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Australia, Canberra
1 Level
739 Review
41 Karma

Review on ๐Ÿ”ต DROK Blue~Tooth Amplifier Board 4.1 | Digital 2 Channel 50W+50W | Wire~Less BT 3.0 4.0 | Speaker Amp with Case by James Cowan

Revainrating 4 out of 5

A lot, but for a price

Yes, everything they say is true. Well done, sounds good. Clear plastic panels give it a cute aki swag look. It's lightweight, so if you use thick speaker wire it's prone to flipping over like an astronaut trapped in the tentacles of a space octopus. You can always put a stone on it. Almost all Chinese outfits use the same design and chips, these chips are good, so paying more doesn't mean buying more. You're running the same Class D (or "T") circuitry in a prettier box that just gets more exciting as the price goes up. My wife preferred massively decorated watches, full of gems and Swiss precision movements, and I really enjoyed opening one up and showing her the ridiculously small thing inside. The same principle. I did some simple frequency response scans with the same studio monitors powered by fairly expensive amps and DROK in linear mode and they came out (and sounded) very similar. Over Bluetooth, the 10k-plus ceiling has been bumped up a few dB (surprisingly), but this little board doesn't disappoint. In fact, it's amazing that you can get something in a size and price very similar to a pack of cigarettes. A bunch of annoying problems. BT pairing works, but once you've paired something with it, it's almost impossible to disconnect and reconnect at will. Space octopus at work. Switching to the line input doesn't make him "let go" either. There must be some other way to turn it off other than banging on it with a brick. And the fact is that the level can only be adjusted with tiny knobs. It seems to be about 30 volume steps. When you turn it off, it forgets what level it was at, its pairing, and wants to tell you all about it. Which brings us to THE VOICE. That indescribable C'tula. This limits its use to 1) very well planned and careful reconfigurations, 2) leaving it on 24/7 so you don't give it a chance to use VOICE. I have a pair of Altec A7s the size of a fridge. -500s. They are very efficient and at 20 watts per side they will blow your clothes off. Well, when the VOICE first said "Wash the Lingading Path" it shook the windows - in the house next door. I have no idea what the "level" was and I'd rather avoid repeating it. The VOICE is unforgettable, hard to forgive, always MUCH louder and speaks the most unintelligible Mandarin C-English. I understand "Rine in" but the rest is a complete mystery. One star deducted for trying. If you use it in a fixed application, it's a very good building block, no frills, no problem. highlighted. If you want to use it with different sound sources paired with say a phone and a computer and switching in today's day-to-day life, it becomes difficult. And the VOICE will understand.

Pros
  • Large selection
Cons
  • I'm mad