DOSS SoundBox XL Bluetooth Speaker with Subwoofer, Booming Bass, Dual DSP Technologies, 10H Playtime, TWS, 2.1 Audio Channel for Home, Indoor, Office and Entertainment - Upgraded

The DOSS Soundbox XL seem to be plagued either by bad design issues or a high rate of poor manufacturing quality. I recently got one, and took off the cover to remove that speaker grill liner some reviewers said causes a rattle and saw the left tweeter cone was mashed in. I returned it to Amazon only to get a second one with an annoying bass vibration, one recent Amazon reviewer described as a "farting sound" with music with a strong bass line. It actually happens at 54 hz when you use a tone generator and comes from air blowing out the jack/slot holes in the back. I really liked the sound, but I feel this needs to be shared. DOSS needs to get it together before I would even consider a THIRD. UPDATE: Aug 29, 2017 Within a short time, I got a reply in this thread requesting my email in order to receive a replacement free of charge from Milla with DOSS. Without that, I would have probably not ordered a third.The replacement arrived a few days ago and I am submitting the following update. Milla was quite wonderful sending me updates as to the status of the arrival of the new unit. The first thing I did was remove the grill to check if the dust liner was loose like the first two only to find that it was attached directly to the inside grill. The drivers looked perfect. After charging a few hours, I was ready for my test to confirm if the air leak problem was fixed. I put on a few bass heavy songs and listened for that telltale air leak. As i turned the bass up to the point of distortion, the cabinet seal held. I got no rattles The top trim plate seemed to be secured tighter as pushing down on it detected no movement indicating bad adhesion. This one as far as build quality was perfect. Rather than evaluate the sound in depth right out of the box, my experience as an audiofile knows that it takes a few hours of playing different kinds of music at various levels to allow the speakers to break in and not sound dry and stiff, but more rounded like live music. After two days of playing off and on, the sound difference as they broke in was quite noticeable in the sense of warmth also with an increase in sonic accuracy. I highly suggest one of the better apps for music playback rather than the generic one that comes with your device if you really want to experience their true capability. As an audiofile, listening to various players using my headset was the test.. After trying/buying several, Jet Audio Plus was my choice. I custom built my home PC with a high end audio card including custom opamps, mil-spec capacitor, low noise motherboard, a case that isolates the power supply, routing the wiring, etc. Windows system tweaks, and special software that as a result compares spec for spec and in sound quality with the more expensive audiofile preamps sold separately. So using this app, I have been listening for hours with everything from smooth jazz, rap, rock, and other types also with various dynamic ranges. I will give my impressions based on other bluetooth speakers i have auditioned. Frequency Response: To my ear, this speaker is flatter and more neutral and natural sounding than most. The bass extension is uncanny for a box this size and not only goes lower, but maintains a sense of focus and tightness to actually be able to hear the low notes, not the boomy blur that seems to radiate out of most of the others at this price range. I actually put a little dip in the bass at 60hz because i felt the bass a little overemphasized for my room proportions. The mids were just fine. The treble has a slight roll off due to the dust cover I presume, but it is easily correctable with your player's equalizer with just some minor tweaks above 10k. Soundstage: The Soundbox XL creates a soundstage that occurs just in front of the speaker and has a 3D quality of air, that is missing from most of the others. It is so good that on certain songs you can hear each instrument or voice distinctly in their own "space". Also when placed 12 inches from a solid wall, the soundstage blooms to a room filling wall of sound as the back wall reflections contribute to the sense of space and presence. This also increases the bass to a point you can FEEL. This same effect happens placing it in a corner, but i found that 33" from the center of the back of the speaker to the corner works without overloading the sound with bass. Dynamic Range: After the speaker broke in, i noticed the sound become more alive in sense that as each instrument or vocal in the music became louder of softer, the overall balance of soundstage pretty much stayed flat instead of the dropouts or peakiness you hear with speakers that have a narrow range of accurate frequency reproduction based on the frequency amplitude "sweet spot" of each driver. It results in a lack of listener fatigue for extended music listening and as a result is more akin to my home rig sound. Overall Loudness: For most listening, esp indoors, I find the volume range more than adequate. This range can be extended using the preamp setting in the equalizer such as the Jet Audio to levels that go beyond the max that is available on the generic device that is set to protect the internal speaker and earbuds. A step or two up is what i found works best. without significantly increasing the possibility of damage. This speaker ROCKS! If I have to find a fault, it is having readjust the speaker volume each time it is turned on. The speaker sounds better with its volume set at max and controlled by your device. If you do this make sure the volume on your device is turned down a lower range before you adjust the Soundbox XL volume to max. In summary, based on their top notch customer service, better build quality and the other attributes I highlight in this review, the DOSS Soundbox XL, especially at the price point, is 5-Star product. There just is nothing better, IMHO. I can't wait for the pairing option to come and and review a stereo pair! Thanks, Milla. Well done, DOSS!

