Over the last year and a half, Sony has just been improving all of their speakers, headphones and home theater equipment. And last year, Sony released both the Sony ULT Field 1 and Sony ULT Field 7 which are two of the best small sized a larger sized speakers today… and more recently they just released their ULT Field 3 and ULT field 5 which are two great mid sized speakers as well. But today we’re going to break down Sony’s complete ULT Field series of speakers and lets see which one is right for you.
So first off we’re going to be breaking down Sony’s ULT Field series of speakers which are their portable speakers, cause Sony also has their ULT Tower series of speakers which are their larger box speakers. But when it comes to pricing, the Sony ULT Field 1 has a retail price of $130, the ULT field 3 has a retail price of $200, the ULT Filed 5 has a retail price of $330 and the Sony ULT Field 7 has a retail price of $500. And sometimes both the ULT field 1 and ULT Field 7 go on sale for crazy prices… nonetheless if you want to pick any of these speakers up they’ll be linked down below or you can always press on the YouTube shopping button… and if you want to further support the channel than you can always pick up some merch.
So first theres the design of these speakers, now all of these speakers have a fabric wrapped body so they are going to be able to stand up to constant abuse from bumps and scrapes, and they are all water proof. Another thing that I also like about all of these speakers is that their charging ports are covered… which is a big deal for the ULT field 1, 3, and 5 cause their direct competitors have exposed USB C ports… so you’ll might want to keep this in mind if you’re looking for speaker to use by the water on a regular basis. Cause with these speakers, you dont have to wait for them to be dry before you can charge them with like some other speakers out there.
But something that Sony did very well on the ULT field 1, 3, and 5 is that they had portability in mind. Now both the ULT Field 3 and ULT field 5 come included with very high quality shoulder straps, so carrying them around is very easy. And with the ULT Field 1, they have this convertible carrying handle which looks good, but more importantly it has two positions. So you can either have a loop and hand this speaker from something or you can attach it to your back pack… or you can use it as a carrying handle. Long story short… all three of these speakers are great if you’re looking for something portable.
Now with the ULT field 7, this speaker is also portable… however it is noticeably larger than its direct competitor, the JBL Boombox 3, and unlike Sony’s other speakers, the ULT Field 7 doesn’t come included with a shoulder strap. Now you can easily attach your own cause this speaker does have two built in carrying handles… but I just think this speaker should be sick if it had the same shoulder straps like on the new ULT field 3 and 5.
But also, both the ULT Field 5 and ULT field 7 have built in light features… but these light features are very different. The light feature on the ULT field 7 is tucked away in the passive radiator, so I feel that its too hard to see and its just not worth using. Where as the light feature on the ULT Field 5 is worth using cause first off this light feature extends passed the passive radiairtos, so you can actually see it… but also this light feature has a flooding affect to it while at night or indoors… so I do feel that it is worth using. And also the light feature on the ULT Field 5 looks better than on the ULT 7 cause the RGB here has a better gradient to it.
But then theres battery life, the ULT field 1 has an advertised battery life of 12 hours, both the ULT Field 3 and ULT field 5 has an advertised battery life 25 hours and the ULT field 7 has an advertised battery life of 30 hours. Now this is with these speakers playing with their light features turned off, but with their ULT feature turned on, which is good. Now these volumes is with these speakers playing at 50% volume, except for the ULT Field 7 which is with it playing at 32% volume… but the important thing here is, with all of these speakers you can extend their battery lives if you use them with their ULT feature turned off and they all also have a stamina mode which is going to extend their battery life even more… but with stamina mode, these speakers are going to sound very flat,
But to charge these speakers… the ULT Field 1, 3, and 5 all charge via a USB C port, which is super conveninate, where as with the ULT Field 7, it charges via a double barrel AC port, which is to be expected since it is a larger speaker… but the good thing is, there is no external power brick that you have to worry about.
But the real cool thing with the USB C port on both the ULT field 3 and 5 is that you can use their USB C ports to charge your own devices… which is super useful if you’re going to be taking your speaker to the beach or camping… now you can also charge your phone with the ULT Field 7… but it has a USB A port, which I feel isn’t as relevant as a USB C port.
However, something that the ULT Field 7 has over all of these speakers is that it has a quarter inch input, so you can plug in a microphone for karaoke or you can even plug in a guitar. But if you are interested in karaoke, a pro tip is you can use Sony’s ULT Wireless microphones, and this way you can have two microphones going to karaoke. But nonetheless, being able to connect a mic to the ULT Field 7 just makes it more versatile.
