Yamaha ISX-80 Restio MusicCast Speaker Review

A lifestyle product that doesn't compromise on sound quality

by Steve Withers
MSRP: £399.00

What is the Yamaha ISX-80?

The Yamaha ISX-80 Restio is a lifestyle wireless speaker that forms part of the company's MusicCast range of products. It has plenty of features and, along with MusicCast functionality, also includes Bluetooth, AirPlay, DLNA support and an FM tuner. There's a built-in alarm clock and an interior art picture frame design that comes in a choice of black, white or purple. The speaker itself uses a dual woofer and tweeter configuration and provides the option of a stand or wall mounting. It isn't cheap, costing £399 as at the time of writing (February 2016), so can the Restio offer a performance to match its design and price tag?

Design

The ISX-80 offers an unusual design to say the least, with an appearance that is more like a picture frame than a speaker. This is very much a lifestyle product, so Yamaha have paid close attention to the details of material and form. The Restio uses a compact, high-quality 302mm square form that can be placed on a shelf or wall-mounted and the front panel is manufactured from a single sheet of expanded steel mesh, which reduces waste and lowers the environmental impact. If you want to shelf mount the ISX-80 there are non-skid pads and a stand that screws into the bottom rear to support the speaker. Alternatively there is a hole for wall mounting and a screw hole for attaching a safety wire.
Yamaha Restio Mini ISX-80
Yamaha Restio Mini ISX-80

Aside from the picture frame design, the Restio also has some basic controls along the top and an alarm clock in the centre. This display can be dimmed using the provided remote control and can be set to wake you up with a beep or an audio source (network or radio). The clock works well enough but the layout of the digits in the display is a bit strange. There are connections inside recesses on either side and there are also removable covers and grooves down each side for tidy cable management. The ISX-80 has dual 8cm woofers and dual 3cm soft dome tweeters, with 30W of built-in amplification. The speaker itself comes in a choice of white, black or purple, measures 302 x 302 x 65mm (WxHxD) and weighs 3.3kg.
The Restio's unusual design is certainly eye-catching but might be slightly too big.

Connections & Control

The ISX-80 has connections on both sides that are built into recesses and have removable covers. On the right hand side as you face the speaker there's a 3.5mm audio input and a connector for the AC power adapter. There's also a switch to turn the clock on and off. If you turn it off then the clock only illuminates when the speaker is on and not when it is in standby. On the left hand side, as you face the Restio, there is a connector for the FM aerial.
Yamaha Restio Mini ISX-80
Yamaha Restio Mini ISX-80

Along the top panel of the ISX-80 there are a number of small indicator lights and controls buttons. Moving from left to right, there is a WiFi indicator light and a Bluetooth indicator light, followed by a power/connect button, a source select button, volume up and down controls, a button for select radio presets and one for choosing the alarm.
Yamaha Restio Mini ISX-80
Yamaha Restio Mini ISX-80

The Restio comes with a small remote, which has some controls that can also be done via the MusicCast app and others that are unique to the ISX-80 and thus are only on the remote control itself. The shared controls are the on/off, source select, play/pause, skip forwards and backwards, volume and mute. There are six presets on the remote control but you can have up to thirty using the MusicCast app. Finally there are buttons for alarm, snooze/sleep, clock setup and dimmer that are unique to the remote control.

Features & Specs

Naturally the biggest feature of the ISX-80 is the inclusion of MusicCast, which is Yamaha's new multiroom system that uses a wireless network to connect all your compatible devices; allowing you to listen to your favourite music in any room where there's a MusicCast product and control it all from a single app. As a result the Restio includes built-in WiFi (2.4GHz, 802.11 b/g/n) and DLNA version 1.5, so you can connect to your network server, as well as use Bluetooth or AirPlay to listen to streaming services such as Spotify or internet radio.
Yamaha Restio Mini ISX-80
Yamaha Restio Mini ISX-80

The ISX-80 is equipped with Bluetooth (Ver. 2.1 + EDR/A2DP, AVRCP), making wireless operation even more convenient and allowing you to stream music to Bluetooth headphones for private listening or from another Bluetooth speaker. The Restio also includes a remote control, an alarm clock and a built-in FM tuner. The ISX-80 uses a forward firing stereo array with dual 8cm woofers, dual 3cm tweeters and 30W of built-in amplification. It supports WAV (PCM format only), MP3, WMA, AAC, ALAC, AIFF and FLAC files, with sampling rates up to 192kHz for WAV, FLAC and AIFF, 96kHz for ALAC files and 48kHz for everything else.
The ISX-80 has plenty of features but is easy to setup, simple to operate and flexible.

Setup & Operation

Setting up the ISX-80 was as easy as all the other MusicCast products we have tested to date. All you need to do is download the MusicCast app, which is freely available for both iOS and Android, and then start the app and select Setup. You then turn the Restio itself on and hold the power/connect button for three seconds, at which point the Network and Bluetooth lights will flash. The device will then connect to your network and you simply follow the instructions in the MusicCast app. If you already have a MusicCast network setup and are simply adding another device, then all you need to do is go into Settings and select Add New Device. Once you have setup or added your device, you can name it according to which room the MusicCast device is in and even add images of the room.
Yamaha Restio Mini ISX-80
Yamaha Restio Mini ISX-80

If you would rather connect via Bluetooth, then all you need to do is turn the unit on, turn on Bluetooth on your connecting device and pair it to the speaker. If you want to use AirPlay then all you need to do is select the ISX-80 from the list of options on your AirPlay compatible device. You can also use DLNA to stream music from your network server or via services like Spotify, as well as listen to internet radio. Finally if you need to update the firmware on your Restio, then you can also do this via the internet and the MusicCast app, making it easy to keep your speaker up to date. We ran all of our tests using an iPhone 6 and the iOS version of the MusicCast app and experienced no issues. However our audio reviewer Ed Selley was also testing some MusicCast products and experienced certain issues with the Android version of the app that he has reported back to Yamaha.

