DTS Play-Fi exists for individuals who’d prefer to make their audio expertise just a little smarter, however both aren’t glad with it being restricted to their Alexa gadget or do not fancy the look, design or audio high quality of bespoke sensible units.
So DTS has teamed up with plenty of audio producers (most of them within the higher-end a part of the market) and developed an app to attach these units wirelessly to show them into de-facto sensible units that may be managed out of your cellphone.
I acquired a few suitable units despatched to me to make use of for plenty of weeks, together with a HiSense soundbar and home-cinema audio setup, and a Philips bookshelf speaker, together with setup directions for the app. And though I had some points with Wi-Fi connectivity between the app, my router and the units, the top outcome, I admit, is a somewhat good classing-up of the entire smart-home expertise.
DTS Play-Fi overview: Design and setup
DTS Play-Fi is an app that may be managed by way of your cellphone, pill, Home windows PCs and a few smartwatches. After a few years available on the market, the app is now suitable with plenty of totally different manufacturers, though most are within the dearer reaches of the audio market. This contains each mass-market and area of interest manufacturers corresponding to AudioLab, Thiel, Sonus Faber, Philips, Hewlett-Packard (sure tablets solely), Anthem, Elite, Wren, Quad, Loewe, Polk Audio and a couple of dozen others on the time of writing.
For us mere mortals, we will additionally see soundbars from TCL and HiSense included on that checklist, and certainly I attempted it out with a HiSense soundbar working with a Philips bookshelf speaker.
First up: connecting the factor.
That proved to be rather less easy than the easy directions made me imagine it might be. To attach a tool to the Play-Fi app, it’s a must to first allow the wi-fi pairing mode on the gadget itself, then pair it utilizing your cellphone, and at that time, the app is meant to mechanically take you to the gadget setup display screen. Nonetheless, it did not accomplish that for me for both suitable gadget at first, and never till I had gone via a number of resets of each the audio system and the Wi-Fi router and reinstalled the app did it lastly relent.
I came upon after some on-line looking out, that the precise mannequin of router (a latest-edition one from Virgin Media) I’ve is thought to have a turbulent relationship with Play-Fi for some cause, so connectivity is not going to be this painful for everybody. Nonetheless, this serves as a reminder so that you can analysis forward of time whether or not your web router is suitable earlier than investing in merchandise with the purpose of connecting them by way of DTS Play-Fi.
Options & efficiency
As soon as we had been up and operating, although, a collection of options opened up for me. First there’s the straight ‘casting’ choice, i.e. taking part in your music off your cellphone (I efficiently used BBC Sounds, Spotify, Amazon Music and Play-Fi’s built-in Web Radio) via your speaker. It is also Alexa, Siri and Google Assistant-compatible, so utilizing my Android I might use the flamboyant Philips bookshelf speaker as a Google Residence speaker – a little bit of an improve from Google’s personal providing there…
There is a Vital Listening characteristic, which permits for Play-Fi to ship ‘Hello-Res Audio’ information (24-bit/192kHz) to the gadget with none transcoding or downsampling, which goals to deliver the very best out of your audio system.
I might additionally arrange music presets, so after that, one click on would begin BBC Radio 6 Music on my Philips speaker, and one other would beam Spotify into my HiSense soundbar).
The Play-Fi Residence Theater mode additionally lets you hyperlink your TV to a number of audio outputs directly, so I might increase my house theatre setup offered by the Hisense soundbar, subwoofer and again audio system by including the Philips bookshelf speaker. There was no lag so these totally different manufacturers labored collectively by way of the app in blaring the noise from motion scenes throughout my lounge.
It even claims to hyperlink to your turntable (if it is from a suitable model) to any related speaker, though my lack of a suitable turntable meant I could not do that out for dimension.
And when you’re a smartwatch fan, excellent news! You should use Play-Fi’s playback and quantity controls via Apple Watch and Android Put on units.
As soon as I had conquered the mountain of frustration that setting the units up and pairing them was, all the expertise of utilizing them was a pleasure. I might change sound settings for the units utilizing the app, connect with and disconnect from a number of units directly and use my speaker as a Google Assistant (though I did have to talk into the cellphone somewhat than the speaker itself, as that is the place the app actually is, the response simply being forged to the speaker).
For a artistic, having the ability to play audio manufacturing in progress off of a number of totally different or interconnected units could be useful, for instance, to check how your sound stability comes off in a single-speaker setup versus a directional-audio or encompass setup.
Worth
DTS Play-Fi is a free app, however to make use of it you have to purchase suitable audio merchandise, and like acknowledged above, lots of these are extraordinarily premium and may simply set you again hundreds of {dollars}/kilos a chunk. The models I had for this take a look at had been the Philips Audio Fidelio FS 1/10 (RRP £329.99) speaker and the Hisense AX5100G soundbar with subwoofer and rear audio system (RRP £329.99), and that mixture is near the entry-level threshold for utilizing DTS Play-Fi.
Ought to I get DTS Play-Fi?
There are two eventualities the place it makes specific sense so that you can go down the DTS Play-Fi route. 1. You have already got a high-end setup in your house or studio that occurs to be Play-Fi suitable, or 2. you desire a smart-compatible and interconnected audio setup however have increased high quality goals than a Google or Alexa speaker. That is the explanation Play-Fi is usually suitable with high-end equipment on this still-evolving guise, as that is the place the supposed goal demographic resides. Aside from persevering with teething points with a pairing course of that feels prefer it might nonetheless be simplified from its present incarnation, and the unique market phase it principally occupies, DTS Play-Fi is an effective future guess for a barely classier smart-home setup that is not reliant on a single model.
