San Diego – Grace Digital, known for its tabletop Wi-Fi Internet radios, is launching its first Bluetooth home audio products.
The Bluetooth products consist of a pair of active shelf speakers and two micro-size integrated amplifiers.
The speaker pair is the $199-suggested AC-only GDI-BTSP201. The leatherette-wrapped two-way speakers feature 36-watt output and ability to stream the AAC and AptX codecs over Bluetooth. Bluetooth 4.0 technology enables up to eight devices to be paired, Grace Digital said.
The speakers also feature 1-inch soft-dome tweeter, 3.5-inch woofer, bass port, frequency response of 50Hz to 20kHz and a 30-foot Bluetooth range.
Other features include Bluetooth AVRCP, which enables a top-mount control panel to control payback of songs stored on a mobile device. A USB jack charges a mobile device while its music plays, and a 3.5mm aux in connects to devices that lack Bluetooth for music playback, the company said.
“Unlike portable Bluetooth speakers, our bookshelf pair provides a room-filling full-range spectrum of sound with true stereo separation,” said CEO Greg Fadul.
It’s available on the company’s website and Amazon in black, white and red.
The company’s other Bluetooth home-audio products, also available on the Grace and Amazon sites, consist of a pair of Bluetooth-equipped integrated amplifiers at a suggested $129 and $169. The 2×12-watt (RMS) BTAR122 and 2×50-watt (RMS) BTAR502 feature metal chassis measuring 1.3 inches by 4.9 inches by 5.9 inches. The $129 model supports AAC streaming over Bluetooth, and the $169 model adds AptX streaming over Bluetooth, the company’s website shows.
Both feature Class D amplifiers, speaker-level output to connect to passive speakers, and a line out to connect to active speakers. Both also feature analog input, Bluetooth 4.0, 2-amp USB charging port, remote control, and front-panel bass, treble and balance controls.
Besides Internet radios for home and commercial applications, Grace’s product selection includes a docking speaker designed specifically for select Samsung Galaxy smartphones, a docking speaker system for Amazon’s Kindle Fire tablet, outdoor wireless weatherproof speakers that use 900MHz analog frequencies to stream music from a portable transmitter with aux input, and a ruggedized docking boombox that connects to MP3 players and cellphones via 3.5mm input.
