Bowers & Wilkins Zeppelin Air

Reviews for Bowers & Wilkins Zeppelin Air

Customer Reviews and Ratings

4.0 out of 5 stars

Based on 175 reviews

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  • 2.0 out of 5 stars

    Airplay just does not work

    • Written by from Duluth

    Frequent interruptions of music played over airplay is a massive letdown. Firmware updates and emails to customer support are just a waste of time. I would not buy it again.

    14 of 21 people found this useful

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  • 2.0 out of 5 stars

    Need to be wired to work

    • Written by from key west

    Bought myself these speakers a year ago. The sound is great the shape is large and cumbersome. You cant place them close to a wall as the quality of sound drops and they do not work well unless plugged into the wifi box!

    14 of 25 people found this useful

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  • 2.0 out of 5 stars

    Good sound, poor all around otherwise

    • Written by from Palm Springs

    Other than the good sound, there is great difficulty in its formula to connect to your wifi, and very poor performance if you do. Intermittent play at best, not consistent as with my bluetooth experience.
    The remote control and buttons on the speakers work poorly and are often non responsive.
    The speakers default to tv play when a video or youtube media is play, thereby only giving sound.
    Software restore would not fix my no longer working wifi connection in the unit, and support said I had to send it in to have it looked it.
    I sold it as is

    66 of 71 people found this useful

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  • 2.0 out of 5 stars

    Wireless is difficult

    • Written by from Oakland

    The sound is fine when it works. The wireless feature part no longer works because it needs the famous firmware upgrade. I have been hearing about firmware upgrades since the dawn of the computer age. It usually means the gadget doesn't work right. It was fine when I first set it up but after moving and trying to connect to a new network, it is impossible. Overpriced.

    16 of 27 people found this useful

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  • 2.0 out of 5 stars

    Sounds Great - Wireless Drops Regularly

    • Written by from Pittsford

    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.

    22 of 30 people found this useful

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  • 2.0 out of 5 stars

    Nothing but a headache

    • Written by from Stanley

    Great sound....but don't buy if you have BT Infinity!!!! Despite assigning a static IP etc to the Zepplin and spending hours on repeated set up attempts Airplay only stays connected for about 1 day.

    Very unsatisfying

    14 of 16 people found this useful

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  • 2.0 out of 5 stars

    Amazing sound and a huge hassle

    • Written by from Colorado Springs

    I want to love this thing so much. It sounds and looks amazing. But I've wasted hours on setup. Airplay didn't work at all out of the box. I've flashed and re-flashed the firmware and had to configure the wifi multiple times. B & W tries to make it easy, but it's not. I don't understand why the iOS app has to run over wifi instead of using the dock connector for configuration. Anyway, if you're ok with the wasted time, go for it.

    11 of 17 people found this useful

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  • 2.0 out of 5 stars

    Sounds Great AirPlay Terrible

    • Written by from Soquel

    I just returned my Zeppelin to the Apple Store yesterday for the same reason so many people complained, AirPlay problems. It would be playing fine for a few minutes then total loss. The Zeppelin would be indicating that the connection was there, but nothing showed on, iPad, iPhone4s or Macbook Air. I wrote to B&W and got a very fast response indicating that the problem was with Apple and had been corrected with iOS 5.1. For me it was too late, I had already returned it and don't feel inclined to try again. I took a look at the Kliptch, which has a similar problem which they acknowledge on the opening page, saying that they will post the information when the problem is corrected. I like that attitude better and will try that product when they do post the correction.

    16 of 25 people found this useful

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  • 2.0 out of 5 stars

    Great sound, broken for iPhone 4s

    • Written by from New Westminster

    Apple lists the 4s as being compatible with this device, but it is not. This is a problem B&W knows about but is blaming Apple, and there's no indication of when it will be fixed. It has been this way for many months.

    Sounds is way better than I expected for something of this size. Really good solution and sounds amazing. If it only worked as advertised (by Apple anyway).

    If it weren't for that it would get 4 stars (missing one because the setup is a bit convoluted), but as it is, since I have a 4s, this device leaves something to be desired.

