Symfonisk Picture Frame Speaker available July 15th

  • 14 July 2021
  • 6 replies
  • 268 views

Userlevel 7
Badge +23

As first revealed by yours truly 3 months ago, the IKEA Picture Frame speaker is available tomorrow. Review at https://www.theverge.com/22573890/ikea-sonos-symfonisk-picture-frame-speaker-review

And before every starts moaning, it is of course S2-only.


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6 replies

Excellent review by one of the only review sites that really matters:

https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/ikea-symfonisk-picture-frame-speaker-review.25139/

Conclusions
Measurements of this speaker unfortunately is not quite the same as its in-use application. Still, signs of good design shine through in the form of great directivity and to some extent frequency response -- both on-axis and predicted-in-room. Subjective listening tests are even more impressive indicating either I don't know what I am doing when listening to speakers, or, wall mounting helps the response. Either way, there is some genius design at play here that is absent in other smart speakers I have tested and listened to. Considering that you can hang this on a wall and have it not look like an odd thing sitting some place, it is a major accomplishment.

Objective measurements don't fully support my highest honors but my listening test results do. So it is my pleasure to give a strong recommend to Ikea SYMFONISK picture frame speaker by Sonos.

Can’t wait for the Etsy folks to come up with some decent grilles for these…   Even better if we could upload our own photos to be printed...

You might think that a printing of your own design feature might make someone some fair profit….as long as there isn’t too much competition.

 

Userlevel 4
Badge +6

ikea.com/us/ already shows op-art (“Splash”, art:205.068.24) and record-player (seriously!) (“Vinyl”, art:805.071.42) covers, USD $20 add-on to the $200 speaker, but not yet available.  [Edit: Another 10 designs available in the EU, should come at $30 because they are licensed from commercial art houses.]  I would really love to see the Skiniplay.com designs produced for Sonos/Symfonisk -- plus they will custom-print -- but they probably couldn’t price competitively vs. their Bang&Olufsen carriage-trade.

Two Symfonisk panels plus a hidden Sub should make a surprising “invisible” audio system, even bringing in some new customers who create only single-zone households.  That’s *if* one can add the Sub and *if* TruePlay allows it to creep to slightly higher frequencies to make up for where the panels inevitably roll off.  Also certainly a useful option for theater rears, though constrained placement vs. the table-lamp Symfonisks….

Can’t wait for the Etsy folks to come up with some decent grilles for these…   Even better if we could upload our own photos to be printed...

 

Not sure how well that will work. The frame is 16” x 22”, so I don’t know that  the plastic frame of the ‘front’ or grille can be made on a 3D printer very cheaply.  it might be easier just to buy one of ikea’s fronts and take off the fabric, replace with your own.  Maybe someone will offer a service  to do that for you for a reasonable price.  Not sure.  The other thing that could happen is people just make a larger size frame that covers up the whole thing.

IMO, ikea should have made a line of regular picture frames of the same size and shape.  That would allow them to create and sell a lot more variety of fronts, or make it something for etsy folks.  It would make the frame/speaker a lot more useful too.  If I have a hallway that really needs 3 of theses sized pictures, but I only want one speaker….

I also still wish these had been designed to run off 12V or USB connection. A power cable with wall wort provided.  That would allow you to maybe run power through the walls easier or use a portable battery with this.  I wouldn’t be too surprised if someone tears this apart and finds a way to do that.  I don’t think people are going to tear this apart to use the parts to build a different speaker though.  That’s being done on the bookshelf speaker because of it’s lower price point.  No reason to do that with the frame unless you specifically need a shallow tweeter and woofer.

Userlevel 6
Badge +11

Excellent review by one of the only review sites that really matters:

https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/ikea-symfonisk-picture-frame-speaker-review.25139/

 

 

Thanks for posting this. Really good review by Amir, looks like a great speaker. I don’t really need this but I’m thinking I will pick one up anyway.