Griffin Evolve

The basics

The Griffin Evolve is a speaker system comprised of two cube-shaped speakers and a charging base. It is a wireless sound system so there are no wires to handle. Each speaker cube is powered by its own Lithium Ion battery pack and can deliver 10 hours of playing time between charges. It comes with its own remote and can serve as a dock for the iPod.

The good

Trying to make iPod docks exciting is like putting mascara on a dog - it doesn't work (unless your a B&W Zeppelin). This, however, is the first we've seen to support two fully removable wireless speakers. Yep, those two cubes can be taken off and placed anywhere up to 150ft from the base station - and guess what, it actually works. Both are battery powered (they charge on the base station) and can be set to mono - so you can put them in different rooms and still get both channels of audio. It's clever stuff. The dock also works with most iPods (thanks to included adapters), although our iPhone isn't supported.

The bad

The Evolve is let down a bit by the sound quality. It's decent, nothing to write home about, but good enough - and in general the wireless link works well. We did get a bit of spotty performance during our test, but nothing awful.

The bottom line

Sound quality and the price aren't great, but how many iPod docks can put their speakers at opposite ends of the house? Exactly!