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Teufel Audio iTeufel Air

Teufel Audio iTeufel Air

Golden age of stream

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Accessory of the Week As AirPlay speakers go, the iTeufel Air is big. Placed next to, say Audyssey’s Audio Dock Air, it dwarfs its rival — though it’s marginally less wide than B&W’s Zeppelin Air.

The glossy white wedge houses two 80mm mid-range drivers, a 25mm tweeter, and a 130mm woofer, and pumps out a total of 100W.

Teufel Audio iTeufel Air

On top there are three buttons: one for power, two for volume. Round the back, you'll find a power socket, set-up button and a 3.5mm line in. And that’s it.

Despite its size, the Air is not unattractive and won’t look out of place in the living room. I particularly like the aluminium stand, and the way the speaker seems to hover when placed on it.

Teufel Audio iTeufel Air

The first test for an AirPlay speaker is the ease with which it can be added to a network. The iTeufel Air scores highly here because it supports WPS, meaning that if you have a WPS-enabled router, you can add it to the network with a push of a button.

Otherwise, you’ll need to connect to it directly and configure it from a web page so that it can join your Wi-Fi network. That’s straightforward, but the manual could have explained the process more clearly. There’s no set-up app.

Teufel Audio iTeufel Air

At £430, the iTeufel Air is bang in the middle of its competitors, price-wise. I’d rate the Audyssey as better value, but if you’ve got the space for it the iTeufel is an excellent AirPlay speaker. ®

Reg Hardware chooses its Accessory of the Week every Friday. Got one in mind you want us to consider? Please let us know.

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What's the point?

I re-read the article, assuming I'd missed the point of it, but no, it seems there is no effort to make any comment on sound quality at all! Actually, having re-read it, I don't think Mr Hemphill was ever in possetion of the item in question - everything in the article could be quite easily deduced from reading the blurb on the companies website - dimensions, price, promo pictures would all be there.. Surely the 'Hard Facts' include the sound quality?!

So, El Reg, what's the point? And how on earth do you get to 85% without even judging the sound quality?!

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£430 for a mono speaker?

It contains one tweeter. However many mid-range drivers it has, it cannot possibly produce stereo sound properly, besides which it only has one enclosure. Would anyone really pay that sort of price for this? Ah, but it has the fruity seal of approval...

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Anonymous Coward

Damned if you do and damned if you don't.

OBJECTIVE OBSERVATION ALERT.

It seems to me that RegHW gets slammed every time they provide a review of an audio product with commentary on sound quality and now they're getting slammed for not providing commentary :)

Aside from that I could do with another AirPlay round-up as I'm actually in the market for an AirPlay Speaker (s) / HiFi at the moment (completely undecided on brands, sizes, form factors, other features as yet).

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Sound quality

Were those one hundred watts any good? Some indication of sound quality (and not in the BS terms increasingly pervading audio reviews on here) could be useful for the wonga involved?

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Re: £430 for a mono speaker?

Stereo is unfasionable nowadays. You just have to look at all DAB radios and a lot of iPad/iPhone/iPod docks to see that.

Anyone who cares about sound quality will buy an Airport and a pair of decent powered monitors, or similar.

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