Rocking the Holidays with a Wireless JBL Charge 2 Speaker

This shop has been compensated by Collective Bias, Inc. and its advertiser. All opinions are mine alone.

We always go all out at Christmas time to celebrate the holidays at our house - a huge blowup snowman in the front yard, the glow of our home shining from being covered in LED lights, a pleasant wreath on the front door, stockings hung above the fireplace with care, and of course a decorated tree with cookies and milk for Santa.  Something seemed to be lacking though; but I just couldn't put my finger on it.  It hit me the other day when I was driving home from work and realized they were playing Christmas songs on the radio...we hadn't been rocking our home with holiday music.  I was going to have to fix that by getting some Bluetooth compatible speakers for our house.

We haven't had a nice stereo receiver or speaker system in our house to make listening to music that worthwhile.  When my wife and I tend to listen to music it is on the radio in the car, at the gym with our mp3 player, or via the playlists we have stored on our iphones. Our children are at an age where they really don't listen to music much. So while our house was decked out for the season the musical component of the holidays had been lacking because we just didn't have an outlet for enjoying Christmas carols and tunes at home. Thanks to #CollectiveBias we were given a JBL Charge 2 Speaker because tis the season for #GiftingAudio and now it appears our family is going to be a lot merrier through the holidays being able to incorporate music into our festivities.

I have to say that this speaker has exceeded my expectations.  Its little body belts out the tunes with power, clarity and bass that rivals the bulky monstrous four foot high box speakers I used to take a lot of pride in from my bachelor pad days.  It was very easy to sync the JBL Charge 2 speaker to my iphone so that my children and I were very quickly listening to some holiday tunes via Pandora through this connection.  I was actually somewhat surprised just how exceptional the sound quality was especially with how I was playing music through a wireless connection with my phone.  We really had the jingle bells rocking as I cranked up the sound to enjoy the music of Mannheim Steamroller and Trans-Siberian Orchestra.  I kid you not the speakers delivered such a rich bass that it felt as if we could have been at a concert.  You can actually see the speaker working to provide a rich listening experience as you can see the twin passive radiators (the silver discs on either side of the speaker) pulsating to the beat of the music which is quite impressive to observe.

So what is on your Holiday Playlist this year?  Here are a few of the favorites from our family playlist:

Christmas Don't Be Late - Alvin and the Chipmunks
Grandma Got Run Over By A Reindeer - Elmo & Patsy
Santa Claus is Coming to Town - Bruce Springsteen
Little Drummer Boy - Bing Crosby & David Bowie Duet
Do They Know it is Christmas - Band Aid
The Most Wonderful Time of the Year -Andy Williams
Joy to the World - Mannheim Steamroller
God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen - The Bare Naked Ladies
Carol of the Bells - Trans Siberian Orchestra
Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas -  Judy Garland
Frosty the Snowman by Jimmy Durante

There is such a focus on the visual elements of the holiday season through the lights and decorations, but the musical aspect is also an important part of celebrating the holidays and was something we had been neglecting the last few years.  Being able to pull out this convenient portable speaker and easily play holiday songs from our itunes playlists or Pandora is really going to enhance the Christmas spirit for our family. My kids were so excited when they heard the holiday tunes pouring through our house as they jumped around like reindeer singing the lyrics to Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer and Frosty the Snowman.  It was so convenient just being able to pull out my phone, hit play and have the music flow wireless between devices and through our home.

Speaking of convenient, it was really nice to have this great speaker delivered directly to my front door rather than drag myself out to the store to search for one.  If you are looking to get a JBL Charge 2 for yourself or maybe as a gift for someone keep in mind the convenience of shopping online.

It is so convenient to get one of these online now too because JBL is having a special holiday promotion on its website. If you purchase a Charge 2 from www.jbl.com, they will provide FREE ground shipping plus FREE extended returns.  I hate paying for shipping for online purchases so that is a real plus for me!  Another perk that I appreciated is JBL provides lifetime support for your purchase when you buy it online directly from their website!  The JBL Charge 2 is $149.95 and while my preference was black you can choose from five colors to personalize your selection: blue, purple, red, white or black.

