Bowers & Wilkins Zeppelin Mini impressions
By Darren Murph 
posted December 18th 2009 11:19AM
posted December 18th 2009 11:19AM
Bowers & Wilkins isn't a name that's generally associated with "mere mortals." Sure, you'll find B&W gear within palatial mansions and the drool-worthy motorcars, but by and large, these guys stick to the high-end and never bother coming down to the level of the layperson. Thanks to Apple, it seems that even this company couldn't resist the temptation of pumping out its own iPod sound system, with the Zeppelin Mini being the second that it has sold. At $399.99 (MSRP), this one is positioned alongside more pricey options like Bose's SoundDock, JBL's On Stage 400P, Altec Lansing's Mix iMT800, iHome's iP1 and Boston Acoustics' i-DS3. As is typical with B&W gear, the Zeppelin Mini is nothing short of beautiful, but do the acoustics really match the design? Read on for a few of our impressions.
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The Zeppelin Mini ships in an attractive box along with a few cradles for various dock-connecting iDevices, a pebble remote and an AC adapter. Aside from playing nice with the iPod and iPhone lines, users can also connect this directly to their computer via USB or plug in any other source through the 3.5mm auxiliary jack in the rear. Everything about this screams minimalism, and in our opinion, that ends up hurting the overall package. You'll find a color-changing light underneath the mesh speaker grille that signifies a variety of scenarios based on color and flashing, and in case you happen to misplace the diminutive remote, there's a power button and volume up / down rocker on one side. And... that's pretty much it.
Within, you'll get twin 3-inch glass fiber drivers, a rear bass port and 36-watts of Class D power. The iPod connecting arm can easily twist horizontally to enable Cover Flow and to show off widescreen movies the way they should be shown off. In terms of design, we honestly have no complaints. It's compact enough to be used in a bedroom or office, and unless you have something against mirror finishes, we doubt you'll be able to knock the aesthetics. It's easily one of the classiest, most highly stylized iPod speaker systems on the market today, and we get the impression that a fair chunk of the asking price goes toward the design.
You see, the Zeppelin Mini may look like a million bucks, but we found the actual audio output to be somewhat disappointing. For starters, the bass port on the rear is evidently for show, as we noticed a significant lack of low-end in every tune we tried. Highs were also too pronounced, and to compound the issue, B&W provides nary a way to adjust this. There's no built-in equalizer, and there's not even dedicated treble / mid / bass adjustment buttons. A $400 sound system with no way to control anything but volume? Color us underwhelmed. Granted, you could connect your iPod or iPhone via the 3.5mm auxiliary jack and utilize its integrated EQ, but that's very obviously defeating the purpose here.
Don't get us wrong -- the Zeppelin Mini didn't sound "bad," but it didn't sound $400 good. We put it up against an aged Logitech mm50 (which can be found today for just over $100), and frankly, we didn't greatly prefer the Mini over the mm50. What the Zeppelin Mini provides is yet another forgettable way to experience your iPod or iPhone library within the home, and aside from the design, there's simply nothing extraordinary to speak of. The weak mids and lows lead to an unbalanced aural experience, and the baffling inability to adjust levels whatsoever leaves you with no choice but to simply deal with the factory settings or tap into the aux input. We dig the exterior, sure, but we can't recommend spending four bills on something that doesn't absolutely dazzle the eardrums.
Anyone have an opinion on the Klipsch iGroove SXT?
Damn, I thought it was gonna be an iphone controlled zeppelin.. I am profoundly disappointed now.
@kingtaz looks kinda like a chrome air ship, look at the unboxing video with terrible garage band music, so mute it, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZkxKRF-TKRE
@kingtaz Sorry, is just yet another fucking iPhone speaker system. Not newsworthy, but ok engadget..
Ignoring for a moment whether this is good or bad, not having an EQ (or at least having a way to bypass it) is extremely common on any Hi-Fi kit over $400.
@Wolfticket
I don't know if $400 is the price point where tone controls become less common, but overall you are correct. Over $2,000 and you'll almost never find tone controls. Yes, you pay more and get less knobs. Why? The objective is to get the music coming out of the system to match what happened in the recording studio to begin with. The equalization curves used to record music are pretty much set in stone if your playback equimpent matches those cures, you should get out what was put in. Tone controls usually are used to correct playback equipment that is not very good. Fiddling with tone controls is like playing with the colors of the Sistine Chapel because you feel Michelangelo should have used more red. You may be right, but Michelangelo did not use more red so you should see it for what it is.
If you buy the right playback equimpment, you will not miss the tone controls. Most music will sound great. If it sounds bad, it is because it IS bad. In the case of this B&W Zeppelin, it the bass is really that lacking, then the manufacturer messed up. The fact that the tone controls are missing is not the problem. You'd just be attempting to correct a playback device that has problems to begin with.
@MidwestTechGuy wow you have no idea whatsoever regarding what you are talking about. What you are describing is "accuracy", the desire to have sound output match the sound input in the recording studio. Accuracy is just one of the objectives of good sound systems. But let's pretend for the sake of argument that it is the only objective like you say. Do you have any idea how much of an effect the listening environment and its acoustic characteristics have on the sounds you hear? Unless your listening environment is exactly the same as the recording studio, the sounds being produced will not match the recorded sound no matter how accurate your equipment is. This is why you need equalizers, phase controls, etc., to adjust for the acoustic characteristics of the environment. A properly calibrated set of equipment will produce highly accurate renditions for listeners located in its sweet spot. But you are not going to be able to achieve that without having a wide range of controls over the reproduction of the sound.
