The Yamaha PDX-50 is an iPod speaker dock – with no sign of a physical dock on board. That’s because it’s totally wireless, sucking up tunes from your iPod via a clip-on dongle. So does it deliver cable-free quality, or are its cordless capabilities little more than a gimmick. Hit up our full Yamaha PDX-50 review and you’ll find out.
Let’s get this out of the way quickly: the Yamaha PDX-50’s wireless link works like a charm – up to a certain range, at least. Move more than a few metres away and the signal will cut out, but that’s unlikely to be an issue: it’s not the most powerful speaker dock and you’re unlikely to find yourself wandering around the house expecting to hear the Yamaha PDX-50 pumping out music from whatever room you’re in.
Despite its small size and low weight, the Yamaha PDX-50 can deliver a reasonably hefty sonic punch to your lugholes. We found bass to be a touch on the narrow side (compared with, say, the B&W Zeppelin or the Pioneer XW-NAS5, both of which are much pricier), but considering the price it’s a more than powerful enough performer. Vocals come through clearly, treble is crisp and there’s no sign of interference over the wireless link. In fact, Yamaha claims its tech is completely lossless.
Read our Pioneer XW-NAS5 review
The Yamaha PDX-50 is light on extra features. Battery charging is taken care of by a completely separate ring dock, which lets you play music at the same time. There’s no auxiliary input on the dock either, which is a bit of a puzzler: what happens if you want to hook up something other than an iPod?