And when it comes to overall connectivity, both the ULT Field 7 and ULT Field 5 have an audio jack so you can use these speakers with a wired connection, where as with the ULT Field 3 and 1, you can only use them wirelessly. But when it comes to bluetooth connection, all of these speakers can be connected to two devices at the same time so you and friend can both be DJ, latency is not an issue for any of these speakers so you can use them to watch videos on your phone… and when it comes to audio codecs, both the ULT 1 and 3 and 5 have support for SBC and AAC… where as both the ULT Field 7 has support for SBC, AAC and LDAC. However in order to use LDAC you do have to be an android user cause iPhones top out at AAC.
But with all of that being said, lets talk about sound. Regarding speaker set up, but the ULT Field 1 and ULT Field 3 have a fronted firing woofer, a frontward firing tweeter and dual passive radiairots that shoot out the sides. Where as the Sony ULT Field 5 has a single frontward firing woofer with dual frontward firing tweeters and dual passive radiators that shoot out the sides. And finally theres the ULT Field 7 which has dual frontward firing woofers, dual frontward firing tweeter and dual passive radiators that shoot out the sides. And the fact that both the Sony ULT Field 1 and ULT Field 3 have a woofer and tweeter set up is a big deal, cause this is going to hep with instrument seperation and this speaker set up is usually reserved for more premium speakers.
Tweeter demo
So like you may have just seen, the woofer handles the mids and the tweeter handles the highs. But now we’re going to jump into the sound test, the ULT Field 7 is playing at 75% volume, where as all of these other speakers are playing at max volume… and we’re also going to be using dual ULT Field 1’s while in stereo mode.
Sound test
So obviously, the larger the speaker, the louder and more bass you’re going to get. I feel that the Sony ULT Field 7 is going to be good for like a 15 to 20 person party… plus you can do karaoke. The ULT Field 5 is good for like a 10 to 12 person party. The ULT Field 3 is good for like an 8 person get together and the ULT Field 1 is good for like a 5 person get together. Now in the event that you are using dual ULT field 1’s… I think they sound better and perform better than a Single ULT field 3… but an ULT Field 5 still sounds better than dual ULT field 1’s.
But also, since the ULT Field 5 has dual frontward firing tweeters, this speaker sounds more open and the highs are less harsh than the highs on the ULT Field 3 cause it only has one tweeter… So if you’re trying to choose between the ULT Field 3 and ULT Field 5… yes you’re going to get more volume and more bass, but you’re also going to get better instrument separation. And finally theres the Sony ULT Field 7 which is obviously going to be the loudest speaker here. But no matter what, with all of these speakers, something that sony has really been focusing on is strong mids and deep bass…
And finally lets talk about pairing these speakers up with other speakers. Now with all of these speakers, if you have two of the exact same speakers than you can wirelessly pair them up and get them to play in left and right stereo mode. And with the Dual ULT Field 1’s you saw that they sounds more open… but they also got louder and they had more bass. But with the ULT Field 1, you can only pair two speakers together.
Where as with all of these other speakers therye all using party connect, So you can pair your sony ULT Field 7, ULT Field 5 or ULT Field 3 together and get them to play in sync… and you can also pair them up to older sony speakers that are also using party connect like either an XG500, XG300, XE300, XE200, or to an XB43, XB33 or XB23. And you can also pair your smaller speakers to Sony’s larger box speakers that are also using Party connect like either an ULT Tower 10, Tower 9, XV800, XV500 or XP700 or XP500.
The only unfortunate thing here like I said, you cant connect your Sony ULT Field 1 to any of these other speakers cause this speaker does not have Party connect.
But with all of that being said, Sony’s new ULT Field line up speakers are all great and they all hit a few main topics. They all sound great cause they all put an emphasis on the mids and sound pressure and they all have a lot of bass. And they all put an emphasis on portability and durability. Now obviously the larger the speaker the louder its going to get and the more bass youre going to have. But if you’re trying to choose between the ULT field 3 and ULT field 5, you are going to have better instrument separation on the ULT Field 5 thanks to the additional tweeter. Also with the ULT field 5 you’re going to have a light feature thats worth using. Now the light feature on the ULT Field 7 is okay… but id rather save on battery life… but I do like that you can plug in a microphone for kakroke… and finally theres the Sony ULT Field 1… this is currently my favorite small sized speaker to use and recommend. The only unfortunate thing is, it doesn’t have party connect so you cant pair it up to Sony’s other speakers.