Yamaha WX-030 MusicCast Speaker Review

The easiest way to start a MusicCast multiroom system

by Steve Withers
MSRP: £179.00

What is the Yamaha WX-030?

The Yamaha WX-030 is a compact wireless speaker that forms part of the company's MusicCast range of products. The WX-030 packs plenty of features within its diminutive cabinet, including Bluetooth, AirPlay and, of course MusicCast. In fact the speaker is designed as a gateway product, offering consumers a quick, easy and relatively cheap way of starting a MusicCast multiroom system. The Yamaha is intended to be flexible in terms of placement and can even be wall mounted or used as a stereo pair, making it quite an adaptable product. As with any wireless speaker, the performance won't just depend on sound quality but also how easy it is to setup and use. However an asking price of £179 as at the time of writing (February 2016) is certainly a good start, so lets see if the Yamaha WX-030 can deliver in the other important categories.

Design

Whilst the WX-030 probably won't be winning any awards for its looks, we rather like its clean and minimalist design. It's solidly built and effectively laid out, with a well engineered feel. The unit is stable when placed on a flat surface and it's size makes it ideal for offices, kitchens or bedrooms. Although if the shape seems reminiscent of a surround speaker that's because you can also wall mount if you so wish. There are connections in a recess at the bottom, which can be hidden using a provided cable cover, and some basic controls on the top; along with little adhesive cushions to prevent vibrations if you wall mount. There are small indicator lights for Bluetooth/Power/Network at the top centre, there is a metal grille around the front and sides and a choice of a black or a white finish. At the rear of the speaker is a hanger hole and key hole slots (with removable covers) for wall mounting, which can be done horizontally or vertically. In terms of its dimensions, the WX-030 measures 243 x 157 x 113mm ((WxHxD) and weighs in at 2.2kg.
The WX-030 is well made, compact, flexible and easy to set up.

Connections & Control

In terms of physical connections, the WX-030 keeps it to a minimum with only an Ethernet port for a wired set up and a two-pin connector for the power cord. These are both with a recess on the bottom, which keeps things tidy whether you plan on desk or wall mounting the speaker. All the other connections are wireless with built-in WiFi, AirPlay and Bluetooth (Ver. 2.1 + EDR/A2DP, AVRCP).
Yamaha WX-030
Yamaha WX-030

On the top there are some basic touch sensitive controls, with a connect button that powers the speaker on and off (there's also an auto standby feature), volume down, volume up and a play/pause button. These controls are handy if you happen to be standing next to the speaker but obviously a wireless speaker like the WX-030 is designed to be controlled by the MusicCast remote app.

Features & Specs

The biggest feature of the WX-030 is the inclusion of MusicCast, which we'll cover in more detail later in this review. MusicCast 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. The same app also functions as a remote control for all your other MusicCast-compatible devices. Along with MusicCast, you can also use DLNA to connect to your network server, as well as using Bluetooth or AirPlay to listen to streaming services such as Spotify. The WX-030 is equipped with Bluetooth (Ver. 2.1 + EDR/A2DP, AVRCP), making wireless operation even more convenient and allowing you to stream music from the WX-030 to Bluetooth headphones for private listening or to another Bluetooth speaker.
Yamaha WX-030
Yamaha WX-030

Inside the WX-030 you'll find a two-way speaker design (9cm woofer and 3cm tweeter), with 30W of built-in amplification, and a large passive radiator that is designed to deliver deeper bass from such a compact unit. The speaker also includes Yamaha's proprietary DSP technology, along with an onboard Music Enhancer feature that is designed to smooth out the stretched-out highs and muddled mids associated with over-compressed files. 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. Although you can happily use the WX-030 on its own, you also have the option to pair two of the speakers via the MusicCast app to function as left and right channel speakers, providing stereo sound for a wider listening area.
The WX-030 supports Bluetooth, AirPlay and Yamaha's MusicCast multiroom system.

Setup & Operation

We were pleased to discover that setting up the WX-030 was very easy, in fact probably amongst the simplest setups we have experienced with a multiroom wireless speaker. 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 unit 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 WX-030
Yamaha WX-030

If you would rather connect via Bluetooth, then turn on Bluetooth on your connecting device and pair it to the speaker. If you want to use AirPlay select the WX-030 from the list of options on your AirPlay compatible device. You can also use DLNA to stream music from your network as well as listen to internet radio. Finally you can update the firmware on your WX-030, via the internet and the MusicCast app 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 Ed Selley is also testing MusicCast products and has experienced issues with the Android app that he has reported back to Yamaha.

What is MusicCast?

