SOUNDBOKS Go Portable Bluetooth Speaker (It's Loud BUT is it Proud?)

Home • DJ Accessories • SOUNDBOKS Go Portable Bluetooth Speaker (It’s Loud BUT is it Proud?)

Chief Editor

Our reviews are based on extensive research, community driven DJ surveys and, when possible, hands-on testing of the DJ gear. Each time you make a purchase through one of our independently-chosen links, we will receive a percentage of the proceeds at no extra cost to you.

If there’s one thing every DJ should understand, it’s that your most important device isn’t your controller, CDJ, or even turntable & mixer; it’s your speaker.

Having a good quality speaker is the number one most important facet of DJing. I mean just think about it. You can have the best DJ controller or CDJ imaginable and it won’t mean a thing unless you have some method of playing the music out to the audience.

The good news is that you don’t need a ton of money to find a good set of speakers. If you know what to look for and where to look, you can find some remarkable speakers on the market for some incredibly reasonable and l0w-cost prices.

One of the rather interesting speaker setups we’ll be taking a look at here is a Bluetooth-based speaker called SOUNDBOKS Go.

Read this next: Reloop Mixtour: Portable Micro DJ Controller

Now, here Soundboks Go is sold at a fairly eye-catching price of over $600. Now, on one hand, that’s a pretty high amount of money. But that’s just looking at the other side of the token. We have other speakers at cheaper prices that have been reviewed.

If price alone is what you’re looking at, regardless of potential quality, then there are a lot of super affordable options out there such as the Minirig 3.

In this review, we’ll take a look at what Soundboks Go offers to warrant that higher price tag as well as what makes it so much more special compared to every other Bluetooth speaker out there.

By the end, you’ll know, not only whether the speaker is worth your buy or not, but you also understand what things to look out for when it comes to a quality speaker and what is and isn’t worth your money.

Starting fresh out of the box, I will say that it was a bit disappointing to see that, visually, you aren’t given a whole lot to look at. The Soundboks Go speaker comes as just a speaker alongside a set of charging cables, a battery, and the user manual.

There weren’t any additional connecting cables for your computer or any other device.

You can get an additional carrier strap for the speaker itself, but that’s an additional purchase of $60.

Again, it is a bit on the lean side in terms of what it’s offering. Still, that shouldn’t ideally take away from how it looks or what it can do.

Probably the first thing you’ll notice (if you’re a Soundboks fan) is that the Go shares a ton in common with the previous big name, the Soundboks Gen3.

Really, they’re a lot like siblings, with the Go just being the smaller, kid-brother version of the Gen3. (This is a bit more than skin deep, but we’ll go over that later).

The two share the same iconic front-facing grille as well as both have their battery and button layout in the same place.

The batteries themselves are the same, to the point that you can pretty much swap one out for the other. I’m not sure if that takes the nostalgia play a bit too far, but it certainly makes collecting Soundboks speakers, if only to grab an on-hand speaker battery.

Read this next: JBL EON 610: An Affordable Portable PA System

Not only does the Soundboks Go share a similar overall appearance with the Gen3, but it also borrows much in terms of its general resilience and durability.

Now, I’m not going to sit here and say it can take a dropkick to the face or a one-story fall. That would be crazy.

No, what I’m saying is that it can get a few light smacks or short drops without skipping a beat, something that many other speakers will outright shatter over. It’s really impressive to see something fall off a table while playing… and KEEP playing.

Like, not even stutter!

This is thanks largely due to the silicone rubber bumpers that cover it. On top of that, the speaker has an IP65 rating which helps it resist heavy splashes of water.

This means things like rain, or accidental spills won’t be an issue (though tosses in a pool probably will).

Still, that’s not an open invitation for recklessness. As we started this off, the speaker isn’t free, and I’d hate for you to test throwing it off a table to see if you’re as lucky as me.

Moving on from its overall durability, the Soundboks Go isn’t all that bad to look at.