    13 of 19 people found this useful

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  • 2.0 out of 5 stars

    Does not work wirelessly with IPhone 4s

    • Written by from Nashua

    looks good and sounds great. unfortunately gets disconnected frequently when i use my iphone 4s. It works well with my MacBook pro. I'm not sure if I keep it as I am disappointed .I am sure B&W is aware of this problem and they have not fixed it yet and falsely claiming that it is compatible with all Iphones.as I gathered after googleing this problem ; others have this problem and even more(I felt somehow lucky). The bottom line is that they have not delivered what they promised for 600 dollars.

    18 of 30 people found this useful

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  • 2.0 out of 5 stars

    Good sound but lost wifi way too often

    • Written by from N/A

    One of the worse product I have ever bought. There is no comparison with the sound. The Zeppelin Air is by far the best in sound. However, AirPlay support on that device is zero. The connection is often, way too often lost.

    If I had the chance, I'd return it

    23 of 32 people found this useful

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  • 2.0 out of 5 stars

    Great speakers. AirPlay a dud.

    • Written by from SAN FRANCISCO

    Solid, great sounding speakers, but AirPlay was a key selling point.

    I bought my partner the ZA for Christmas from the Online Store. After spending three hours on Christmas Day trying to get it to AirPlay properly I have come to the conclusion that the WiFi or AirPlay module is faulty. I had to update the firmware to 1.1.3 twice. After the first firmware update, the unit went into some kind of torpor and wouldn’t even respond to a hard reset.

    I found that a LOT of customers have the same problem, but most end up returning it at this point. It was by PURE CHANCE that I ran across a forum post that pointed me to where to download the software to restore the firmware to 1.0.0.

    Incidentally, B&W don’t include a USB cable, so unless you have one handy, you can’t update the firmware.

    But EVEN AFTER finally successfully updating to 1.1.3, the ZA now connects to my wifi network fine, but will only AirPlay for half a minute. I set my WiFi router to issue a dedicated IP to the ZA’s MAC address and used an IP scanner to watch. When the ZA stops streaming, it disappears from all my iDevices’ AirPlay lists, and also the IP scans fail to detect it. So I’m quite sure that the WiFi/AirPlay module is kaput.

    Apple was very accommodating when I called to arrange for a replacement, but ultimately, I wasted a lot of my time trying to get it to work and have to waste more time and effort lugging it to FedEx and waiting another 7-10 days for a replacement unit that was supposed to be a CHRISTMAS GIFT for someone special.

    This product isn’t cheap. Is it wrong to expect better QC than this?

    7 of 8 people found this useful

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  • 2.0 out of 5 stars

    Looks nice but continues to drop the network

    • Written by from Calgary

    I bought this unit for Black Friday and had it set up all week. Not once in the whole time did AirPlay work for a whole song.

    I first set it up with the default Firmware and followed the instructions. I had my network hidden and used WPA2 Wireless Security. The B&W would could not find my network. I un hid my network and the B&W finally found it. Once the Zepplin was all set up I tried using it via Airplay. The music would play for about 5 seconds and then the Airplay would drop and I would have to restart the Zepplin to find it again on Airplay. I tried with my MBP, iPhone 4S and iPad2 all with the same results. So, I updated the Firmware to 1.3.3. With the update I could 'almost' make it through a song before it was dropped. I repeated this several times in several rooms across my house. No Joy.

    The sound is great when it is playing and it looks great but alas I bought it for the iPlay functionality not the looks. I am returning this unit as completely unhappy with it.

    Note: I currently stream my music to Living Room via Airplay and AppleTV and office using Airport Extreme and an Amp. With excellent results. I wanted a portable unit to move to other rooms and the deck.

    I will keep looking for a decent unit.

    11 of 14 people found this useful

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  • 2.0 out of 5 stars

    AirPlay nightmare

    • Written by

    setting this thing up gave me a migraine.

    Anyone else have issues with the wi-fi setup?

    21 of 57 people found this useful

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