While the JBL Charge 2 is going to make our holiday celebrating more enjoyable it is also going to be very useful throughout the rest of the year as well.  Often times when we call grandma and grandpa our kids are fighting to grab the phone to talk to their grandparents...now we can use the Charge 2 as a speaker phone routing the call through it so the kids can both hear the conversation at the same time and also talk through the speaker's built-in microphone.  That featured turned into an unexpected treat which we are going to be using a lot all year long.  Based on the sound quality that I've experienced so far I may also use this speaker phone application for some of my work conference calls too.

Another great feature that is really nice if you are taking the Charge 2 with you on a family road trip or on business travel is that you can actually use the speaker to charge your phone when you are on the go.  The Charge 2's 6000mAh Li-ion battery can play up to 12 hours of music or if it outlasts your phone or other portable devices you can recharge them through its USB port.  No more having to look for an electric outlet to plug into at a highway rest stop while you are traveling to recharge your phone or tablet when you have this speaker with you.  This speaker really is the gift that keeps on giving.

In the spirit of Gifting Audio, our friends at Collective Bias and JBL are giving away 30 speakers for the holidays.  Just complete the steps below for a chance to win.  Good luck everyone!


JBL.com #GiftingAudio Sweepstakes

A Geek Daddy Takes the Huawei Ascend Mate2 for a Test Drive at the Mall

Photo taken with Huawei Ascend Mate2's 13 megapixel camera

I recently combined a trip to Great Lakes Crossing Outlet Mall for back to school shopping for my kids with a chance to take the Huawei Ascend Mate2 smart phone for a test drive.  We spent an afternoon shopping at children's clothing stores like Children's Place, The Disney Store, Gap, Gymboree, Marshall's, and Osh'Kosh B'Gosh, enjoyed dinner at the Rainforest Cafe, and stopped at this Geek Daddy's favorite store Bass Pro Shop.  During our whole day out, I carried along an Ascend Mate2 smart phone that Huawei had loaned me to review which I used for a whole lot of things like calling Rain Forest Cafe on the car ride to Great Lakes Crossing making dinner reservations, taking pictures of my kids enjoying our roadtrip, going online to compare item prices/features and look up a variety of other things like the way back to the freeway when I took a wrong turn heading home, and texting my wife about where to meet up when we got separated (lost) in the mall.

The Ascend Mate2 is a 4G compatible smart phone that runs the Android Jelly Bean operating system.  It's standout feature is a 6.1 inch high definition screen that provides a stunning display of graphics, visuals and videos.  The screen is not just huge but also provides for an exceptional viewing experience that wowed! me and was truly impressive.  Taking a photo of the high definition imagery doesn't do it justice because the pictures I took didn't capture the stunning visuals you were able to eyeball from a firsthand personal view.  This was the feature that my 17 year old niece and my mother-in-law both found most desirable about this phone when they saw me using it; each  telling me that this would be a great Christmas present for us to think about giving them.  Hmmm while the $300 price tag for this phone isn't bad that is a bit more than the gift cards those two each get for the holidays.

The second best feature about this smart phone which is just plain out AWESOME is its battery life.  I used the Ascend Mate2 pretty extensively for a whole day using a variety of features and apps that would normally drain the everyday phone I normally use within a few hours and it's battery life was only reduced to 50%.  I used this phone for a whole week without having to recharge it!  The Ascend Mate2's battery promises 60 hours of standard use and it lived up to that during my test drive of the phone.  This is accomplished by having 3 power settings to select from that allows the phone to be smart about how your battery power is utilized maximizing your power and minimizing your drain.  In fact the Ascend Mate 2 is so efficient with its battery that it has a nifty feature that allows other people to plug into this phone to recharge their phone's drained energy.  Out with a friend whose phone dies you don't have to look for an electrical outlet to plug into they can get a recharge by plugging into your Ascend Mate 2. That's a darn cool feature to have on a phone.

