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Mivi Roam and Mivi Moonstone Review

Mivi Roam and Mivi Moonstone Review

By Aditya Shenoy | Updated: 25 February 2019 21:53 IST

Highlights

Roam and Moonstone are affordable Bluetooth speakers for Mivi
The Mivi Roam is priced at Rs. 1,699 and has IP67 rating
The Mivi Moonstone is priced at Rs. 2,299 and has a microSD card slot

We recently reviewed Mivi's Octave, which is an affordable Bluetooth speaker priced at around Rs. 2,999 and offers decent value for that price. Mivi has two more Bluetooth speakers in its lineup for value conscious buyers, the Roam and the Moonstone. Priced at Rs. 1,699 and Rs. 2,299 respectively, both of them promise good audio quality and both are quite compact. Should you choose one of these over every other option in the market? We put them both to the test to find out.

Mivi Roam and Mivi Moonstone design and specifications

These affordable Bluetooth speakers from Mivi have thin fabric covers on their top halves, while the lower halves are plastic. Both these Bluetooth speakers come with aux and Micro-USB cables in the box.

Let's talk about the smaller Mivi Roam first. At first glance, it would be easy to mistake it for a Google Home Mini. It is round in shape and has similar dimensions to the Home Mini. There are four buttons on the lower half of the body for play/ pause, volume, and power. These are very slightly raised which makes them easy to miss.

It also has a lanyard attached to it which lets you hang this tiny device anywhere you want. There is a small rubber flap that covers the Micro-USB port, charging indicator, reset button, and 3.5mm aux input. The speaker has an IP67 rating but you need to securely close this rubber flap. There are four tiny rubber legs at the bottom.

The Mivi Roam looks similar to a Google Home Mini

The Mivi Moonstone is comparatively bigger and has a square shape with rounded corners. The quality of the fabric on top is better, and has the same four buttons on the top. These buttons are made out of plastic and are raised making them easy to use.

The Moonstone also has a lanyard attached to it which makes it convenient to hang. A similar rubber flap protects the Micro-USB port, charging indicator, 3.5mm aux input, reset button, and in this case a microSD card slot as well. The bigger Moonstone gets a lower IPX5 rating, which means it is only splash resistant. Mivi's Octave has a slightly better IPX7 water resistance compared to the Moonstone.

Mivi's Roam is compact enough to fit into big pockets. It has a 5 Watt driver with a frequency response range of 20Hz to 20KHz. It supports Bluetooth 4.2 LE, has an 800mAh battery, and weighs 173g.

The Mivi Moonstone on the other hand has a 10W driver with the same frequency range. It also supports Bluetooth 4.2 LE but has a bigger 1500 mAh battery and is heavier at 243g.

Mivi Roam and Mivi Moonstone performance and battery life

The Mivi Roam is priced at Rs. 1,699 on Amazon India as well as on the company's official website. This is the same price at which the original JBL Go is currently selling. The Mivi Moonstone is priced a little higher at Rs. 2,299.

We played some of our test tracks on the Mivi Roam to see how it performs. This tiny speaker is loud enough to fill up a 150 square foot room even at 70 percent volume. We paired the Roam with a Google Pixel 3 (Review) smartphone and played music using JioSaavn for the test. The sound lacked bass but had decent mids and highs at moderate volume.

The Mivi Roam does a good job when playing tracks with a lot of vocals and is good for listening to dialogue when watching a movie. The sound quality is acceptable as long as you stay below the 70-80 percent volume mark. Crank it up any higher, and the sound starts to distort, with highs sounding especially shrill.

We also played some high-quality audio files using a MacBook Air, and observed a noticeable improvement in the audio quality when streaming over Bluetooth.

The Mivi Moonstone is pebble-shaped and has buttons on top.

The Mivi Moonstone can get much louder and you can fill the same room at lower volume levels. It has a similar sound signature to the Mivi Roam and lacks bass. At high volumes it also distorted noticeably, and it would be best to keep the volume level at less than 100 percent.

The Moonstone has a microSD card slot which can be used to play songs. The four buttons on the top of device can be used to control playback. We copied FLAC as well as MP3 files onto a microSD card and put it into the Mivi Moonstone. It played the MP3 files just fine but refused to recognise the FLAC ones.

Both these speakers can be connected to audio sources using a 3.5mm aux cable. When connected to a MacBook Air, we found the audio quality to be marginally better than it was when using Bluetooth. Just like with the Mivi Octave, the volume controls of the speakers are independent from the devices they are plugged into when using a wire, but are synced with the source device when connected over Bluetooth.

The Mivi Moonstone has a MicroSD card slot

Mivi lets you wirelessly link two compatible speakers and use them as a stereo pair. We could pair our Roam and Moonstone devices easily, and they delivered proper stereo output. If you are planning on buying more than one device, this feature could come in handy.

Let's talk about the battery life of these two Bluetooth speakers now. The smaller Mivi Roam has a claimed battery life of 6 hours at 70 percent volume. We played music at full volume and it only lasted for 2 hours and 30 minutes. The remaining battery percentage showed on our paired Android phone, but the reading wasn't reliable and kept fluctuating. Charging the Roam took a little longer than we expected, and it needed to be plugged in for 2 hours.

The Moonstone has a bigger battery and a claimed playback time of 6 hours at 70 percent volume. We managed to get 4 hours of continuous playback out of this speaker while blasting it at full volume. Charging the Moonstone took close to three hours.

VerdictThe Mivi Roam and Mivi Moonstone both have acceptable performance for the prices they are commanding. Both lack bass and the battery life is relatively low if you use them at full volume. Your pick between the two will depend on how you intend on using them. For a price difference of Rs. 600, the Moonstone offers better battery life and louder output than the Roam, but if you are planning to use one on a trek or as a bathroom speaker, the more portable Roam with its IP67 rating would be the better pick.

Mivi Roam price: 1,699

Pros

IP67 Rating
Compact

Cons

Low battery life
Lacks bass
Sound distorts at high volumes

Ratings (out of 5)

Design: 3
Audio quality: 2
Battery life: 2.5
Value for money: 3
Overall: 2.5

Mivi Moonstone price: Rs. 2,299

Pros

IPX5 Rating
Good design
Decent mids

Cons

Disappointing battery life
Lacks bass
Sound distorts at full volume

Ratings (out of 5)

Design: 3
Audio quality: 2.5
Battery life: 3
Value for money: 3
Overall: 3

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