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Indispensable for summer vacation. Mobile speakers are now as important to slip into a suitcase as a tube of sunscreen. Whatever the size, they embody the essential accessory for any smartphone wishing to play its sounds on the beach or by the swimming pool. Watch out, not all of them are necessarily ready for such adventures. “20 Minutes” reminds you of a few precautions.
Dive, don’t dive…
Too tempting. With water at 32°C in these high temperatures, the swimming pool of the small house rented this summer on Airbnb is “ the place to be ! On her air mattress, Eloé listens to her summer playlist on Deezer. By his side, his nomadic loudspeaker plays in a loop 4U of Ofenbach, Bad Habits by Ed Sheeran and cold heart by Elton John & Dua Lipa. And here is the drama. His brother Valentin has found nothing better than to make a bomb to impress the gallery. As a result, Eloé capsized and its enclosure failed at the bottom of the basin. Good for scrap?
Standards to navigate
In fact, everything depends on the protection standard with which Eloé’s enclosure is flanked (if there is a protection standard). Defined by the International Electronic Commission (to which manufacturers submit -or not- their devices) it can be identified with the letters and numbers it bears. Behind the letters “IP” (for Ingress Protection, or Protection Index) are two numbers.
The first digit indicates whether the device is protected against dust. A 5 indicates that the device is immune to dust deposits, and a 6 that it is totally dustproof. Attention, if instead of this number appears the letter X, it means that the device has not been tested for this type of resistance!
For its part, the second number informs if the product is water resistant. A 4 indicates that it is resistant to splashing water; a 5 in water jets; a 6 with powerful water jets; a 7 that it is waterproof up to one meter for 30 minutes; and an 8 over a yard for 30 minutes.
Suddenly, it’s a bit of a cacophony on the side of these IP standards on the portable speaker market. It’s not uncommon to find devices on the market that sound a little dissonant in this area. Thus, the Marshall Emberton speaker is IPX7 (it therefore resists well to immersion, but a priori not to dust); the new Sony XE200 is IP67 (it resists dust and immersion up to one meter for 30 minutes), while there are still IPX5 speakers, such as the Grundig Soloblack which will simply resist splashing water . The latter models are the least expensive.
IP67, current best guarantee
The most recent and best protected enclosures of the moment are all IP67. To date, the standard does not go beyond for consumer equipment. In addition to the latest from Sony (sold for 149 euros), we can mention the Roam from Sonos (189 euros), the SoundLink Flex from Bose (169 euros); or the JBL Flip 6 (119 euros), all of which are IP67. Unfortunately, the waterproofness of these devices does not allow them to play music underwater. If we can obviously wonder about the interest of such a perspective (what would we really hear?), the water immediately interrupts the Bluetooth connection.
However comprehensive it may be, the protection standard is not everything. Behind it, nothing says that the speaker resists the effects of chlorine in a swimming pool for a long time, or even that of salt from seawater, which is corrosive by nature. It is therefore important to systematically rinse your device carefully under clear water after use, but also to let it dry.
We take this opportunity to check if the connectors, present under a small waterproof cover, have been well preserved from the water. And you also avoid prolonged exposure of your speaker to direct sunlight, which will fatally affect the condition of your battery. Above 30°C, the temperature can lead to its self-discharge, but, worse, its premature aging. And it will be impossible to replace.
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