@AlexL You are partially right and partially wrong. Look at almost all of the best preamps around and very few have any tone controls. If I have no idea what I'm talking about then most of the industry does not know either.
Your listening room will affect sound. A carpeted room with drapes will sound duller than one with wood floors and no drapes. A large room will sound different than a small room. So matching components to your room is extremely important. That is why the better high-end stores insist you take the equipment home to test it in your room to make sure you have a good match before you buy it. To get the best sound, picking the right equipment for your room is what you need to do, instead of having the wrong equipment and trying to fix the sound with a tone control.
The one component that has the biggest effect on sound is the speaker. Choosing the right speaker for your room and your taste is very important, then getting the right amplifier and pre-amplifier (or integrated amp) that works well with that speaker is the next consideration. A good retailer will help you sort this all out. It may sound like a huge investment in time to get it right and a bit complicated. But if you are the kind of person who would rather listen to a Miles Davis CD than watch an episode of Survivor, you will be greatly rewarded by this investment to get it right.
I left out another argument used against tone controls. It introduces extra circuitry into the signal path. In the best equipment, that extra circuitry compromises the sound quality so the design goal becomes keeping the signal path as direct and clean as possible. That is how you get the best sound.
That thing is ugly, rich people spend money on some horrid looking stuff.
Equivalent to a Bentley Motorcycle.
(And Ducati makes better ones, but Bentley will still get some customers, just like JBL and Bose in this case).
Design looks great, but one too many wines and that iPod dock is going to snap.
Why buy this when you can just buy something like the Boston Acoustics Microsystem CD? I use it for basically everything. Its got every button imaginable on the top, slick remote, and excellent sound. AUX input in the front, tons more in the back.
@tike0rz Well, quite. It's what sounds good to you that's important, and having proper control over that is essential, otherwise you're saying that all types of music are the same, all rooms are the same, and all personal preferences are the same, when clearly that's not the case.
I happen to have 5 rooms wired with B&W speakers, but they're still all driven from an amp where I can - and do - tweak the sound. The notion that the higher-end you go the less functionality is needed or provided strikes me as ridiculous and rather pompous.
This is a bummer.
I have the large zeppelin and it sounds phenomenal.
I'd be interested in a review of the Klipsch unit as well.
@sheynk So you must be rich then? What's your secret? Engadget readers are dying to know!
I'm more interested in the mm1 at this point. Hopefully it will be more befitting of a B&W label...
Aw, the Humanity...
The iHome iP1 is a great alternative at ~$250.
Someone's listening to Switchfoot's Hello Hurricane...
@MisterSquared Indeed!
love all the high quality speaker docks and headphones to listen to compressed mp3 files. I guess bad speakers can make compressed music sound even worse. Also doesn't the iPhone have a crappy DAC anyways??
Looks very nice. Its bigger brother zeppelin is beautiful, but I like the smaller size of this. Bose better wake up... Would be good to see a wi-fi version so you can stream from your PC or control from iPhone, getting up to properly browse music gets boring very quickly.
What do you guys suggest instead of the Zeppelin Mini? I like the looks but what great sound.
I don't actually intend to dock anything to it. I was looking to hook a couple of these around the house to Airport Express' that I have in a mesh configuration.
I'm a big B&W fan but I have to agree with the reviews. It just didn't sound as good as other products under $150. The one thing I didn't agree with the review is the EQ portion. I don't ever mess with it. I listen to music the way it was meant to be heard.
As a B&W fan for a number of years I admittedly have the urge to go deeper to understand how something got out of their factory with sub-par sound. I'd love to know what format the reviewer was using for playback, and if any experimentation was done with lossless codecs vs. mp3. Acknowledging that this is an ipod dock and should sound good playing anything that comes out of an ipod, I can't help wondering if it's more tuned to uncompressed media. I'd also love to know if it's a jump in quality to the full zeppelin that warrants the price difference. I have a hard time not thinking airport express by mini-toslink to a set of bookshelf B&Ws for 600 chickens if you've got a receiver, and if not and you're going to drop that much cash it might be better towards a full setup...
I wonder if the lack of bass is an actual lack of bass or just the perceived lack of bass because other systems they are listening to have too much bass and this is actually more-accurately reproducing the music. I'd love to see a frequency response graph with this article to kick up the objectiveness a bit more.
Is the rear firing port against a wall? Without a wall to bounce the sound waves off of, this may explain the lack of bass.
@cherryboom
What is a gauger?
yeah so you guys know that adjusting the EQ on the iPod/iPhone will work right?
Thats why there is no EQ on the unit, you can just do it on the player
Nice stereo, nasty iPhone. Every heard of a microfiber?
"We put it up against an aged Logitech mm50 (which can be found today for just over $100), and frankly, we didn't greatly prefer the Mini over the mm50. "
What a slap in the face to B&W. Try updating the Zeppelin Mini's software and see if you can tell a difference. I know I sure have.
I'd listen to my music through a Zeppelin over a Logitech speaker any day.
@Sminman
The Zeppelin Mini has a software update? And it improves the sound? I'm not saying that it's not possible, but that seems very strange.
Secondly, in reference to your Logitech comment, it makes you sound like you are focusing on brand over preference of sound production. I always try to do a blind test when I shop for any kind of audio device so that I can have an unbiased approach to a product.
A brand name or visual design can easily fool one's ears into thinking they're hearing something they might not be.
Stupidly priced speakers.
While aesthetically superior, it performs no better than the cheaper bose sounddock II