Some other nice features about this phone include that it allows floating screens so that you can have multiple windows open and accessible at once plus the Ascend Mate 2 provides a glove mode that you can flip on during the winter.  I threw on a glove to test this feature which I thought would be very valuable during Michigan's cold winters and it worked great.  I was able to easily type and open up apps with my gloved hand just as easily as using my bare hand.  Often times you can't operate a phone's touch screen with gloves on or you need to buy "special" gloves to wear when using one, not in this case...just pull your gloves or mittens out and you are ready to go! (Note you to do have to manually turn on / off the Glove Mode in the Settings Menu). With the extra large screen size of the Ascend Mate 2 it is also a snap to type with a gloved hand too which is an extra bonus.  You also don't have to worry about over-extending this phone's memory with your photos, videos, documents and other misc stuff you may store on it because you receive 20GB of cloud storage from Bitcasa for FREE during the lifetime of the phone.  If you don't want to store on the cloud the phone also has about 13 GB available for internal storage which is pretty practical for most average phone users and a microSD slot for additional memory if needed.

 The Ascend Mate2 isn't completely without negatives though. After enjoying the high-def screen features you'd think its 13 megapixel rear camera (it also has a 5 megapixel front camera) would be outstanding on this phone and while it is adequate it didn't standout as overly impressive in the photos I took.  It was a little cumbersome and not easy to just point and click to record great shots.  The camera on "normal" setting took decent pictures outdoors but not so great pictures inside.  Once I set it to HDR mode though the quality of the pictures really improved.  HDR mode takes 3 pictures very quickly and merges them into one shot improving the details in the lightest and darkest areas of the photo to create a high quality picture.  The trick with this feature is you have to keep the camera steady to avoid blurry pictures.  There are a bunch of features to this camera that can improve the quality of your shots and if someone uses it for a longer period of time than for a quick product review so they can play with and become accustomed to all the setting they may find it a very a good camera.  For someone who wants a good quick click and shoot camera that you can just simply take out of the box and use without making menu selections and taking time to learn to use this may not be your best choice. If you like to take videos the phone is a little easier to manipulate than it is with still photographs and provides 1080 full HD video at 30 frames per second that turn out really crisp and sharp although the audio at times can become crackled.

Taken with Ascend Mate2 camera in "normal" mode

Taken with Ascend Mate2 camera in HDR mode

A few other nitpicky type complaints for me were the power button was located at the side of the phone and I occasionally would bump it during handling it and the drag to unlock feature to open the phone's functions you sometimes had to fumble with awhile.  I particularly didn't care for the size of the phone, although I'll admit for its screen size it was very light to hold and not bulky at all, because it wasn't convenient for me to carry around.  If you are traveling around with a purse or backpack this is a much more ideal phone than for someone trying to carry it in a sports jack or slacks pocket.

I used this phone on the T-Mobile 4G LTE network and had exceptional sound quality on phone calls and blink of the eye quick download data speeds and instantaneous connectivity when online that worked great.  I'm not sure who should get more credit for the incredible service, T-Mobile or Huawei, but the fact that the Ascend Mate 2 was so compatible with my mobile service provider's network is obviously a plus.  I had nothing but a positive experience from this perspective using the Ascend Mate 2.

Display at Bass Pro Shops - photo taken with Ascend Mate2

Dinner @ Rain Forest Cafe - photo taken with Ascend Mate2

We found the Huawei Ascend Mate2 to be a very useful and convenient phone during our roadtrip to Great Lakes Crossing. It's exceptional battery life and screen really make it stand out. From my experience it is probably the ideal smart phone for the SENIOR in your life whether that be a high school/college student who could find it very useful for their studies but probably would love it for watching movies and playing video games or the older parent who could really benefit from the large screen for viewing and typing.  Of course, if you are between these stages in life, I'm sure you would appreciate this phone too.

For more information about the Huawei Ascend Mate2 please CLICK HERE.

Disclaimer:  I was loaned an Ascend Mate2 for thirty days by Huawei to review the product.  I did not receive any compensation for this review.  The opinions and views in this post are my own.  The product was returned to Huawei when A Geek Daddy Blog completed this review.