Sound quality is great! Battery life is as stated by the manufacturer. I was very impressed by the look of this soundbox, you could easily set this on your fireplace mentle. Ive had this device around 60ft from my phone and had no issue with function, not sure about any further away than that. Connectivity is fine through barriers like walls. Well worth the money.

UPDATE 11/1/20: I forget exactly when we bought this, but it's been at least 2-3 years. It's holding up well. For the amount of volume it can produce, the battery life is decent, charging is very fast. I *love* that it doesn't have fancy whizbang colored lights on the front, just tiny little LED indicator lights on top. Pairs super fast on Windows 10 compared to Windows 7. Sound quality is bass-heavy, so if that's your thing, then it's good, but of course any sort of EQ or pass filter could remedy that if you want to. I haven't found the need to reduce the bass while watching action movies. In my review Title, I mention "wish 3.5mm aux cord disabled Bluetooth". *If* you plug in the 3.5mm cable before powering the DOSS on, the DOSS will enter bluetooth pairing mode by default, but the moment you plug the other end of the 3.5mm cable into your PC or device, it switches to AUX mode. Or you can simply press the "M" button once and when you see the indicator light switch from blue (bluetooth mode) to red (AUX), then you're good to go. BUT, if you power on the DOSS, then plug in the cable to the DOSS, then to the PC, it doesn't automatically switch to AUX mode, you'll need to press the M button once. What could be better I think is not the fault of the DOSS, but rather the current Bluetooth standard. Let's say I watch a movie on the PC, paired over BT. Later I want to listen to music on my phone, also over BT. But since the last paired device with the DOSS was the Windows PC, it keeps looking for that device. It won't finally give up and try to pair with the next device in the list, which would be the phone. I notice this is a universal shortcoming of Bluetooth and it drives me nuts. Why wasn't it Apple that designed the BT standard instead of whomever it was? Because if Apple had designed it (I'm not a huge Apple fan, except for their phones), then pairing with Bluetooth would be a thought-free process...it would just WORK and you wouldn't have to futz around with getting it to connect. Original review: This really does have great sound. Lots of reviews of that here that I won't bore you by repeating. The battery life is mediocre, we can get through about 3 hours of tv/movie watching before it needs recharging. I wish it accepted a standard micro-USB plug instead of what it has. My biggest complaint is how to handles source audio input. Bluetooth is a nightmare to deal with...well it pairs with my iphone just fine, but trying to pair with a Windows PC is not intuitive. It's really more of a Windows issue, though. So my workaround is to simply use a 3.5mm aux cable to plug the PC to the DOSS input jack. It works great when I first plug it in. But if I turn DOSS off and later turn it back on and the 3.5mm cord is still plugged in, it does not recognize the cord. DOSS is still flashing a blue light, signaling it is waiting for a Bluetooth connection. I think it should rather recognize that the cord is already plugged in and switch the source input from Bluetooth to aux-in. The fix is to simply unplug the aux cord from the DOSS and then plug it back in. It's a minor inconvenience, but one that -ahem- Apple would not have allowed if they had designed this thing. I'm not an Apple fan-freak, but I do appreciate some of the user interface details they obviously spend a lot of time working out for a smooth experience. It's a screaming deal for the price, even with that minor design flaw.

