Marshall’s Middleton Portable Bluetooth Speaker carries the same gold-lettered logo and textured vinyl wrap Marshall uses on its guitar amp cabinets. That alone is probably why many people are buying one. The True Stereophonic sound comes from a four-driver array with two tweeters and two woofers shooting outward in various directions. This lets the music spread throughout the room rather than being directed only toward someone in direct line of sight of the speaker. The battery lasts about 20 hours per charge. The IP67-rated design will keep dust and full submersion out, and it also serves as a power bank for your phone.
Check out Amazon to get the Marshall Middleton Portable Bluetooth Speaker for just $150, down from its usual price of $320. That’s a $170 discount and 53% off.
A waterproof portable speaker with four drivers
True Stereophonic refers to Marshall’s multi-directional approach and helps alleviate the biggest problem with most portable speakers. Most portable speakers create a single sweet spot, and everyone else experiences less of the same sound quality. In contrast, the Middleton’s two-tweeter, two-woofer configuration provides even coverage by firing both forward and rearward. Your position relative to the speaker becomes irrelevant during use, which matters at a party where nobody is standing still.
By splitting the load of reproducing a full range of frequencies, neither driver has to do everything at once. On top of that, two passive radiators enhance low-frequency reproduction. This explains how a speaker this size can produce enough bass that doesn’t get overpowered as volume levels increase.
The IP67-rated design protects against complete immersion in water as well as dust. You can take it to the pool deck, the beach, or a campsite without having to worry about whether it’s safe to bring. Rinsing sand off under a faucet after a day at the beach also won’t cause harm.
A battery life of twenty hours is enough to cover an entire weekend away without needing to charge it again partway through. Most portable speakers in this class ask for a charger by the end of the first day. A 20-minute quick charge restores a large portion of the battery life when you leave. The USB-C charging port also charges your phone using the speaker’s battery.
Along with Bluetooth connectivity, the speaker has a brass knob on top with physical controls to adjust volume, bass, and treble without using an app on your mobile device. Beyond those controls, the Marshall Bluetooth app offers more features, such as custom EQ settings and Stack Mode, which lets you connect two or more Marshall speakers if you can’t get enough coverage from just one. Reaching over and turning a knob also beats pulling out a phone and unlocking it every time somebody wants the volume down a notch.