Jam Classic Review
I, like many people bought a number of items from Amazon over the Thanksgiving weekend. One of the items that I bought was a Jam Box. I was in the market for bluetooth speaker that would work with my iOS devices. The speaker would be used primarily while I am in the shower. I chose this speaker mostly because it was a Lightning Deal, and it was a good price.
My requirements for a bluetooth speaker were:
- Cheap. I did not want to spend a lot on the speaker since I would be using it in the shower.
- Bluetooth 4.0. I wanted to make sure that it supported Bluetooth LE (Bluetooth 4.0).
- Rechargeable. Given that I was going to be using it off and on, I didn't want to have to deal with replacing batteries.
Before I jump into the product itself, let us discuss the packaging. The container that the Jam Classic comes in is a plastic container. Inside of it there are three items. The Jam Classic, the USB cable, and an instruction manual. The top unscrews and here lies the USB cable and manual. You can discard the manual if you want, because you honestly will not need it. There is a black plastic cap that needs to be removed. Once this cap is removed, you have access to your Jam Classic. The plastic jar casing is reusable, so you should keep it and use it for something else. The stickers that are on the sides of the plastic jar are removable without much effort, this does not the sticker on the bottom of the package nor the one on the top.
Now that the textual unboxing has occurred, here are my thoughts on the Jam Classic itself.
Good
The speaker works quite well. It has paired with every bluetooth audio device that I have own. The setup is very easy. You enable bluetooth on your device, it will discover the Jam Classic, you select the Jam Classic and it pairs. All Audio will go out through the Jam Classic.
The Jam Classic can perform three basic functions, Volume Up, Volume Down, and Pause/Resume. All of these are buttons on the Jam Classic. Since the connection is Bluetooth, you should expect to be able to perform these functions, and they work as anticipated.
With most other audio items, as you turn up the volume, the audio becomes quite distorted, so you have to find a happy medium. This is not the case with the Jam Classic. During tests, I was able to turn up the volume all the way on my iOS device and turn up the volume all the way on the Jam Classic, and the audio was audible with a bit of distortion, but it was not completely unbearable as some analog solutions can become.
The bass on Jam Classic is actually really good on bass. To some, it may be too bass heavy. The amount of bass that is generated by the Jam Classic can be felt quite well, if you have a bass heavy song.
The Jam Classic is also capable of being a speaker phone, if it is a feature that you require. I do not use that feature, but it is nice to have if I was in need of having a bluetooth speaker phone.
Bad
While the Jam Classic does work with my iPhone 6 Plus and my iPod Nano without any issues, it did have some random issues while paired with my iPad Air 2. The issue that was occurring was that you could not pause what was playing on the iPad Air 2. It is not consistent and could just be an intermittent issue.
The only real downside of the Jam Classic is the length of the power cable. While it is a standard Micro USB, it is a mere 10 inches, which is fine for my usage, but it may be too short for others. Since it is a standard micro-usb connection, you can easily replace the cable with a longer one, but it would be nice to include a slightly longer USB cable.
Outside of the two items listed above, there is nothing else negative to say about the Jam Classic.
Overall
If you are in the market for a bluetooth speaker, you cannot go wrong with the Jam Classic. It is simple to use, easy to set up, and pretty inexpensive. While it may not compare to some higher end companies, like Bower & Wilkins, Denon, or even Bose, it does a great job at being a speaker that does what you expect.