It's big, it's heavy, and it isn't going to win any design awards but Sony's ULT Tower 10 makes up for that with its ear-splitting volume, eye-catching LEDs, and feature-rich app ecosystem. If you need to fill a large area with audio (music, your vocals, or a plugged-in guitar), this is one of the most capable choices. For any other occasion, this probably isn't going to be worth it.
-
Design
-
Performance
-
Features
-
Value
It isn’t difficult to find a good speaker these days. There are plenty of options that range from speakers you can fit in your pocket, to larger devices that require a plug socket. But if you’re looking for something that could fill a small stadium with your choice of music, there aren’t nearly as many choices. That’s where Sony’s ULT Tower 10 comes in.
It’s the biggest, most powerful speaker in the company’s ULT Power series and offers a few extra features to enhance your parties or travelling music gigs. At least, that’s how Sony sells it. This is a seriously big speaker and comes with the sound output and price to match. Does that mean it’s worth having around? Well, that depends on a few things, like how much you hate your neighbours.
Pop a wheelie
At over a metre tall and weighing around 30kg, the ULT Tower 10 is one of the biggest speakers we’ve reviewed and not one we’d call portable. Yes, it has its own built-in wheels but that’s a necessity for something this big. Those wheels are for getting it to your car van if you plan to take it somewhere or manoeuvring it around your home without putting your back out. To make that manoeuvring easier, something akin to a handle forms a ring around the top of its frame.
The other reason we wouldn’t call this a portable speaker is its lack of a battery. Other speakers in Sony’s ULT Power series contain a rechargeable battery but those don’t already weigh 30kg. Adding a battery here would’ve been swell but would undoubtedly complicate things. There’s always the option of powering it with a portable power station or generator but those don’t come cheap.
It can, however, play music without requiring a cable via Bluetooth 5.2. To that end, it supports basic wireless codecs like SBC and AAC, along with Sony’s LDAC format (you may need to enable LDAC playback on your source device). It also supports inputs from an analogue 3.5mm jack, digital TOSLINK input, or USB-A be that a flash stick with music loaded or a smartphone.
Unfortunately, it doesn’t support Wi-Fi connectivity, so while you can connect two ULT Tower 10s for a stereo pair in the companion app, it won’t support adjustable multiroom playback. This isn’t a dealbreaker though, especially if you can afford to have more than one of these in your house.
Music + lights = party
Atop this behemoth sits the control panel with some basic capacitive controls for playback, lighting effects, and switching input modes. There are also a couple of rather large and satisfyingly tactile buttons; one for power, and one labelled ‘ULT’ which we’ll get to later.
There are also two controls for the ULT Tower 10’s karaoke function (did we mention it comes with a wireless mic that can be stowed in the two foldaway holsters on either side?); one to help with your pitch, and a reverb effect toggle. Lastly, a little rubber flap hides the quarter-inch (6.3mm) guitar or microphone input and volume dial.
The ULT Tower 10 houses a total of seven speaker units; four 40mm tweeters, two 80mm midrange drivers, and a single, large (320mm x 320mm) squarish woofer. One of the selling points of this gargantuan device is its 360-degree sound, hence why two tweeters face behind and outward. Together, the drivers cover a frequency range of 20Hz to 20kHz and can drive up to 1,000W of audio power (not to be confused with the power draw of the system, which is rated at a surprisingly low 139W).
Turn it up at your own risk
All that audio power is the reason we had to keep the ULT Tower 10’s volume slider on our smartphone at under a quarter. We once raised it just over halfway on the first day of testing and quickly received several irate messages from various neighbours.
Part of the reason for their irritation was the fact that the ULT button was glowing, meaning the Tower 10 was set to one of the ‘ULT Power’ sound modes. There are two ULT Power modes to choose from (aptly named ULT 1 and ULT 2). Like an EQ preset, they add emphasis to the low and upper bass ranges respectively.
If you like to (literally) feel your music as much as hear it, you’ll want to try them out. For the best results, make sure there aren’t any walls nearby. They will reflect the low-end impacts and could add some nasty phase issues to the mix. If they don’t tickle your fancy, you can use the seven-band equaliser in the Sony Music Center companion app (Android/iOS) for more granular control.
Even with the ULT Power modes disabled, the ULT Tower 10 produces a full, low-end heavy sound. That said, we were pleasantly surprised by its clarity and tonal balance in the mid and high ranges. Even so, some genres sound better than others.
Electronic and dance music is, unsurprisingly, handled the best. The only genres we encountered issues with were grunge, rock, and metal – anything with heavily distorted guitars – as the ULT Tower 10 wasn’t able to provide enough definition which made tracks like Only Shallow from My Bloody Valentine sound bland and smeared.
Sony ULT Tower 10 verdict
Due to its size and weight, the Sony ULT Tower 10 isn’t going to be for everyone and all occasions. It’s aimed at party hosts or travelling musicians with the space and budget to accommodate it. It isn’t particularly pretty but that won’t matter much with its dancing LEDs in a dimly lit hanger as it blares doef doef music at ear-splitting volumes. At R22,000 it certainly isn’t cheap but you’re getting a lot of speaker for your money. And for some, it’s a small price to pay to one-up the neighbour who insists you listen along to six hours of the Chainsmokers’ greatest hits.
