Altec Lansing inMotion Classic iMT620 iPhone stereo review

Gallery: Valeera Sanguinar | 11 Photos

From afar the iMT620 appears to be encased in an anodized aluminum bezel, but in fact it's just a semi-gloss metallic silver finish applied on plastic. While this saves you from the cold, harsh touch of metal, we couldn't help but to think this was just Altec Lansing opting for the cheaper material (and still charging a fairly large amount). We like the subtle marks on the top buttons -- quite a radical but nice change from the ugly, faux LCD buttons on the inMotion MAX and GLOW. On the top right corner of the speaker you'll find an LCD which shows the mode you're in, battery level, song information and FM radio frequency. Turn the speaker around and you'll find an audio-in port, power socket, slide-in remote control dock and telescopic radio antenna. As for the universal iPod dock, you can garnish it with a choice of two adapters: one for the iPhone 3G / 3GS, and another for the iPod nano 4G / 5G; owners of other iPod models will just have to be careful not to knock over the player. Similarly, the iMT620 is kitted with several socket adapters (US, UK, Europe and China / Australia) to cater to travelers.

As mentioned earlier, one of the highlights of this stereo is the handle which also serves as a stand and a power-off switch while folded during battery mode (i.e. the device doesn't turn on by accident when the bar is down). The bar alone has little we can fault -- it locks well in the three hinged positions, has good grip and as a handle supports the 4 pound body with little flex, but we did notice its loose rubber feet which could do with some stronger glue. Leaving that minor issue behind, we then had a go on the full-featured IR remote, which has plenty to offer -- not only do you get the usual playback control functionality, but there are also dedicated keys for accessing the iPod menus and playlists, as well as toggling shuffle and repeat. You can also program the four preset keys for your four favorite radio channels: simply hold down one of the 'P' keys for a few seconds to store the current channel. The only problem we had with the remote was our iPhone's delayed response to us pressing the 'Menu' button, but strangely the other iPod keys had no problem, and we weren't sure whether it was the phone or the speaker to be blamed. We doubt many would use the remote to access the iPod menus anyway since it's quite a challenge to read the text from a distance, and we'll let you decide if the said delay in this video is enough to deter you from buying the speaker: