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Devialet, a French manufacturer of loudspeakers, makes some of the best all-in-one speakers on the market, but they have always been too expensive for the average customer. With the Phantom Reactor, the company publishes a cheaper speaker that always sounds good.
At $ 999 (or £ 990 / £ 990), Devialet's address to a wider audience of music fans with enough disposable income to look beyond your average Bluetooth speaker.
But pricing is only part of the story. The Phantom reactor is also much more compact than the original Phantom. It is four times smaller and weighs 10 pounds. It is still quite heavy, so you can not carry it in your suitcase when you go on vacation.
But now you can put it on a shelf, unplug it and move it to the kitchen, and so on. In other words, you no longer need to dedicate an entire table to your Devialet speaker. And as you have seen in the photos, it is a Devialet speaker with its egg-shaped design, but much smaller.
Fortunately, the company tried to make the least possible compromise on the sound. Devialet has been working on this speaker for three years to produce the same sound quality in a smaller format. "We had to reinvent everything to launch this product," said co-founder and chief technology officer Pierre-Emmanuel Calmel.
Regarding the specifications, the Phantom Reactor has a small touch screen located at the top to control the speaker. It connects to your phone or computer via Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, AirPlay, Spotify Connect or UPnP. There is also an audio jack. Support for Chromecast Audio as well as the ability to associate multiple speakers will come later with an update (you can probably already use multiple speakers with AirPlay 2).
Devialet does not plan to directly support voice assistants on its devices. "We are totally focused on sound quality. We want to be agnostic on platforms with Apple, Amazon or Google. Our idea is to make our speakers compatible with all the protocols of these companies – but our business is a sound quality, "said CEO, Franck Lebouchard (former CEO, Quentin Sannié, N & D). Was not present at our meeting).
If you like voice assist, you can always find a workaround. For example, you can buy an Amazon Echo Dot and connect it to your Phantom Reactor. Let's see if the company will add HomeKit support and other features of the smart home in the coming months.
Since Sonos turned around and integrated Amazon Alexa with its flagship speaker, I insisted a little more on this front. "We do not have a plan today because it would involve a lot of effort to interact with Reactor to make your purchases. In the end, we will never be as good as Amazon, "said Lebouchard.
So, the Ghost Reactor is just a fucking good speaker, nothing else. "There is no background noise, no saturation and no distortion," Lebouchard said. And just like the other Devialet speakers, the size of the speaker is incredibly loud. During my session listening quite limited, it sounded good.
It takes advantage of Devialet's patent portfolio, including its unique sound amplification technology, a mathematical model that allows you to push the speaker to its physical limits and iconic piston woofers.
But Devialet is not just a speaker manufacturer. The company sold its technology to other companies, such as Sky in the UK, a few years ago, it wanted to put a sticker "Sound powered by Devialet" on all your electronic products, from your TV to the top. speakers of your car. .
"Phantom was the first step in making our technology accessible," said Lebouchard. "Phantom reaches tens of thousands of people today. We have reached an important milestone with the Sky Soundbox and we now reach hundreds of thousands of people. And with the Phantom Reactor, the company hopes to reach even more customers.
The company said that Devialet would follow all the options. There will be new Devialet products in-house as well as other licensing agreements. Lebouchard did not comment on the rumors about Freebox.
The ghost reactor will be manufactured in France near Fontainebleau. The company has built a brand new factory and plans to produce one speaker every 49 seconds.
There will be two versions of the Phantom Reactor, a 600W model for $ 999/990 / £ 990 and a 900W model for $ 1,299 / € 1,290 / £ 1,290. Pre-orders start tomorrow and the speaker will be available in many consumer electronics stores (also on Amazon) on October 24th.
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