Samsung's 32-bit wireless speaker is sleek and loud
But 8 of those bits are pure guesswork.
24-bit audio is, presently, the upper echelon for high-resolution digital music. So, of course, Samsung has a 32-bit speaker here at CES. The company says the H7 Wireless Speaker will upscale your 8- and 24-bit audio to cover a wider frequency range, thereby making your music sound closer to the original recording. That claim is pretty dumb. There's no way to get 32-bit audio files, and there's no hidden data inside a 24-bit recording, so any extrapolation is pure guesswork on the speaker's part. But that doesn't mean the H7 is a complete write-off. For what it's worth, it's a very attractive wireless speaker that sounds pretty good too. All of the inputs are hidden beneath the H7, which means the only discernible details on the speaker are two circular grilles up front, two circular dials up top (one for volume, the other for navigating menus), and a small display. The listening area at Samsung's booth wasn't ridiculously noisy, but it's still not an ideal environment in which to judge a speaker's quality. What I can say is that it's definitely loud enough to fill a room, and that there was no distortion at full volume. Hopefully we'll get the chance to spend some more time with the H7 before it launches this summer. There's no word on pricing, but Samsung said we'll be "pleasantly surprised" by their MSRP, which it characterized as "affordably premium." Click here to catch up on the latest news from CES 2017.