Great Speaker! I hooked it up to my Echo Dot in our family room. Fantastic sound and volume. Best low bass I've heard in this size and price speaker. I didn't hear any rattling at high volumes like some reported. Bluetooth range is good. I've taken outside to patio without any breakup. The range I tested was only about 20 feet with a wall and sliding glass doors between source and speaker. I play Amazon Music Unlimited via Echo Dot - sounds great! Cons: When I connect with Bluetooth, the speaker disconnects after a period of time of no use. I ask Alexa a question and get no answer and find that I need to turn the speaker back on because it turned itself off. The workaround is to connect to Echo Dot via provided cable. The downside is you need to keep the speaker close to the Dot. But at least it doesn't turn itself off - usually. Sometimes I find it is off and I have to turn back on, but not as often as when using Bluetooth. I keep it plugged in all the time except when moving it to the patio. Another con is there is no equalizer function to adjust bass or treble. Not a big deal as the sound and balance is great. Volume is plenty loud for our large family room. With the volume all the way up, it is too loud. If using for an outdoor party with lots of people and area, it may not sound as loud as some larger speakers. If you want a fuller soundstage, place in the corner of the room. It will improve the fullness of the sound. However, we have the speaker in the center of one wall and it sounds fine. I contemplated the Harman Kardon Onyx Studio 2 larger speaker because my friend has one and it sounds fantastic. I chose this Doss Soundbox XL because of the size, reviews, and price. I am happy with my decision. If you listen to a lot of music every day, you may want to consider the Harman Kardon. You will not find a speaker in this range with the clean bass that picks up bass under 40 Hz. You will hear clean bass down to about 25Hz. The sound is crisp, clean, and deep where you feel it vibrate in you. Most smaller speakers are boomy sounding and make people think they have loud bass. I was like that with my Home Theater setup... I had a 16" subwoofer that shook the house. I thought I had good bass. Then I purchased a 14" much more expensive SVS subwoofer and realized what other audiophiles were talking about when they said "clean bass." Very crisp, no distortion, short punch without the hollow boom. Makes the music sound so much better. You can read the specs in the description - so I won't repeat here. Suffice it to say, for the size and price, you can't go wrong with the Doss SoundBox XL. You will not be disappointed in this speaker. It sounds much better than others that cost twice as much.

I have tested out and heard quite a few Bluetooth Speakers and this is one of the better ones and probably the best for the money, although it's hard to say for certain as there is so much out there that isn't mainstream or on Amazon that is high quality but as far as what is on Amazon you really can't go wrong with this, I have some high end in ear monitors for when I want the absolute best sound quality but for the rest of the time a Bluetooth speaker is fine, that's not to say this doesn't put out high quality sound, it's just not as high up on the scale, I also have some high powered bookshelf speakers for when I really want to crank up the music, but this speaker fits perfectly in it's Bluetooth nitch, I'm surprised that they went with such a small battery though, it's the same size battery as my old flip phone that I still use as an alarm clock and it's not big at all. I don't really use it very much on battery so it's not a concern for me but if I were needing to use it a lot on battery I would be looking to replace the battery with something a lot bigger and I am sure there is more than enough room inside. The only other suggestions I have for the next updated model would be a physical switch to completely disconnect the battery for better standby life and some kind of switch to turn off the annoying led that lights up the ceiling at night, some of the high end routers let you turn off the led lights and that is very smart, most people don't need a constant led light on all of the time, they don't even really need a switch, just put it on a timer and if someone wants to see it they just press the power button briefly or the mode button when switching modes otherwise it's completely pointless light pollution. Also on the next model if they can add another subwoofer and have another set of passive radiators on the back that would go a long ways towards boosting the bass, if you turn the speaker around and face it towards a wall the bass sounds much more prominent, most subwoofers are ported out of the back or towards the ground, the passive radiators serve the same function as a port but the slower bass frequencies (in terms of volume as bass moves at the speed of sound but the lack of volume means you can only hear it so far away) combined with the minimal air being moved means that it is only pushed so far into the room and sounds somewhat flat from a distance, obviously much more powerful subwoofers overcome this by pushing hundreds of cubic inches of air every second, but this little 12 watt sub can't do that so it needs to take better advantage of the acoustic properties of the room it's in when inside, outside there's not much you can do.

