UE Blast Review: More of the same, just with Alexa

The only major difference between the Boom 2 and the Blast is Alexa functionality, and while that is neat to have, that’s hardly worth the premium price tag you will have to pay. The things the Blast offers, mainly portability, ruggedness and somewhat better sound are all cancelled out by the extra cash you’ll have to pay for it.

For comparison, the second-generation Amazon Echo with Alexa built in is $79.99. That is a $150 price difference from the Blast. Ouch.

Unfortunately for the Blast, things continue to get worse. Many features of past UE speakers have been inexplicably excluded from the Blast. Multi-room playback is not supported as well as the new UE app is nothing more than a glorified Amazon log-in portal. You can’t adjust any EQ for music playback within the app like you were able to with the old app. You’ll have to do that through each individual app you use to stream music.

During my testing of the Blast, I encountered a different issue. The speaker just crapped out on me. It was working fine one day, fully charged, and the next, it wouldn’t turn on. I tried charging it overnight, but in the morning it still wouldn’t turn on.

This happened late in my testing, so I wasn’t able get a clear answer from UE as to why this happened. It may have just been a faulty unit, and UE does offer a two-year limited warranty, but it doesn’t inspire confidence in the Blast.

Add that all up and the Blast just isn’t worth the $229 price tag. And that doesn’t even include the $39 for the Power Up dock.

If you want a rugged, portable speaker, you’ll probably be best off buying a marked down Boom 2 or another comparable option. If you want a speaker that has Alexa functionality, Amazon has you covered with the Echo or any other of the myriad of Alexa-powered options it offers. The odd man out here is the Blast. And that’s such a shame, because it is a good speaker, it’s just not worth the price and compromises.

Article source: https://www.technobuffalo.com/reviews/ue-blast-review-more-of-the-same-just-with-alexa/