Cambridge Audio Go v2 Bluetooth speaker review: Speaker excellence

It’s amazing to me how many Bluetooth speakers there are on the market now. They range in size from a speaker you can stick in your shirt pocket to a big one that requires a ton of desk space.

Quality of sound covers the full range along with price, so I guess the question a consumer would need to ask is “how to get the best sound for the best value.” The folks at Cambridge Audio released their second generation Go v2 a few months ago, and this speaker offers great quality sound in a small footprint, for a decent price.

Cambridge Audio is a UK-based company who’s been making audiophile quality devices for years and who has only in the past year or two come to the Bluetooth speaker game.

Their new Go v2 speaker is a small bookshelf speaker that fits perfectly in the office or anywhere in the home and is easily transported anywhere you want to go. Measuring 237 mm W x 123 mm H x 60 mm D and weighing 1.1 kg, the Go comes with an onboard lithium-ion battery which offers 18 hours of battery life from a single charge.

Of course that time depends on the volume you play at – I tend to listen to music while working mostly, so I got pretty close to the prescribed number of hours. You can even plug your smartphone into the Go v2 to keep it charged up while using it – that way your phone will last as long as the Go v2 does.

It comes with 2- 50mm woofers, 2- 19mm titanium dome tweeters and 1 rear-firing bass radiator, and the one things I immediately noticed when I first fired the Go v2 up is the clarity of the sound. There isn’t enough bass for me – but I like a lot of bass, so that’s not uncommon, but to my ear the highs and mids are crystal clear and there’s more than enough bass to offer a very balanced sound.

My test version came in satin white, with a grey plastic grid across the front – very nice-looking.

The Go v2 uses AptX Bluetooth with Near Field Communication (NFC), which means that if you have a NFC enabled device then pairing is automatic after the first setup. The AptX Bluetooth offers CD-quality audio through Bluetooth; something you don’t get with all Bluetooth speakers.

I’m really a dummy about this kind of thing in terms of the science involved; what I understand is that the clarity of the music coming through this Go V2 is superb, and it doesn’t really break down when I crank it up, if anything, the bass gets better the louder I play it. Great for AC DC, but She Who Must Be Obeyed doesn’t really like me cranking it up all that much.

Cambridge Audio Go v2 Bluetooth speaker. Cambridge Audio

The Go has become my go-to speaker in the past few months of testing – I like the look and when it’s sitting on a shelf it seems to make the bass deeper because of the backward-firing bass. It sits on a shelf in my office and is getting plenty of use.

Priced at under $200 CAD, the Go v2 isn’t the cheapest speaker out there, but in terms of quality for the money I think it fits right in there with some of the top speakers available.

PROS: Crystal clear sound; small footprint; NFC; decent price point.

CONS: I’d like more bass; I’d also like it to be more easily available in Canada.

TO SUM IT UP: The Cambridge Audio Go v2 comes from a long history of audiophile quality products. It’s a quality product with great fit and finish, and the sound quality is very clear in all the ranges – for my ear – so it’s a very nice speaker that’s suitable for the home, office or on-the-go. Great battery life means this is the type of speaker you can run all day on battery power.

Murray Hill is lead tech writer at communicatto.com, a social media marketing agency where this article originated. You can reach Murray by email at [email protected] or on Twitter at @MurrayDHill

Source:: canada.com