Earfun UBOOM L - WIP

I got 2 samples of the upcoming Earfun UBOOM L and used the recent days to fine tune the final sound.

Although it looks quite similar to the Sony SRS-XB33 it’s definitely smaller and lighter, although still larger than the JBL Flip 6. Apart from an additional “outdoor mode” which reduces bass and true wireless stereo pairing with another one, there are no other special features like light effects, apps etc. According to Earfun the retail price should be $79.99. I suggested a lower price of $69.99 to make it more competitive but Earfun told me due to the current situation (continuous lockdowns in China etc) it’s hard to offer it for much lower but maybe I can convince them to at least sell it with a lower introductory price.

The tuning it arrived with was already quite OK, nothing outstanding but not bad without any serious flaws. Now my task was to make something really decent out of it with the given hardware and limitations. Of course I can’t make it sound highend as I have no direct access to the DSP neither do I know all the features it offers, but I asked to get at least the applied EQ settings so that I can simulate the raw sound by applying the negative EQ values from them. The DSP seems to offer 14 PEQ filters, from which 13 were already used by Earfun. With 3 lowcut filters on top of each other, and another high-cut filter already used, there are little filters left for detailed corrections. The low-cut filter series could  be necessary though to really get a clean final signal with no lower frequencies left, to avoid any distortion at high levels. With this in mind I think I managed to make it sound quite appealing using their existing filterbase and adjusting that to make it sound better and more natural while still offering some nice kick and sparkle to the sound, thus by no means "neutral", but not fake sounding either, rather more similar to what Bose did with the Soundlink Flex recently: a speaker really making fun listening to.

Below you can see some measurements. Green is the raw tuning (simulated), blue is the tuning by Earfun and black is my suggested sound. 

What I tried to do is to get rid of the nasty peak close to 15khz, at the same time I wanted treble to become a bit “thicker” it was rather thin and sizzling sounding thanks to that peak. The other issue was some honkiness which I tried to minimise by reducing mids and evening out the sound towards the midrange. I mostly tuned with pink noise, as issues become more obvious especially if listening off axis while filling out a dip which showing up in the measurement made the resulting sound resonant when listening not exactly on axis. This,just proves that tuning by ear rather than towards some graph is still necessary and more imporant is having a really reliable neutral source which I had hoped to finally get with the Neumanns. Talking about bass: the present bass amount actually needs some treble boost for the overall sound to remain balanced, otherwise the speaker would sound too dark. The bass has some nice oomph to it, and as there is no dynamic bass boost for low levels I think it still sounds convincing even at lower listening levels, but it doesn’t sound as phat as the Sony of course, more similar to the Bose but less knocking. It’s probably something in between the Flip 6 and Charge 5 series and it also manages to retain more bass than the Flip 6 up to maximum without becoming as shrill and shouty as the JBL which would need some additional EQ adjustment like I have shown before in some of my videos. The UBOOM L should be also nicely usable at high levels, although don’t expect miracles, it would seem a really solid performer. I even think it could be a better overall choice than the JBL not even taking the price into account, as you get 2 drivers and a full stereo signal instead of a mono sound but with a tweeter instead. The tweeter should give an advantage in dispersion and smoothness, but on the other hand with treble being spread over 2 drivers always gives slightly more resolution. At least this is the experience I made so far. And although the UBOOM L is only equipped with 2 full range drivers the dispersion is not as extremely directional as that from the Sony, treble appears also a bit smoother and more natural sounding than that of the JBL which thanks to the tweeter you would expect to sound smoother. The Sony on the other hand has treble slightly too subdued, you can of course help with an additional EQ on both which the Earfun doesn’t have, but so far I didn’t feel the need to change something depending on the listening level, the bass can maybe become a bit thumping at levels around half which still shouldn’t be bad for outdoor listening on the other hand could become slightly boomy indoors in smaller rooms or placements closer to a wall or corner. I didn't throw in the Motion+ on purpose here, because despite the EQ you cannot really make it sound "true". Some weird hokiness within the mids always remains, which simply may be the crossover with the tweeters. You see any additional "feature" will lead to other problems and possible issues, thus the choice for just 2 full range drivers was not such a bad idea.

There is also this other outdoor mode which reduces bass unfortunately too much. Below you can see some measurement with both the normal and outdoor mode and also my sketch how I would prefer it to be:

Less bass reduction than it is now and also some treble reduction in regard to the other mode to basically make the sound more or less flat. I would rather call it “studio setting” instead of “outdoor” because outdoor listening with little bass doesn’t quite make sense to me but if bass could be reduced to a flat level like I suggested it could make the speaker more versatile and also offer a nicely flat sound with no stronger bass or treble boost.

Right now I am waiting for a response from Earfun and I hope they will send me a new firmware immediately so that I can check the result and also prepare a first quick video showing you what to expect.

I got lots of inquiries about the best sounding portable speaker lately, Motion+, XB33 etc… I won’t claim that the Earfun will be the best but I would definitely wait until it’s release as I think it will become quite an interesting and affordable option with an honest and natural sound which should also satisfy most bass lovers. For those who liked the Tribit Maxound+, this here sounds way more serious, but I really need to have the final sound applied to the speaker to give you my final verdict. So stay tuned…