After reading/viewing many Amazon and YT reviews I decided to take the plunge and ordered my first Soundbox XL. I say my first for a real and specific reason I will cover futher into this review. After receiving, unpacking, charging and seamlessly pairing my first Soundbox XL I excitedly brought up some music on my Android device.....And I was met with the quality sound I expected after my pre purchase research. While not audiophile quality, the Doss Soundbox XL does deliver high quality sound. The bass was deep, the mids were musical and the highs were pleasant and spacious. The Soundbox XL really does take advantage of it's larger size to create a more spacious than average soundstage and open presence. Overall I found it to be everything it was advertised to be. As far as sound quality it was everything I hoped for and definitely punches above its reasonable price point. Now for the one and only "negative" of the Soundbox XL. It's not very loud. It is only slightly louder than my much smaller Anker Soundcore 2 speaker. If you are expecting truly room filling output prepare to be disappointed. While the output is quite a bit louder than conversation level don't expect it to be party level. In that respect I was a little disappointed. That is until I took a realistic and honest look at the speaker and its sound quality. There is absolutely no way that Doss could have pushed the output level any higher while maintaining 40 hz. and lower bass response. Sure the XL has a dedicated sub, but it's not a 12" sub. Sure the XL has dedicated power for the sub, but it's not 500 watts. There is only so much that you can do with this small form factor. And after taking that into consideration I raised my initial opinion from disappointment to grudging understanding and acceptance. But, I still wanted more output. And that's where the second best feature of the Soundbox XL comes into play. The newest version of the XL features TWS (true wireless stereo) connectivity. This feature allows you to easily daisy chain two Soundbox XL's in true stereo for more output, more bass and even bigger soundstage. So I quickly ordered a second XL and I am glad to report that the TWS feature works perfectly. It really does elevate this speaker system to a whole new level. Now I have the room filling output I was after. And it sounds damn good. The big bass is reinforced and even more impressive. The soundstage is as big as you want it to be. And the sound quality doesn't have to suffer at all. The two speaker units are perfectly synced with no latency at all. I couldn't ask for this feature to work any better. Not only do I get higher output levels but I now have the option for multiple room sound. I am loving this speaker system now. So.....If you are looking for extended bass performance the Soundbox XL definitely delivers. If you are looking for quality sound that is balanced and pleasant it's also in the Soundbox XL. And last but not least, if you want the ability to expand with a second Soundbox XL the TWS feature is a game winner. Whether you want higher output, fuller sound or multi-room capability adding a second Soundbox XL via TWS is simple, satisfying and rewarding.

I don't have any experience with owning bluetooth speakers, but I have demoed the stuff at best buy. I've owned a lot of hifi though: Magnepan, Stax, Hifiman, and lots more, more than I can remember. I became aware of this speaker by stumbling upon oluv's review while looking for a portable speaker. That dude seems to have heard hundreds of portable speakers, and he measures frequency response and makes binaural recordings. Thanks oluv. The speaker sounds great with a neutral frequency response. The bass is the most impressive part: plays deep, low distortion, and tuned relatively flat. I didn't think that I could get a portable this nice sounding for not much $$ when I first started looking. I just received the speaker today, so I'll probably update this post with more comments, pics, and maybe some measurements. I do have a question for all you other owners. When the speaker is on with nothing playing though, do you hear a hiss/static sound coming through the speakers? Its very low, but discernable within a few feet of the speaker. The sound remains when you play music too but it's not audible over the music. I figure it's normal and am not too concerned, but if it's just me... I get the same static sound in my car's aftermarket stereo with it's aftermarket DSP, amps, subs, and speakers. You can hear it when the engine is OFF and no music playing, but the battery and stereo is ON. At first that noise bothered but eventually accepted that practically it's a non-issue because you can't hear it when the music is playing, then add engine and road noise. I originally bought the speaker for my wife, but I might end up getting two. EDIT: The speaker sounds awesome but the static/hum produced by the speaker is maybe too annoying. It's acceptable for music because its mostly inaudible over the music. But for listening to podcasts while sitting near the speaker the static may be too loud. I'm trying to decide if I should order another to see if I got a bad unit or just returning. Can anybody comment if they have the same issue? Edit: 1star removed. The static is enough to make me not recommend this speaker for low level listening (nearfield). Also the frequency response is a little too much on the warm side. I use EQ to balance, but thats my preference. Edit: 1more star removed. The bluetooth connection to iPhone has been a bit finicky since first use, but generally connected with just a couple tries. Lately however its been getting worse, and just today I couldn't get it to connect at all. So, I tried some other devices and I could get my iPhone to pair with those without issue. I then tried the Doss with my iPad and that took three tries before it would connect. And now, I can't get the MODE button on the DOSS to switch over to another function so that I may use it with my iPhone via aux cable. I am now going to be more insistent on a refund/exchange.

I was very surprised at how much Bass response this speaker provides. It seems very well made.You can tell by the weight.It is quality. Charges fast and The Charge lasts for a while.