LG has entered the multi-room audio market with its new Music Flow system, billing it as an “intuitive audio-ecosystem for the connected home” which is packed with benefits and features you’re sure to love while giving Sonos and others a real aural run for the money!
The new range of “Music Flow” wirelessly connected home audio speakers from LG wants to take your music experience to new levels of enjoying.
Three separate speakers, the H3, H5 and H7, a new Sound Bar, the HS6 and the Network Bridge, the R1, can all be connected and controlled through the Music Flow Player app for iOS and Android which lets you centrally manage your entire digital music library across multiple devices and control all Music Flow speakers.
As you’d expect these days, the app can also recommend songs and playlists, provide easy access to internet streaming services and function as a smartphone music player when the user is on the go.
Each speaker links with the others wirelessly, letting you choose from a variety of home audio configurations, meaning you can play whatever audio you choose (it could be a song, album, playlist or streaming service) across the entire house for an immersive experience across a wide area.
Alternatively, you can designate unique music to each room to fit individual tastes.
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One example LG gives is of “Mum”, who has a “weird thing for sand-socked acoustic surf balladeers in the kitchen”. Fine, she can have that music playing. Meanwhile, “Dad” prefers the sounds of a slinky jazz chanteuse for his den, which is also no problem.
The teenage “son” wants to blast muscular metalcore in his cave-like bedroom, while your sister wants to crank her “cheesy house anthems in her princess suite”. Again, all no problem, as the Music Flow system can assign different tunes to different rooms.
There’s also the “Bluetooth.Link” feature which allows any Bluetooth audio (including that from YouTube) to be repeated across all of your Music Flow Speakers.
Music Flow’s smarts keep on streaming, thankfully, with another feature described as having you arrive home while listening to music on your smartphone.
This is where the “Simple Music Syncing” function comes into play. It lets you listen to the same tune on your Music Flow speakers, whether filling your entire house or your room of choice.
As LG states, this multi-room wireless audio system ‘keeps the flow going’ whether you are hosting a party, keeping everyone in the family content or just seeking good vibes after work.
Even better are the NFC tags built into all of the Music Flow Speakers, letting you easily ‘tap’ your compatible phone for effortless pairing to let the music flow as you travel from room to room.
Intelligent music options abound, with the Mood Station function in the App letting you to simply select your current mood, whether it be romantic or calm or something else. Mood Station is powered by Gracenote, and it will then automatically compile a playlist from your music to match your mood.
The big question, of course, is what it then all sounds like. LG says “the short answer is, great!”, although you’d expect them to say that.
To support the claim, LG says its Music Flow speakers run on the latest wireless Mesh-Network technology, which includes dual band Wi-Fi support (2.4/5GHz) to deliver streaming music throughout the home or to individual speakers.
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Continuing, we learn that each wireless speaker “not only produces rich sound with clarity and depth, but also can act as a Wi-Fi extender for the other Music Flow speakers in the home”.
Two Music Flow speakers can even be placed as a stereo group to specifically play dedicated left + right audio for a room filling sound experience.
There’s still yet more features. Consumers are increasingly purchasing music online where they can access high quality music files. We’re not talking 320kbps MP3’s here, but studio-like 24-bit/192kHz music files, which LG’s Music Flow is capable of playing thanks to its HD Music Playback feature.
This means the richest sounding audio most people will have ever heard from a home system, and while you will need to buy 24-bit songs, the tinniness of some MP3 files will be finally eliminated, with low-bitrate MP3’s set to become as ancient as the 56k modems they were designed to travel over.
The 24-bit revolution isn’t quite here yet, but as it accelerates over the next 12 months and beyond, Music Flow owners will be well and truly ready for it.
The Music Flow range includes the Network Bridge (R1), three sizes of speakers (the 70W H7, 40W H5 and 30W H3) and the 320W Sound Bar (HS6), which at over a metre long is ideal for large screen TVs.
The HS6 Sound Bar links to the other Music Flow Speakers around your house, so you can hear your TV sound throughout the home. The HS6 Sound Bar includes a wireless sub- woofer for easy room placement, plus the ability to decode Dolby Digital and DTS surround signals.
Thankfully, the system is also easy to control remotely. No matter how large or small, your entire Music Flow set-up can be controlled from one or multiple smartphones via the Music Flow Player app.
The app makes for an easy-to-use master control unit, while the Music Flow system enables access to digital audio collections on your network devices.
The app even lets users seamlessly stream audio from online sources like Spotify premium (the full paid version of the app), Deezer premium, and TuneIn via the Audio Streaming Service function. Plus, with Bluetooth App.Link you can stream any music streaming service plus the likes of YouTube and other streaming sites throughout your home!
LG’s GM of Marketing, Lambro Skropidis said: “At LG we are not only about improving lives, we are also about making life more enjoyable. We believe that with LG’s new Music Flow system, we have taken wireless multi-room connection to the next level and that this is going to excite those who love their music and are looking for mastery over the soundscape of their home,” he added.
Music Flow will be available at JB HiFi, Harvey Norman, The Good Guys, Betta and other selected outlets from mid-October.
Pricing is as follows:
HS6 Sound Bar (LAS650M) – RRP $799
H7 (NP8740) – RRP $549
H5 (NP8540) – RRP $399
H3 (NP8340) – RRP $249
R1 Bridge (MR140) – RRP $79
