Spectacular good sound. I've bought and thoroughly tried many bluetooth speakers. I'm picky about them; I spend enough time listening to music that it's important to me - and worth paying what it costs - to have actual good sound, regardless of the specific use case. I lump speakers into three categories: ultra-portable (Bose Soundlink Mini, Sony SRS-X5), portable (Marshall Kilburn, B&O Beolit 15, Klipsch KMC-3) and stationary (Marshall Woburn, Aiwa Exos 9, Cambridge Air Minx 200). This speaker is definitely a member of the latter category, large-ish, heavy, attractive, and designed to sit on a shelf or under a TV. As such, it's expected to provide "full sound system" quality sound - and, it does. Sound is crisp, accurate and distortion-free across the range, including (very important to me) very deep, punchy bass. A professional review stated you'll probably be fine without a subwoofer - I'll double down on that. You WILL be fine without a subwoofer. Unless you're going for a movie theater setup, or a rock concert, the Woodbourne provides quite ample, quite deep bass - and in reality, for that application, you probably don't want to be depending on a single-cabinet powered speaker system anyway. Taken together with being incredible attractive, this counts as my favorite stationary bluetooth speaker, and is only the third speaker where I've bought a second one as a backup and/or to deploy in another room (the other two being the completely impressive, impeccably engineered Bose Soundlink Mini, and the spectacularly good, and regrettably discontinued, Klipsch KMC-3).
The soundstage is VERY good, probably in part due to the curved face, which is something single-cabinet bluetooth speakers typically have trouble with. You really aren't limited to standing in front of, and at eye level with, the speaker to get the best treble. It's genuinely room-filling. Stereo separation is better than most, but still not all that great. Even "360-degree" or "surround" speakers like the Bang & Olufsen Beolit 15 really don't manage actual stereo separation. You really need 2 actual channels to get that.
It sounds like some folks have had quality issues with it. That very well may be true. The speaker has worked well for a year and a half of intermittent use for me, but I just set it up in an application where I need to use the remote control for the first time - which unfortunately, didn't work. Or, to be specific, it turns the unit on, and turns it up, but can't turn it off, and none of the other buttons/functions on the remote work. I have a tech support case in to Polk's customer service for that.
Nevertheless, it's a spectacularly good speaker, and very attractive, which of course the Marshall, Aiwa, Peachtree Audio DeepBlue2, are not. It originally retailed for $599, which would have been difficult, though perhaps possible, to justify - but for the current sale price, it's a steal, a clear leader of the pack in terms of value - top performance for a very good price. It comes strongly recommended.
Customers also viewed these products
Page 1 of 1 Start overPage 1 of 1
Compare with similar items
This Item  Polk Audio AM6119-A Wireless Woodbourne Speaker - White |  |  |  | |
| Price | Currently unavailable. | $149.97 | $129.98 | $299.00 |
| Delivery | — | Get it Apr 9 - 15 | Get it Apr 3 - 5 | Get it as soon as Thursday, Apr 4 |
| Customer Ratings | ||||
| Sold By | — | SupremeElectronics | Parts Express | Amazon.com |
| speaker size | 3.5 millimeters | — | 4 inches | 200 millimeters |
| power source | Corded Electric | Battery Powered | Corded Electric | Corded Electric |
| connectivity tech | AirPlay, Bluetooth, Optical, USB, Infrared | Bluetooth | — | Dolby Atmos |
| speaker type | Portable | — | Subwoofer | Center Channel |
| mounting type | Freestanding,Plug Mount | Freestanding | Shelf Mount | Wall Mount |
| weight | 17.5 pounds | 4.2 pounds | 2.38 pounds | 14 pounds |
| control method | — | application | remote | — |
| model name | AM6119-A | — | — | MXT35 |
| surround channels | — | — | 2.1 | 5.1 |
| subwoofer diameter | 5 inches | — | 4 inches | 3 inches |
Reviews with images
UPDATED: FAILed after a few years of use.
