Reviews for Bowers & Wilkins Zeppelin Air

Being an owner of the original zeppelin, I had a hard time believing how much better the zeppelin Air could sound. After purchasing the new Air play version, I immediately put the new one to the test. Right out of the box I would say that the initial sound did not seem to be better considering all the internal upgrades. I have to say I was considering taking it back. The fact that it was brand new I decided to give it a chance to break in.
After three weeks of continuous play, I performed one more side by side comparison with the original zeppelin. I have to say that the Air version really outperforms the original in the following areas:

-Wider sound stage
-Vocals have more body and sounds more palpable
-Even in airplay mode the new zeppelin out performs the original

There was one thing that I found interesting though. the new Air version is considerably lighter than the old version. With all the upgrades I can't imagine why.

I purchased this unit about 9 months ago and have been using it extensively.

The sound is terrific given its limitations with respect to size Certainly, it sounds better than the competition from Bose and Bang & Olufsen. However, as with all smaller speaker systems, on types of music that have a big soundstage or great complexity, it seems to me that the Zeppelin "works" really hard and the music starts to sound a little strained. This is more a limitation of size than a fault with the Zeppelin.

A few caveats: first, the dock for the iPod/iPhone is VERY delicate. It breaks VERY easily and should be treated accordingly. Second, you must follow the directions for Airplay meticulously because if you do not, it may not work properly. This is easily remedied by performing a Reset of the Zeppelin. Remember NOT to plug in the power cable before plugging in the Ethernet cable; Ethernet cable first! Finally, if you are using the device via Airplay, make sure that you disconnect the Airplay connection via iTunes before you try to switch to the iPod dock, otherwise it glitches and won't let you play via the dock.

This speaker/docking system is the best on the market for it's intended use. It does not replace a larger system for large rooms, but for home or small room use - you simply cannot purchase a better unit. I would recommend multiple units to effectively fill larger rooms, which B&W supports with their software enhancements to sync multiple units together.

The outages that other people complain about has nothing to do with the B&W unit, but rather their WiFi systems. People using multi-channel WiFi will not experience sound interference. Alternatively, one can dock their unit onto the unit, which by=passes the WiFi airplay, and plays directly to the system.

Sound is clear and bass is smooth and punchy.

Firstly, this thing is built like a tank and weighs a lot more than its size would suggest.
It sounds as good as it looks and if you had to do a blindfold test you'd never believe that such a big sound could come from such a relatively small package. Sound stage is not great which is understandable with the speakers so close together but I don't think it was intended to replace your living room hifi. It's meant to fill a small room with big sound and it does that brilliantly.

It's not all good news though, updating the firmware and setting up Airplay is a real pain. There is an app from B&W in the AppStore but simply connecting to the unit's wifi hotspot and going to its IP seems to be much easier. That being said, make sure your wifi router's security settings are set up properly else the Zeppelin will not be able to connect, even if it accepts your WiFi password.

Also, the unit doesn't control it's own volume, even though it's got vol up/down buttons, what happens is that it controls your iPhone/iPod/Mac/etc's volume. This means that when you dock your phone the first time it could start playing music at full blast!! I found this out the hard way and I feel it's a serious design flaw that should be looked at and fixed ASAP. You could seriously injure your ears.

Other than those 2 issues which cost it a star, it's a superb device and I'd highly recommend it, just remember you've been warned - don't blow your ears...

Love the sound of this thing but the networking stack they implemented stinks.
The device is constantly dropping off of my wireless network even though the indicator light remains solid purple which means it's connected and in AirPlay mode. Check of wireless clients through Airport Utility shows that sure enough the Zeppelin is not connected to the wireless network. I have had this happen during the middle of playback, like others. But I have also had this happen after pressing the standby button on the unit to wake it up with zero AirPlay connection attempts. The only way to correct this is to power cycle the unit. Really? And yes the firmware is at the latest version. And I'm still waiting to hear back from B&W's tech support.

Honestly I'm ready to just dump this thing and go with an Airport Express and speakers. My sister's family has had zero issues with this setup.

If you are seriously considering dropping this much cash, I would think twice.

This speaker has an amazing sound, the bass is incredible and the the music is balanced even at loud volume, the speaker not only looks great but the performance is also excellent; the airplay function is a little hard to configure but once you got it right the freedom it offers is unparalleled, since you don't have your phone on the dock at all times and goes with you around the house instead.

bottom line one of the best loud speakers, great design and the innovative airplay function.

This is by far the best iPod dock/speaker that I have owned.

The sound is simply wonderful for something this size, however, one needs the speaker to run for a good 90 mins before the sound really starts to sizzle. i.e. there is an initial break in period.

The airplay took about 30 minutes to setup but went without a hitch. The installation video on the Bowers & Wilkins website aids tremendously in this... no need to read the manual.

Finally, it such a pleasure to use Airplay with my iPad or iPhone from around the house.

I've owned the Zeppelin Air for 10 months and agree with many users that the sound is fantastic but the wireless functionality is unreliable at best - certainly frustrating.

I've used with three different wireless modems in two different apartments (and separate internet providers) with little distance between modem and Zeppelin.

I've implemented the update with no improvement. The thing drops out to the point where I can't get through a single song.

For the money, this is not worth it.

BW should stop selling this unit since it clearly hasn't committed to a solid fix after all this time and selling such a flawed product damages its reputation.

Compression in the BOSE units leads to poorer fidelity, however, at least BOSE has a more reliable technology.

Do not buy this unit.

I’ve had this for about a month now, and I love it. The sound is crisp and clean, the highs are clear, the bass is defined and rich. All in all, the sound quality is almost worth the $600 price point. Then you add in the Airplay functionality, well, what more do you want? Words of advice though; if the regular setup method doesn’t work, try the others that you can find on the website. For me, I tried the regular setup for about 4-6 hours, could not get the Zeppelin to connect to my router. I tried everything they said in the manual online to try and get it to work, but to no avail. Took it back to Best Buy, got a different one, and got the same results. Then, almost on a whim, I decided to try the method that uses your iOS device. Got it running in two minutes, and I haven’t had a single problem since then. Also, I’ve seen many people on here and other places complain that there is about a two second delay in whatever you do when you use Airplay on this (play, pause, skip track, etc) Let me tell all of you this is an “issue” with Airplay, not the Zeppelin. The data has to be transmitted over the internet, instead of there being a physical connection between your iPod and the Zeppelin. It is that way no matter what you use Airplay with, and I don’t see it being fixed because it’s not a problem. Anyways, to sum this up, I would strongly recommend the Bowers & Wilkins Zeppelin Air for anyone who appreciates music. I don’t think you’ll regret it.