Gadget review: Soundscience Qb-Mito Wireless Portable Speaker

The portable speaker has a horrific reputation; tinny sound, distortion at high volumes and poor battery life. When you consider that a reasonably average £14.99 portable speaker picked up from Argos or PC World has a production value in China of around 75p - £1.50, it’s not hard to understand why they sound so awful.

The Soundscience Qb-Mito is the new-born baby brother of the QSB USB speaker I reviewed last year. If you remember, this speaker stored power like a reservoir delivering bursts of powerful sound when called upon by the sonic waves of the audio track, storing energy during quieter parts. In short, it could punch substantially above its weight. The Qb-Mito is a wireless rechargeable Bluetooth speaker about the size of a Rubik’s cube which claims to be able to deliver 25 watts of sound on-the-go. That audacious claim is like Justin Bieber squaring up to Jason Statham for an arm wrestle – quite simply unbelievable.

The strange thing when the Qb-Mito starts playing is that the sound almost hovers in the middle of the room. It was as if Chris Martin was perched on the coffee table in my living room. This is mostly due to a built-in full-range BMR (Balanced Mode Radiator) driver combined with a patented low-power-consumption digital amp which allows up to 30 hours of playback from a single charge. This combination is a bit like recreating Niagara Falls during a hosepipe ban. The sound generated is genuinely room-filling and the quality is remarkable, especially since it’s streamed wirelessly via Bluetooth. Streaming from my smartphone was painless, and whilst the sound is undeniable mono, the expansive sound stage tricks you to think otherwise.

£59.99 from www.amazon.co.uk and www.amp3.co.uk, for more information see http://www.qb-series.com