Kmart Anko Bluetooth Retro Speaker

Perfect for My Needs – I purchased this for $59 to leave on a table in a holiday rental. I needed something which was large enough not to be accidentally packed and taken home by a holiday maker. The holiday is in a high rise building and so I am conscious of having something which looks and sounds good, but won't be taken home by a holiday maker and won't be too loud… Read more

and annoy the neighbours. This speaker ticked all the boxes. I put a note on the side with instructions for people to connect. Look, it isn't Bose or anything like that, and it isn't loud, but the sound quality and volume are perfect for my holiday unit and I've had positive reviews about it from holiday makers.

Power is greatly overstated – A decent looking unit but that's about it's only good feature. It is woefully under-powered, advertised as 40watts RMS but I doubt it's more than 1 watt. I thought it might be good for background music in a small hall but it barely suffices as a music player next to me on my computer desk. The price had been reduced from $99 to $59 but that still… Read more

doesn't cut it. The main thing is that the manufacturer should not be able to get away with the blatant lie about the output of the device. I have been a musician for many years and am well-acquainted with the power ratings of amplification equipment.

Like many things Kmart - it's kind of good but with many short comings – OK I needed a louder audio system to hear the sound from a greater distance and or above noisy surroundings. So I picked this audio unit out. It has a good volume and a nice sound. BUT - and here are the inexcusable "poor design" issues. 1. It is of a sufficient size and weight, that it needs a strap type of a handle - because it is very awkward… Read more

to grip and hold and transport.

It doesn't have any kind of a handle. This is just too cheapskate.

2. It has a USB port - for connection to audio devices, via a USB cable. But the USB port, meaning the circuitry on the mother board, is such a cheap skate design that contrary to EVERY OTHER USB PORT - on every other device that has it's OWN power supply, it does funny things like cut out (overheating) when you hook a battery bank up to it, to charge up the device.

It only says this in the fine print in the the manual:

"Important: USB socket is only for music playing, not support charging"

I mean this is nit pickingly cheap down the cent.

3. And the Blue Tooth Connectivity - EVERY audio / speaker device I have ever had, I can connect my phone too - to play audio - from the media player AND I can connect my phone / zoom calls audio to as well.

All of them.

The Blue Tooth settings on my phone show "connect" plus "media" and "calls".

All of them.

This is the ONLY device that displays "connect" and "media" - only.

So this device FAILS to be portable, by lacking a handle, It fails to meet the USB connectivity standards - for a mains powered device by being unable to charge anything. It also fails with the cheap skated version of it's only half way there Blue Tooth.

No wonder the management were selling them at around cost price of $59 instead of their usual price of $99.

The management of Kmart have no brains. They value cost cutting and cheap skating as a higher business principle than value adding and being of good quality.

Of course their phone in customer service was just a merry go round of do nothing, get nothing done, don't do a redesign and do nothing but make excuses by constantly repeating, "and what seems to be the problem" - after it's been stated 4 or 5 times already.

Kmart - not worth the hassles.