Astell&Kern Acro BE100 Bluetooth Speaker - Black

Purchased for £99 offer to replace an old BT doctor dre speaker I had. So it does Bluetooth very well can interchange from my mobile to my TV and connects very stable once set up. Has a fm radio which is a plus. Has 3.5mm jack input. Emits a great sound, it's true if your a bass heavy fan don't purchase this speaker.However there are enough tweaks you can do from input devices that make this possible and acceptable. Well balanced quality sound filling the average to large space across the spectrum. It's small and quality heavy but AC powered therefore not portable. Recommended however if more functionality than listed is required look elsewhere. DL Qobuz and got 1 month free this box speaker sounds fab. The LDAC works up to 24 bit 96khz over blue tooth.Superb intro playlist across many genres sounds great to me ears.

I bought this speaker after hearing it at a friends house. When I purchased it was £199 (RRP £449), connection is a breeze to any device via bluetooth (it uses SBC, AAC, aptX HD, LDAC codecs) or via separate 3.5mm input. It also has independent Bass and Treble adjustment on the top of the unit. The construction is pure quality with a nice metal power/volume wheel on the top (that glows different colours depending on the input source). Sound quality is excellent. I use it with all my music stored on a NAS and PlexAmp streams the audio to this speaker. If you can get it under £250 it is excellent value.

I bought 2 of these in white on prime day for £99 each. They were reduced from £449. WTF. I owned an A&K mp3 player. At £500 it was the entry level player. Others were several thousand pounds. So I knew the brand and the audiophile sound quality. I have several sound systems including Sonos 5 and a couple of Bang and Olufsen bluetooth speakers. The A&K sounds better than the £540 Beolit 20. It is a similar size, but the A&K is mains only. The A&K sound does not have the deep bass of other speakers this size, but the clarity and detail are there. I don't know why there is such a huge discount, I thought there must be some catch, but no, for what I paid it's a fabulous amazing bargain.

Sounds amazing and does what it should! It allows music to sound extremely professional without any bells or whistles. I don't want Alexa compatibility or a fiddly App. With this speaker you simply pair up with a device such as an iPhone and press play! Bass and Treble are easy to adjust on the unit .. no need to constantly fiddle. The addition of a volume knob is a master stroke! Sometimes volume is all you need to adjust and it's a traditional dial which is refreshing. I use Qobuz as my music library and wow...it sounds great! I only dropped a star because the price came down significantly a day after I purchased it!

Given that this unit comes with a £449 price tag you'd expect top quality and performance. I have two main issues. Firstly, the sound quality is 5 out of 10.... it's okay but no wow factor. Secondly, I intended to play my A&K Kann through the unit, but no BT connectivity (connecting A&K devices to other A&K devices is a common issue). My Samsung Ultra connects fine. The unit is stylish but the buttons are fiddly. Thankfully I purchased the unit in white for £99 which is about what it's worth.

I recently bought an Astell&Kern digital player which I've been using with a pair of soundcore speakers - and they have been superb. I wanted a speaker in my workshop and came across this - it was heavily discounted at more than half price so I ordered it. It arrived and was somewhat larger than I'd expected - my soundcore speakers are more compact - and its not a battery model, it requires a mains supply. Sound quality is fine but not spectacular. It promises a radio on board but in practice it doesn't have it, and anyway it would have been FM only. I can get radio on my phone and play it through the speaker. So I'm a bit underwhelmed overall. I get the impression its old stock, very old stock. It's not worth hassle of a return and refund and it does what I wanted, but its really nothing special. I would have been much better off overall with a Soundcore speaker like my others. Heyho. Its not the end of the world, just a little bit deflating. Meh.

I was looking for a good speaker that didn't require an app to control the bass and treble. I came across this speaker as it was on sale. I hadn't heard of the make,but with a little research found that they produce high end audio players. It sounds great and also plays the bluetooth via hi-res codec that improves the quality. I have purchased a second one to gift at xmas and connect to an amazon echo a family member has.

Great value and excellent sonic performance

Exceptional sound quality. I’ve been building and buying audio gear for the last 20 years. This unit is a “mid master”. Highs are accurate and non-fatiguing. Freq response says 50hz I’d say in a small room you’ll hear those freq. in a large room it rolls of around 60-65hz. If you want stupid sloppy bass get the JBL Boombox 3. The Bluetooth 5.0 and DAC in this Astell unit provides CRYSTAL clear output. Reminds of the type of output of my Bluetooth receiver by Bludento puts out. I’m talking like CD quality. Don’t knock it till you try it. I use mostly lossless files and I’ve been impressed. I purchased for the kids room. The whole house is SET with my audio gear including Rotel amps and hand made SB acoustics, 3-way speakers,l. This unit puts a smile on my face listening to music in the kids room. This unit is pricey but will sound much better than it’s competitors, including the B&W zeppelin. Don’t waste your money on Bose. I also believe this will compete with the $1600 Bang & Olefson BeoSound Level. It’s sounds much better than the Beolit 20 ($500 portable 4.2 Bluetooth speaker) which I own and compared side by side. Sure, you could build a better system for $500, but not compact like this. Aesthetically, it matches its price point. Nothing cheap feeling at all. I wish the volume knob had more weight to it. If they lowered the price to $375 they would sell 100k of them. I also wish this had a sub out with some bass management features.

Surprisingly good sound from this little speaker. I'm an audiophile and I've been listening to audio gear since 1984. I like precise and clear musical reproduction. I also like a good bottom end. You don't always get everything in one box and this is certainly no exception. Astell certainly put the codecs in this box to good use ( SBC, AAC, aptX™ HD, LDAC) and while they certainly add dimension and clarity to the sound, as they say, there's no replacement for displacement. The use of all the codecs couldn't save the BE 100 from a thin bottom end. You can only do so much with a 4" driver even if it is made of kevlar. The midrange in this thing is surprisingly good if you have a good recording. As you can see from the picture, I also bought the new Marshall Woburn III Bluetooth speaker so I was able to compare both and although the Woburn only has the standard SBC codec, it's not far behind the BE 100 in the midrange dept and with it's 6" bass it driver destroys the BE 100 in the bass dept. Simply no contest. Neither of these are one box solutions. So who is the BE 100 for? If you like jazz, instrumental and vocals and want the latest codecs then the BE 100 is your speaker. If you like an all around good performer and livelier sound with more bass energy, an app to tailor your sound and a classic guitar look then spring for the Marshall Woburn III. Even without the newest codecs it performs amazingly well and you can pair two of them together for a stereo or ambient sound. You cannot pair two BE 100 speakers together and there's no app to tailor the sound to your liking. You really can't go wrong with the BE 100 as long as you're realistic as to how much bottom end you can expect from a 4" bass driver. It's simply amazing that these speakers are Bluetooth. FYI, my streaming service of choice is Tidal.