Sony RA5000 speaker review: extravagant sound at an unreasonable price

Sony’s new SRS-RA5000 is a $ 700 monoblock speaker packed to the brim with drivers, packed with handy features like built-in Spotify Connect and Chromecast, and capable of producing immersive 360-degree sound.

Although it’s only released now, the RA5000 dates back to CES 2019, where Sony exhibited it as a speaker prototype for its new 360 Reality Audio format. So he’s been in the hopper for a while. The same goes for the smaller, cheaper RA3000, which Sony demonstrated a year later at CES 2020. Now, they have both evolved into consumer products and have hardly changed.

At 13 inches tall, the RA5000 is much taller than any smart speaker. And yes, from the top it absolutely looks like an oversized electric razor, thanks to the three round speaker grilles. If this thing was all white, you might mistake it for some kind of futuristic humidifier or air purifier. But Sony has stuck with the blend of black and rose gold that has been the hallmark of many of its recent headphones and earphones. I continue to deepen the contrast that this creates, and the sides of the speaker are covered with a knit that hides the insides. There are tactile buttons on the left and right sides. You get the volume and play / pause on the right, with processing power on the left side, mode selection (Wi-Fi, Bluetooth or auxiliary input) and a calibration function that adjusts the sound regardless of the room in which the RA5000 is located.

The internal layout breaks down as follows: there are three speakers facing up, three speakers facing outward positioned in the middle of the speaker sides, and a single subwoofer at the bottom. On the back is a 3.5-millimeter input and a small NFC icon, on which you can hold an Android phone for quick pairing. Below the speaker is the power cord, and the RA5000 comes with a large external power supply that honks the horn. This is something I didn’t expect to see considering the size of the product. It needs to be plugged in at all times, so Sony’s sophisticated speaker is wireless but by no means portable.

The setup process is… a lot. The Sony mobile app walks you through many steps, such as adding the RA5000 to the Google Home app, integrating it into your Wi-Fi network, connecting it to Amazon’s Alexa platform, and Moreover. At first the speaker struggled to connect to my home Wi-Fi, but with some persistence it finally worked. As is the case with Sony, the app isn’t very neat or pretty, but it gets the job done.

The RA5000 offers a ton of flexibility for the way you play music on it. You can pair a device to the speaker via Bluetooth – AAC and SBC codecs are there, but LDAC isn’t – but you’ll get much better quality when the music comes over Wi-Fi. There is built-in Chromecast support for it. audio streaming, and the RA5000 can also be added to a speaker group with Google Home or Amazon Alexa. I wish Sony had supplemented the streaming options with AirPlay 2, but no luck. The speaker hardware includes a microphone, but this is only used for the calibration function. You’ll have to rely on another device to listen to music on the RA5000 with your voice, but since it’s compatible with Alexa and Assistant, it can be done wirelessly with a cheap smart speaker or your phone.

In traditional stereo mode, this speaker is a powerhouse, although you can expect more bass for the size. (There are EQ options in the Sony app if you want to boost the low end.) It easily covered my living room and bedroom with sound; the up-and-coming drivers help give it a very complete presence. In my average listening, I never pushed the volume beyond the 60% range. Going much higher would likely result in very annoyed neighbors if you are in an apartment. But despite its loud and loud sound, there’s no doubt that the RA5000 is a good set of stereo speakers. It looks quite like the unique speaker that it is.

And that brings us to the remarkable trick: 360-degree audio. Sony’s 360 Reality Audio uses object-based spatial audio to try and create a captivating soundscape. The tone is that it can sound “as real as if you were there at a live concert or with the artist recording in a studio”. When you close your eyes and listen to 360 Reality Audio, the RA5000 definitely sounds bigger and wider than its physical footprint. This is a noticeable change from regular stereo. But does that put me in a realm of mind-blowing music coming from all directions? Not really.

When you jump between 360 tracks, you’ll notice that not all of the content really takes advantage of its reach. It’s still not clear how involved and invested most of the artists are in these 360 ​​mixes, so I’m skeptical of any claims that this is how songs were meant to be heard. Jazz sounds fantastic; the instrumentation really benefits from bouncing off the walls and your ceiling. Concert recordings, like Liam Gallagher performing the Oasis hit “Champagne Supernova” with an enthusiastic host of backing vocals, also have an impressive scale that feels distinct from ordinary stereo sound. The indicator light on the bottom of the speaker will glow green when playing real 360 Reality Audio music.

Only a few music streaming services, including Tidal, Deezer, and Nugs.net, currently support Sony’s 360 Reality Audio. Amazon Music HD will also let you play 360 audio on the RA5000 starting April 6. You can stream 3D audio directly from these apps to the speaker. But even among the services that offer 360 Reality Audio, adoption by musicians and labels has a long way to go. Not a single song on Tidal’s Top Tracks section contained 360 Reality Audio, nor any of the top albums. That says a lot. There is a dedicated section in the Explore tab where you can easily browse the playlists and albums that to do supports 360 degree audio. A large majority of them are older stuff, but recent records like Haim’s Women in Music Pt. III are there too, as are hit singles like “Watermelon Sugar” by Harry Styles.

To compensate for the lack of actually mixed content for 360, Sony includes an “immersive audio enhancement” setting that attempts to recreate the same effect for two-channel music tracks. This algorithm-based approach does not work as well. Turning it on adds an obvious layer of artificial reverb and ambience to whatever you play, and you lose the precision of the soundstage that’s there with true 360 ​​Reality Audio content.

At its mind-blowing price of $ 700, finding direct “competitors” for the RA5000 is complicated. There’s a HomePod-like device in Sony’s promo video, but this Apple speaker was less than half the price and is now a thing of the past. The $ 500 Sonos Five is my favorite monoblock speaker, but it sticks to stereo audio. Then you have high-end and deluxe audio alternatives like the $ 900 Formation Wedge speaker from Bowers & Wilkins, but again, this is aimed at an audiophile-grade stereo experience. Sony’s speaker outperforms the Amazon Echo Studio at $ 200 and can go up a lot louder – but that’s exactly what I expected given the huge price gulf.

So my remaining question is: who is this speaker for? Sounds great, can satisfactorily fill any full-sized room, and 360 Reality Audio is a fun party trick. But the asking price is difficult to overcome. Many people who are serious about audio equipment would pay sooner for a nice pair of bookshelf stereo speakers than to lose $ 700 on that single unit. I think Sony is trying to make the RA5000 a jack of all trades – through immersive sound and a range of convenient streaming options. But I come back with the feeling that this speaker is just trying to do too much, especially when the value of his title remains unproven and often inconsistent.

Photograph by Chris Welch / The Verge