The speaker weighs around 20lbs. That’s not “light” by any means, though it’s also not nearly as dense or “weighty” as most other speakers. Suffice it to say, it’s light enough that you can reasonably take it to most places by yourself while also heavy enough that, when you put it down it isn’t going anywhere.

The speaker also has a rubberized handle that sits at its top.

This is the only way you can move it around unless you opt for the add-on carrier strap, which is a bit of a cheapskate move. On one hand, if you’re buying a near $700 speaker, you’re probably going to shell out an extra $60 for convenience.

On the other, it feels more than a bit predatory since the standard handle is as small and as inconvenient as it is. The rubberized texture is certainly on the more ergonomic side of things, but the speaker is 20lbs and the handle isn’t meant for anything outside of immediately picking it up and putting it down. Overall, it just feels like they intentionally made the carrier strap an additional necessity rather than a fun add-on.

On the good side, the speaker is certainly quite capable based on what it’s sporting. It has two 72-watt Class-D amps as well as a 10-inch woofer and a 1-inch silk dome tweeter.

This makes the Go able to push out some pretty powerful sound, though primarily in a linear direction, rather than in a wider area, as many speakers have been known to do.

In terms of the different available slots and opening ports, I’m surprised at how little it pulled from the earlier Gen3.

It’s got much of the essentials, sure, but outside of a rig mount, battery & power outlet, and a 3.5mm Aux-In port, there isn’t that much to write home about.

This is a far cry from the Gen3, which included an audio output as well as a 1/4-inch input for instruments and microphones.

Yes, I understand that there is a size difference between the two speakers (the Go is half the size of the Gen3), but the fact that even one of the ports isn’t included despite its price tag is a letdown.

Read this next: Best Portable PA System Picks (Top 10)

Now that we’ve had a chance to take a look at what the speaker offers from an immediately visual perspective, let’s now look at some of its different internal features.

The speaker’s volume dial is also its power button. It’s another great way to help keep its trimmed down and simplified look with as few buttons as possible.

Here, the volume dial immediately lights up with an LED light which determines its overall sound level. Rather than going from zero to 10, the speaker takes things “up to 11”, with it letting you blast your sound pretty high.

I’ve got to say that, while there are some things that I’m not a huge fan of, the volume power dial is a pretty cool feature.

Not only is it a great way to immediately know just how much sound you’re putting out, but it does it in one of the coolest, most rock & roll ways imaginable. It’s almost like you’re firing some laser or something as you steadily and progressively amp up the sound.

In addition to the volume controls, the speaker also includes a pairing button that can connect it with up to four additional speakers. When linked with three or four additional Soundboks (four or five total) speakers (Go or Gen3), the pairing feature will allow it to act as either the main host speaker or one of the background options.

If you have two other speakers (three total), one will act as a host with the other two playing along its left and right channels.

If you only have another speaker (two in total), both speakers will run in mono mode, letting you play in two entirely different areas, provided the Bluetooth connection is strong enough.

While the pairing option only goes up to five, you can slightly workaround this by using the Aux-in port, essentially tying two speakers together via the Aux cable.

Technically speaking, you could just keep connecting them this way, creating some crazy huge line of speakers. I’ve never tried it myself, but I’m sure it would look pretty crazy in all the right ways.

Read this next: MiniRig 3 Review: A Complete Unbiased Guide

Now, while we’ve been using the term “Bluetooth” connection to describe what Soundboks is doing, that’s not wholly true.

While you “can” technically connect your device to your speaker via Bluetooth, the truth is that Soundboks primarily uses an entirely separate wireless streaming protocol known as Skaa.

Skaa similarly uses a 2.4GHz frequency band while having a lower latency and considerably fewer dropouts compared to Bluetooth connections.

In addition to the standard Skaa connection, there’s also Skaa Pro Mode. This further reduces latency while also improving stereo sound.

The downside is that, in addition to costing money, you won’t be able to pair more than two speakers together while also having to keep them much closer together (as the connection range decreases by at least 20%).

