OPPO Digital today introduced their first wireless speaker called the Sonica Wi-Fi Speaker, which is also Bluetooth and AirPlay compatible and multi-room ready. It comes with a companion app that makes it easy to manage multiple speakers on the same network. The Sonica app allows you to have every speaker play the same song in unison or enjoy a different listening experience around every corner. At first glance Oppo’s first speaker looks like a Sonos Play:5 competitor for the half the price. The Oppo Sonica even includes room optimization for various locations in may be placed.
The company says Sonica is an elegant and powerful Wi-Fi speaker designed with state of the art technology delivering unbeatable sound quality in a compact package. Acoustic design and tuning was performed by Igor Levitsky, the same designer behind the award-winning OPPO PM-series planar magnetic headphones. The speaker drivers, amplifiers, and chassis have all been expertly tuned for a deep, pure, and engaging sound that can be further optimized with built-in presets for different room sizes, speaker locations, and listening preferences using the Sonica app.
In order to deliver maximum performance from a compact enclosure, Sonica has four separate amplifiers that are set up in a 2.1 stereo configuration. Two 15-watt amplifiers are connected in a bridged mode to drive the 3.5″ bass woofer and two 3-inch bass radiators with a combined power output of 30-watts. Two additional amplifiers, 10-watts each, power a stereo pair of 2.5″ wideband drivers. Utilizing a 2.1 stereo configuration is a time-tested approach that allows for the best possible performance.
The bass radiators utilized in Sonica are unique for a product in this price category and serve to further improve performance. The two complementary bass radiators are located on each side of the enclosure opposite each other. Not only do they enhance the bass response, they also cancel unwanted vibrations in the speaker enclosure. This ensures that Sonica remains stationary without rattling and shaking when music is played at very high volumes.
Sonica is capable of decoding audio files up to 24-bit / 192 kHz from your mobile devices, USB drives, DLNA servers, and NAS drives. It supports established lossless audio formats such as FLAC, WAV, and Apple Lossless, so you don’t have to compromise on quality. Additionally, multiple built-in adaptive antennae with MIMO technology ensure stellar signal strength for 2.4 and 5 GHz 802.11ac Wi-Fi (compatible with 802.11a/b/g/n), meaning users stay in control of the experience wherever in the house they may be.
Price and Availability
Sonica is available direct for $299 at www.oppodigital.com/sonica/. The free companion app for iPhone and iPad can be downloaded from Apple’s App Store, while the Android version is available from Google Play.