Update 10/10/2019So, while work, they sound brilliant. We used airplay with them regularly. I had TWO of these, one purchased in 2014, one purchased in 2016. In the last 5 months both of them died. The first one just stopped working abruptly. The power indicator light stopped showing when it was plugged in and turned off, and wouldn't turn on. The second died more slowly. It kept dropping Airplay (over Ethernet) connection intermittently, then just stopped working altogether. All the input sources stopped working.I called Polk on this explaining both died with in a few weeks of each other. I was basically told "tough luck, they're sealed units and cannot be repaired". I asked if they could give me some sort of discount offer toward another product. Nope.I like(d) Polk products. I have a whole home theater system based around Polk circa 2007. I think they've failed to keep up with pack in terms of wireless speakers etc. The Woodbourne certainly turned out to be a disappointment. As a brand in general I don't think I'll be making another Polk purchase given this customer support experience.I wound up replacing both of the busted Woodbourne units with Naim Mu-So Qb units. They're amazing. Naim is a great name in high end audiophile products. If you're looking for a wireless speaker, stay away from Polk. I just don't think they can be trusted in this market space. I've had the Mu-So Qb's for a few months now and can't say enough good things about them.Oh, and I still use the Airfoil product mentioned in my original review with the Mu-So Qb's. Works great!*****Firstly, let me say this is a workaround and by no means excuses Polk from the atrocious firmware and lack of updates for the Woodbourne. I’ve been using this solution for over 2 years now, so it’s time tested.I have two Woodbourne’s. I was so impressed with the first I bought thru Polk several years ago that I bought a second when they went on sale at Amazon. The sound quality is amazing. I use the Woodbournes and my home theater and AirPlay to play music in my home office, family room (over AppleTV) and 3-season room simultaneously and never have a problem with auto-off or drop-out. Never. If you’re having problems with drop-out it’s most likely AirPlay over your home wifi that’s the culprit not the Woodbourne.This solution will only work for you if you source your music from your Mac or PC and involves purchasing a fairly inexpensive software tool for your Mac/PC called Airfoil by Rogue Amoeba ([...]). I am in no way affiliated with this company. At this writing Airfoil for Mac is $29. There’s also an optional app called Airfoil Remote, more on that later. I’ve used Airfoil on both Mac and PC, but my most recent experience is with Airfoil on Mac (and Airfoil Remote on iPhone), but I strongly believe this solution will work equally well on PC (and Android).Airfoil on your Mac/PC will stream AirPlay music to any AirPlay capable device. AND it will let you choose the source of the music. The source can be ANY audio producing application on your Mac/PC. I use this all the time to stream music from iTunes, the Amazon Music application and Spotify application on my Mac to multiple AirPlay devices. Note, when I stream from iTunes I leave the AirPlay selector configured to ‘Computer’.NOW, here’s the magic that prevents the auto-shutoff. When you start Airfoil on your Mac/PC you pick the all the AirPlay devices you want to stream to. You’ll have to turn your Woodbourne(s) on to make them visible in this application. Now pick the source for the music (iTunes, Amazon Music, Spotify, whatever). The Airfoil application ‘does something’ that keeps the Woodbourne’s from shutting off. It’s like it sends a keep-alive to the AirPlay devices EVEN WHEN NO MUSIC is being played. I leave the AirPlay application up on my Mac all the time with the Woodbourne devices selected. If you ‘unselect’ your Woodbourne from the Airfoil applicationor exit the application your Woodbourne will eventually shut off. You can modify the volume of each airplay device independently or all of them collectively. There’s also a ‘Group’ feature in Airfoil where you can group multiple AirPlay devices together to create scenes. I find this handy.There is a free companion smart phone app called Airfoil Satellite that allows you to remotely control the Airfoil application running on your Mac/PC (you can find it at the link above). This is genius. When you start it up it pairs with the Airfoil application running on your Mac/PC and gives you the same set of options you have on the Airfoil application. So, once you get things setup on your Mac/PC you can walk away and control it all remotely from your phone tablet.Lastly, if possible you can/should connect your Woodbourne to wired ethernet to avoid drop-outs. Airplay will work over ethernet as well as wifi. On your Woodbourne select the ‘wifi’ option, it’s smart enough to use the wired connection if there is an ethernet cable present. I use this solution to the Woodbourne in my office since my router is nearby. Another thing to prevent wifi AirPlay drop-outs is to reduce other wifi traffic on your network if possible. Don’t expect to be able to stream Netflix over wifi and AirPlay audio over the same wifi network. Additionally, if possible, setup a guest wifi network and put all your guests on that.
Top reviews from other countries
Sebastian
der Klang ist super, leider "tickt der Lautsprecher nicht richtig"....
Reviewed in Germany on October 30, 2016
Sebastian
Reviewed in Germany on October 30, 2016
Das Problem mit dem Lautsprecher ist leider das ein ständiges "tickendes" Geräusch zu hören ist, welches unabhängig von der eingestellten Quelle zu hören war. Es ist zwar nur ein leises Geräusch, hat mich aber deutlich gestört. Ob dies nur bei meinem Gerät so war und ob evtl. direkt etwas defekt war kann ich leider nicht nachzollziehen. Ein anderer Kunde hat ja hier schon über die mangelnde Qualitätssicherung geschrieben, evtl. gehörte mein Gerät dazu. Ich habe ihn jedenfalls wieder zurückgeschickt. Was wirklich schade ist da der Klang einwandfrei ist und nah an meine große Anlage heran kommt. Kein Vergleich mit sonstigen Bluetooth Lautsprecher...wie dem JBL Charge 2 oder Soundlink Mini II (bei dieser preislich auch in einer anderen Größen Klasse sind).
Wenn das Ticken nicht wäre oder POLK eine Lösung gefunden hätte hätte ich den Lautsprecher auf jeden Fall behalten. Aber so habe ich ihn entnervt zurückschicken müssen. Und nur zum testen noch einen bestellen wollte ich dann doch nicht....
Nachfrage bei POLK:
Nachdem ich an den Support eine E-Mail geschickt hatte, in der ich fragte ob ein solcher Fehler bekannt ist und vielleicht eine Ursache, kam auch direkt die Bestätigung dass meine E-Mail eingegangen ist. Leider erhielt ich dann seit mittlerweile einer Woche keine Antwort mehr von POLK. Sollte ich doch noch eine Antwort erhalten werde ich das hier nachtragen.
UPDATE: Die Firma POLK hat nicht auf meine Rückfrage reagiert. Die Anfrage liegt mittlerweile mehrere Monate zurück.
Images in this review
