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The Braven Stryde 360 bluetooth speaker measures 16cm tall and 7.5cm from side to side, it weighs 474 grams.
Virtually the whole front and rear of this round tube is all speaker with the top and bottom also being speakers as well, for which the technical term is passive radiators.
The front has a black rubber strip with five near invisible buttons mounted over its length, I say invisible as they are imprinted black on black. The rear has a similar strip but this is a rubber bung to hide the micro USB for charging and full size USB to charge other items.
Quite by chance I was also reviewing the Amazon Echo Dot at the same time and that has a facility to use an external Bluetooth speaker so I hitched them up. Alexa was playing some music in my office through the Braven Stryde 360 and she (sorry it) choose a song I am not keen on so automatically I said ‘Alexa Next’ and to my total surprise she did it, the actual Amazon Echo Dot is two rooms away and well out of my normal voice reaching it so while the Stryde is not stated to have a microphone however this statement on the website says differently ‘and the built-in voice control works with your smartphone to give a command or make and take calls hands-free’ so it also works with the Bluetooth not only to your phone which you might expect but also connecting to Alexa. On close scrutiny of the black rubber strip on the front shows a pin hole microphone just above the on/off button.
The battery is stated to last 12 hours and in my tests nearly reached this but as a lot of the tests were in short bursts where the unit is switched on and off I am quite happy.
The battery is also a charge bank for other devices via the full size USB port it is 2500mAh.
I enjoyed using it around my home and as stated when I discovered it worked with Alexa my remote chats were answered. Anyone hearing me speaking to a wireless speaker would think I had lost my marbles until it speaks back when they then think they have lost theirs.
It has an IP67 waterproof rating and for those of an active nature will fit in a water bottle fitment on the outside of a rucksack.
For most it’s the sound quality that matters and even MP3 from a phone can sound good with the Stryde. When you play CD’s or .Wav files the sound you get is superb.
The Braven Stryde 360 is available from the link below for £77.81
https://www.braven.com/speakers/active-series/braven-stryde-360.html
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