Well MusicCast is a multiroom audio system that has been developed in-house by Yamaha. The manufacturer has designed MusicCast to be reliable, stable and effective but what really makes it different to the competition is that it's 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 WX-030 and HiFi active speakers.

All MusicCast products include the MusicCast chipset and support for both WiFi and Bluetooth. There are access point networking functions inside the products, allowing them to create a network with your wireless router or directly with each other; allowing MusicCast to create a network, no matter what. 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 WX-030
Yamaha WX-030

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 WX-030 along with the RX-A3050 AV receiver, the YSP-5600 soundbar and the ISX-80 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 and we wanted to listen in the office using the WX-030 we could.

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 WX-030 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 WX-030 Video Review

Performance

The WX-030 offers a great set of features but all that is meaningless if it doesn't actually sound very good. Thankfully Yamaha have delivered the goods in this department, producing a compact wireless speaker that manages to sound bigger than its actual cabinet. When it comes to these small speakers with a single woofer and tweeter, you're never going to get a sense of stereo separation but the WX-030 manages to still sound open, allowing it to fill a reasonable sized room. This makes it ideal for use in kitchens, offices or bedrooms; whilst its compact size makes it quite flexible in terms of placement. However we did find that the performance of the speaker could vary depending on how high you positioned it and, if listening from above, it lost some of its openness; so we would recommend keeping it at ear-level or higher for optimal performance. It also has a surprising amount of bass for a speaker this small so it can lend itself to a number of different musical styles

We listened to a range of music on the WX-030 and found that the speaker was capable of delivering a pleasing sound that retained a decent amount of detail whilst also sounding clear and neutral. There is a graphic equaliser built into the MusicCast app for those who want to adjust the sound of the speaker to suit their tastes, but we found that for our listening purposes the speaker performed admirably. It is an effective way of starting a multiroom system and for listening to music whilst performing other tasks, making the WX-030 ideal for the way we consume music in the modern age. We listened to music from our iPhone, from other devices connected to the MusicCast system, from our network server and from music streaming services.

We found that overall the WX-030 handled all the different sources well and was very tolerant of more compressed music, whilst still able to make the most of higher quality sources. We listened to David Bowie's final album Black Star and thought that the Yamaha handled the complex jazz arrangements very well. The speaker also managed to convey some of the scale of the songs on Suede's new album Night Thoughts, still sounding quite open despite the lack of stereo separation. Clearly some of Yamaha's DSP wizardry was paying dividends in this regard. Finally we thoroughly enjoyed listening to M83's Hurry Up, We're Dreaming, with the WX-080 again managing to handle that album's soundscapes well.
The WX-030 produced a surprisingly big sound for a small speaker with plenty of detail.

Conclusion

Pros

  • Good audio performance
  • Great build quality
  • Plenty of features
  • MusicCast is impressive
  • Easy to setup and flexible

Cons

  • No real stereo separation

Yamaha WX-030 MusicCast Speaker Review

The WX-030 wireless speaker is an important product for Yamaha because, as we mentioned at the beginning of this review, it is a gateway into the world of MusicCast. So it's important that the speaker is easy to set up, flexible to install and supports the right sort of features. In that sense it is an unqualified success, with the WX-030 proving very easy to set up and control, whilst its compact size made it simple to position where we liked around the house. There is built-in Bluetooth and AirPlay support, along with DLNA so that you can stream music from your network server. However it's MusicCast that stands out, offering a robust and stable multiroom system that allows you to listen to music from any connected device, as well as streaming services and internet radio. The remote app is well designed and effective, allowing you to set up and control not only the WX-030 but any other connected MusicCast device. We tested the system using the iOS version of the MusicCast app and had no issues or experienced any problems with latency.

Of course, whilst all these factors are important, they would all be rendered moot if the speaker didn't actually sound very good. Thankfully that wasn't an issue and the WX-030 delivered a great performance for a speaker of its size. The sound was both open and detailed and although there was no real sense of stereo separation, the Yamaha managed to sound bigger than its actual dimensions. There is a graphic equaliser in the MusicCast app that allows for some fine tuning of the sound but overall the WX-030 delivered a lovely performance that was eminently listenable. We tested the speaker with a number of different sources and in various locations and the results were impressive, either on its own or as part of the MusicCast multiroom system. The price is also quite competitive, which is useful in such a crowded market place. We have recently reviewed similarly priced speakers, including Samsung's slightly cheaper R1 360 speaker and Sony's slightly more expensive SRS-X77 speaker but for overall features and performance the Yamaha WX-030 just edges past the competition.

Scores

Build Quality

.
.
8

Connectivity

.
.
8

Sound Quality

.
.
8

Ease of Use

.
9

Features

.
9

Verdict

.
.
8
8
AVForumsSCORE
OUT OF
10

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