The good news is that, if you’re not interested in downloading Skaa, you can still pair things up with the ole trusted Bluetooth. The problem is that it’s going to be a bit more difficult compared to Skaa.

You’ll probably take more than a few attempts to force it to link up from the Soundboks app, though after you do it “should” be ok in the future.

Talking a bit more about the app itself, the Soundboks Go speaker pretty much is built to do what it sets out to do, and that’s just to keep you connected with your speakers and allow you access to the different sound modes and EQ settings.

You’ll be able to choose between things like Bass+, Power, Indoor, or EQ.

All of these features are fairly self-explanatory.

Bass+ amps up your sound (particularly in open spaces) while Power helps increase the sound while also ensuring your battery life doesn’t take too big a hit. Indoor is meant to be used indoors and in more enclosed settings, while EQ allows you greater freedom when it comes to adjusting and altering your EQ settings.

The app also allows you to tweak the volume settings as well as the aforementioned pairing options, namely in deciding which speaker is or isn’t the host.

Lastly, Soundboks Go, when it comes to sound quality, makes a point of doing exactly what you got it to do – make as much noise with as little sound distortion as possible.

While sound clarity in and of itself is not “forgotten” here, it takes a backseat to reduce sound distortion while pumping out as loud and as hard as possible.

As mentioned earlier with the sound options, you can push well past “10” and into “11” category.

These higher levels of sound (nine to 11) are very much in their league, making a point of standing out and making it where just about anyone in the immediate area can hear exactly what you’re playing.

This is played up or reduced slightly based on the different audio modes you’re implementing. Bass+, as an example, further strengthens these levels while Indoor mellows it out just a tad.

No matter what setting you’re playing it or how high you have it, however, you won’t have to deal with any real sound distortion. This all culminates in a quality sound speaker that plays out to the audience seriously and respectably.

Read this next: Denon DJ Prime GO: Best Portable Party Starter

While I’d like to give Soundboks Go a glowing review, it’ll have to come with more than a few asterisks attached to it.

At the beginning of this review, I commented that, while its price was on the higher side of things, that didn’t necessarily mean it wasn’t worth considering.

Now, after going through it completely, the reality is that things are much more muddled than a simple “yes” or “no”.

The truth is that there are a lot of things that the Soundboks Go does right. Its sound is meant to impress while also cutting down greatly on any distortion.

Similarly, the app comes with some great sound settings to play with based on what you’ve got going. And then there’s the Skaa low-latency connection and impressive overall build.

Yes, the app is legitimately awesome from those features alone.

At the same time, the speaker seems to be only very loud and not too distorted. Yes, it has a good build and yes it has a functional app, but so do a lot of other speakers out there.

A lot of other speakers are a lot fewer. I have a hard time wrapping my head around the fact that this speaker costs as much as it does, yet comes with no cables, no ports, and super expensive batteries and add-ons.

All in all, the Soundboks Go shares a stark resemblance to that of the iPhone. If that comparison made you excited, then this speaker will be something you’ll enjoy.

If, on the other hand, you’re like me and it made you groan just a bit, then the reality is that this isn’t going to be the speaker for you. Simply put, the price doesn’t match the quality provided. You can just about everything here for cheaper with more things from other brands.

If you have the money and want a legitimately good speaker that prioritizes its name over everything else, then the Soundboks Go will be a great buy. For everyone else, you’re better off checking out some of the other best speakers on the market.

Dexter has worked in the music business since the early 1990s. He has been a keen tech writer for many years and is still regularly involved in promoting prominent electronic music events in Ibiza and the UK.

Dexter also specializes in managing and growing digital marketing platforms for leading international DJs, event brands, and venues.

He relocated to Croatia from Ibiza six years ago but has continued his industry involvement whilst living on the electronic music party Island of Pag.

Alongside music, Dexter is a cat nut and a through-and-through family man!

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Name *

Email *

What do you think?