Addon T3 Review from Australia - best speakers 2018

Pros

• Fantastic Sound – Once Cranked Up
• Big Sound / Small Speaker
• Exceptional Battery Life
• Replaceable Rechargeable Battery
• Minimalist Design

Cons

• Seriously underperforms at low volume
• Build Quality issues with my speaker
• White Version no longer has the brown leather handle

What we feel is a product with build quality belying its $230 AUD tag. The Addon T3 isn't the handbag-friendly bar, but that helps it feel like a more serious piece of kit.

It’s still portable though. Robust, rather than heavy, the handle is a canny touch and battery life is up to 30 hours at half volume or 12 at full blast. But does the sound justify the extra bulk?

There's an auxiliary input for your telly/iPod/record player, and a USB port to charge your phone.

Much like the Addon T5, the T3 comes in various colour finishes including green, white, black and orange, and all models include a useful leather handle on top. As there’s that built-in battery, the handle makes more sense than on the heavier, mains-powered T10, as you're more likely to be moving it around.

It's still not something you'll want to throw in a backpack to take on the road, though, as the T3 weighs a hefty 2kg. However, as a speaker you can move freely around the house or take down the end of the garden, it’s a comfortable weight. Measuring 215x135x115mm, it’s not overly large, either.

Its solid cabinet gives it a reassuring, premium feel which helps with its weighty, confident acoustic delivery. It’s very well finished with nicely rounded corners and edges, and there are two short feet on the front which angle the front of the speaker upwards, giving it some clearance to help disperse the sound.

On the top of the speaker, you'll find a row of control buttons finished in an attractive, metallic rose gold. It could do with fewer buttons in my opinion, though, as there's not only a dedicated button for pairing the speaker with your phone, but there are also separate buttons for switching to Bluetooth and the speaker's auxiliary connection.

The latter two could easily be combined into one button, for example, and the pairing button seems excessive when so many other Bluetooth speakers can enter pairing mode simply by holding down the Bluetooth button. What’s slightly aggrieving is that, even with all of these buttons, there aren’t any media playback controls, so you can’t pause or skip tracks on your Bluetooth-connected device.

Control niggles aside, it does have a handy USB port on the back of the speaker which you can use to charge your smartphone. However, it only outputs at 5V/1A, so it won't charge it particularly quickly, and you can't use it for playing tracks off a USB stick either, which is a shame. I suppose you could use it to neatly power a Chromecast Audio, letting you cast your tunes to the speaker without an additional power adaptor.

Inside, the T3 has a Digital Class D amplifier that delivers 2x5W to the two, 2.75in textile dome tweeters and 15W to the 3.5in woofer. A bass reflex port is found on the back of the cabinet, and the speaker has a frequency range of 60-20,000Hz.

The T3 delivers a sound that is confident and powerful for a speaker of this size and price. However, it’s not the most detail-driven speaker out there, as its low frequencies arguably become a little boomy on certain tracks. I noticed it on First Aid Kit’s ‘My Silver Lining’ where some of the violins became a bit lost, but otherwise there wasn’t a lot to complain about considering the speaker’s price.

Its audio quality has a rather warm sound to it, which some people might find preferable, but I prefer a slightly more transparent sound. Still, there’s certainly a lot to like about the T3’s sound signature, and the well-weighted cabinet keeps what could have otherwise been some rather unruly bass in check without any reverberation. There’s no hint of any distortion, either.

Battery life is rated at an excellent 30 hours on medium volume, or 12 hours with music blaring at full volume, so it should have more than enough longevity to get you through a party or barbeque. Mind you, the speaker isn’t water resistant in any way, so bring it indoors if your next garden party is a washout.

Overall, there’s a lot to like about the Addon T3. It has the same charming design heritage of the equally impressive T10, and the inclusion of a battery makes it more versatile than the T10. Likewise, its sound quality is more than respectable for the price, and its battery life is excellent. Altogether, it's a top-notch all-round Bluetooth speaker, and it wins a Recommended award.

As other audiophiles have suggested, I played the speakers for over 30 hours before a making judgement. I’m not sure this does anything at all… but now nobody can complain they haven’t been “broken in”.

With over 30 hours listening behind me, here’s what I think of the Audio Pro Addon T3 Bluetooth Speaker… from one layman to you.

Let’s start with my biggest T3 Audio Quality issue… volume. This speaker really underperforms at low volumes. It sounds closed in, voices lack depth, and you wouldn’t think it was anything more than a £50 speaker.

I almost thought that my Addon T3 was faulty at first… having read all the rave reviews. But then I stood corrected. When you crank up the volume to around 70%, the soundscape opens up massively. Voices become rich, brightness improves and you start thinking… ‘hell yeah… this speaker is good!’.

No problem here then, right? Well, yes actually.

The little white Addon T3 has a huge max volume! So 70% volume is more than enough to annoy anyone in my house and probably even my neighbours… maybe I’m just a consideratemaphile…

In fairness, the bass works well at any volume but can feel slightly overpowering at lower volumes making voices lose some clarity.

I played around with an equaliser on my phone, but this just felt like extra-effort and didn’t help much. Considering I’d already forked out $230 AUD for the speaker… i didn’t want this extra step.

If you like to listen to your music loud? Then you’ll love the Addon T3. It really is superb once it hits its volume threshold.

It offers excellent bass and superb clarity in the mids & highs.

However, if you’re after a bit of background music while working… then you might be severely disappointed…

The design of the Audio Pro Addon T3 in Australia stands out… in a minimalist… not standing out at all type of way.

I’ve been testing the Marshall Acton speaker at the same time as the Addon T3 and I’m feeling confused. The Stanmore is so much fun with the AMP design, solid twist buttons and even comes with a premium coiled 3.5mm cable.

The T3 on the other hand, comes with 3 power adapters (UK, EU, US), an instruction manual and a design so plain you could easily lose it. Pros & Cons… Pros & Cons…

Do I want to be an environmentally-friendly minimalist or a bells & whistles, the more the merrier capitalist… maybe I’m thinking about this too much…

Back to the review.

On the top of the speaker, there’s a metal plate which features the 6 buttons to operate the T3. Unfortunately, on the model I received 2 of these buttons are a little too recessed, ruining the otherwise streamlined top.

The handle on top is made of a sturdy leather, and is just about big enough to fit a few fingers under for carrying. If you suffer from the common ailment… sausage fingers… you may struggle.

Running your hands over the surface of the speaker isn’t what you’d expect. The surface is coated with a slightly course texture paint. The reason behind this? I’m not sure, but let’s hope it doesn’t become a dirt magnet… too late… it’s a dirt magnet.

I’m going to get my unit replaced which should fix the button issue. Then I’ll be back to update the build quality.

VIEW ON AMAZON

The battery life on the Audio Pro Addon T3 is incredible! 10/10! I’d go as far as saying it’s got the best battery life out of any Bluetooth speaker I’ve ever had my hands on!

You can literally get 30 hours out of the T3 with high-volume. I’ve only cranked the volume up to 100% once for testing and even then Audio Pro quotes 12 Hours playtime.

Well Done Audio Pro!

Connectivity with the Addon T3 is simple. It uses Bluetooth 4.0 for connecting to your smartphone or BT enabled device. There’s also as Aux on the back for a wired connection. (Cable not included).

The Bluetooth connection works perfectly, connects with the last device speedily and only showed the odd bit distortion when moving too far from the speaker.

The other extra connection you get on the T3 is a USB slot. This is for powering your devices when listening to music on the go. 5V / 1000mA output.