What is MusicCast?

MusicCast is a multiroom audio system that has been developed by Yamaha to be reliable, stable and effective. It is also included across almost their entire range of products, allowing you to build a multiroom system without having to buy all new units or lock yourself into a single ecosystem. MusicCast is available on Yamaha’s new receivers like the RX-A3050, amplifiers, as well as their soundbars, mini systems, wireless music speakers like ISX-80 and HiFi active speakers.

All MusicCast products include the MusicCast chipset and support for both WiFi and Bluetooth; and they can create a network directly with your wireless router or each other. The system is also designed to be easy to setup, all you need to do is download the MusicCast app to your smart device. Then you connect the MusicCast product to your network and press connect to pair it with your smart device. It’s that simple and once you’ve started, you can also easily add more MusicCast products to your system.
Yamaha Restio Mini ISX-80
Yamaha Restio Mini ISX-80

What does this mean in practice? Well you can start building a MusicCast network almost by default if you have a number of Yamaha products that already support the system. We were reviewing the ISX-80 along with the RX-A3050 AV receiver, the YSP-5600 soundbar and the WX-030 wireless speaker. The combination of all four of these devices allowed us to immediately create a MusicCast network with each product in a different room. We could then listen to audio from any of the connected devices, so for example if we were listening to a CD through the A3050, we could continue listening on the Restio from another room.

The MusicCast system is compatible with codecs up to 192kHz and even DSD up to 5.6MHz, so you don't have to compromise on audio quality either. You can even add other Bluetooth products to your MusicCast system, all you need to do is connect your existing Bluetooth product to the ISX-80 via Bluetooth for example and you can send music from the non-MusicCast product to any connected MusicCast product in your network. We found that in testing MusicCast was easy to setup and control and the network was stable and robust with no apparent latency. You can find out more about MusicCast in our dedicated review.

Yamaha ISX-80 Restio Video Review

Performance

Despite the ISX-80's unusual appearance, Yamaha haven't let the lifestyle design of the speaker compromise its audio performance. The combination of forward-firing dual woofers and tweeters, plus the physical size of the speaker resulted in a greater sense of stereo separation and a bigger overall sound compared to the smaller WX-030. The Restio produced a sound that could fill a reasonably sized room without distorting and there was a decent amount of bass produced by the speaker. The bass could be a little slow but it certainly had impact and there is a graphic equaliser built into the MusicCast app that allowed for some fine tuning.

The mid-range was well represented, as were the higher frequencies and overall the Yamaha produced a warm sound with good clarity and detail. It isn't going to be as good as a pair of dedicated stereo speakers but that rather misses the point of a product like this. It certainly performed well regardless of whether we used Bluetooth, AirPlay or MusicCast and the ISX-80 supported an impressive list of file types. It was sympathetic to compressed music and was able to take advantage of higher resolution recordings, making it quite a versatile performer.

We used the same music that we tested the WX-030 with in order to make some comparisons and with David Bowie's Black Star the larger Restio was more open and detailed. The same was true of the epic soundscapes on Suede's Night Thoughts and M83's Hurry Up, We're Dreaming. If we had one real complaint, it's that we're not entirely sure who the ISX-80 is aimed at because the obvious place to put it is next to the bed but it's really too large for that. So whilst it performs well in terms of sound quality, a smaller version might be more useful for most people.
Despite the speaker's lifestyle design, Yamaha haven't compromised on sound quality.

Conclusion

Pros

  • Big open sound
  • Great build quality
  • Plenty of features
  • Easy to setup and use
  • MusicCast is impressive

Cons

  • Possibly too big
  • Quite expensive

Yamaha ISX-80 Restio MusicCast Speaker Review

The Yamaha ISX-80 Restio wireless speaker combines a striking picture frame design with a host of features and a decent audio performance. It might well be a lifestyle product but that doesn't mean it can't sound good, with front-firing speakers, decent stereo separation and a nice level of clarity. The bass could be a little slow but it had impact, whilst the mid-range and high frequencies were well represented. The speaker delivered a warm sound with good clarity and detail but if you feel the need to fine tune the sound to your own tastes there's a graphic equaliser in the MusicCast app.

The ISX-80 performed well regardless of whether we used Bluetooth, AirPlay or MusicCast and the speaker supported an impressive list of file types. It was sympathetic to compressed music and was able to take advantage of higher resolution recordings, making it quite a versatile performer. The Restio also had plenty of other features including an FM tuner and an alarm clock, whilst the speaker itself can be stand or wall mounted. It is certainly worth a recommendation based upon its performance and features but we're not entirely sure who it's aimed at and a smaller version would make more sense beside the bed.

It's also quite expensive and at £399 it's up against quite a lot of competition, although its lifestyle design will doubtless appeal to many. The Samsung R5 360 wireless speaker costs about the same and has many of the same features but delivers a omni-directional performance that lends itself to how people listen to music these days. Alternatively you could go for Sony's SRS-X99 or B&W's Zeppelin, both deliver a great performance with high resolution audio; although they are a bit more expensive. Still if you're looking for a lifestyle product that also sounds good, the Yamaha ISX-80 Restio MusicCast wireless speaker is worth considering.

Scores

Build Quality

.
.
8

Connectivity

.
.
8

Sound Quality

.
.
8

Ease of Use

.
9

Features

.
9

Verdict

.
.
8
9
AVForumsSCORE
OUT OF
10

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