A 13-watt-per-channel Class D amplifier drives two, three-inch, long-excursion polypropylene woofers and two, one-inch silk dome tweeters. The amp is strong enough to fill an average bedroom with sound, and it's fine for providing background music in larger rooms, but we wouldn't rely on it for a lively party. We've said the same about the Sonos Play:3, but the Sonos produces just slightly better fidelity. If you want AirPlay support, crave boom in your room, and are blessed with plenty o' coin, the $600 Zeppelin Air is the way to go.

As with other AirPlay devices we've tested, iHome uses BridgeCo's DM870 networked media processor to handle wireless media streaming. The DM870 also runs the Bongiovi Acoustics Digital Power Station software, which is intended to restore life to music that's been encoded using lossy codecs such as MP3 and AAC. The Bongiovi DPS (sorry, but we can't help but pronounce this "bong-jovee") does make compressed tracks sound better; but if you're going to use iTunes and an iOS device, a far better approach is to encode your music using Apple Lossless and preserve fidelity in the first place. You can disable Bongiovi DPS by pushing a button on the included infrared remote control. The remote has a number of other functions that aren't included on the unit, including level adjustments for bass and treble, shuffle mode, and repeat. 

Live at the Grand Opera House