrically placed. As well as the two subwoofers with their Push-Push symmetrical structure, the six full-frequency speakers at the bottom are also arranged symmetrically. With this setup, each speaker cancels out the back wave vibrations of its counterpart. So the body remains stable, even when you’re really blasting out the tunes.

 As it has been imbued with Devialet's SAM® (Speaker Active Matching) technology, the speaker can faithfully reproduce bass in real-time, along with high-fidelity audio. The speaker is also made with Magnetic rare-earth materials, which also contributes towards rich and powerful sounds.

 The thickness and bulkiness of a speaker's shell plays a key role in how it performs. Sound comes from vibration. If the shell is not thick enough, it may shake as the speakers do, and this creates noise. The Hi-Fi effect can be ruined by this unpleasant sound.

 High fidelity audio all around you

In addition to this, the HUAWEI Sound X boasts dual subwoofers and six full-frequency tweeters, which cover an expansive frequency range of 40 Hz to 40 kHz, complete with rich treble and details. They deliver high fidelity sound by accurately reproducing original music recordings. The HUAWEI Sound X is fitted with six powerful full-frequency tweeters, which are evenly distributed in a ring shape. This allows the HUAWEI Sound X to provide an endless immersion amidst a lush 360° sound field.

 HUAWEI Share

Apart from its sound quality, the HUAWEI Sound X comes with a range of enhanced features with HUAWEI Share that improve the user experience and solves most problems found in wireless speakers.

For example, HUAWEI Share takes care of pairing a smartphone with the speaker. To connect your phone to the speaker, simply tap it against the NFC icon. This means when you're listening to a song on your phone, but want to get really immersed in the music, just give the Sound X a tap with your phone, thereby initiating Huawei Share Audio Sharing for seamless music from the speaker. On the other hand, when you get a call and your phone is connected to the speaker, you might end up having the whole room listening in. Instead, the HUAWEI Sound X² not only pauses the music playback, but allows you answer the call on your phone for privacy. But if you want to switch to a speaker call, simply tap your phone on the speaker to initiate an instant connection. When you want to pause, you can cover the top of the speaker with your hand to pause it, then cover the top again to resume playing.

1.        Huawei Share is only available on phones that run Android 5.1.1 or about with screen-on, that support and have enabled NFC. The feature is currently not supported via iOS.

2.        Phone sharing with software upgrade planned in summer 2020

Speaker Design

The HUAWEI Sound X comes with symmetrical openings on either side of the body. Through these capsule-shaped openings, you can see the bass unit, which is reinforced by a laser-engraved metal panel cover. Meanwhile the top of the Sound X comes with touch buttons in the middle ringed by LED lights and an array of microphones. An NFC icon is also visible, because the speaker is NFC compatible. On the bottom of the speaker, a nameplate lists parameters, and you can also see the power port and a notch for cables.

The overall design is astonishing, and defies the traditional idea of what a Bluetooth speaker should look like.

 Verdict

By combining its advanced tech with the acoustic know-how of Devialet, Huawei has produced an audio force to be reckoned with. In terms of design, the Sound X embodies Devialet's unique design style and character. Clever features like HUAWEI Share gives it an edge over Bluetooth speakers. When it comes to sound, the Sound X certainly delivers impressive bass, but it also provides much more. It produces a broad sound field, handles transitions seamlessly, and has remarkable analytical capability, making it one of the best choices for today’s audiophile.