LATEST ADDITIONS

Are there repetitive things you do with your phone? Of course there are. Maybe you always turn on Pandora when you get in your car. Maybe you turn off your screen lock password when you’re home. Maybe you turn your phone on vibrate when you get to work.

What if your phone did this, and a whole lot more, automatically? What if it responded to any command you said. What if it read you your incoming texts while you were driving, and auto-replied that you were in the car?

This is the promise of the incredibly powerful app, Tasker.

AT A GLANCE
Plus
Fast and simple setup
Long transmission range
Zero detectable latency
Minus
Optical input doesn’t support Dolby or DTS bitstreams

THE VERDICT
XStream works exactly as promised, beaming audio around the home with little effort. Easily integrates with existing audio distribution systems or functions standalone.

Thanks to companies like Sonos and Bluesound, wireless audio distribution systems are gaining real traction in the marketplace. And if you’re starting from ground zero, these can be terrific options for sending music around an existing home.

But what if you have an existing audio system you want to expand on? Say an older Elan, Niles, or Russound housewide system that’s feeding multiple rooms that you want to add to? Or if you purchased a multi-zone A/V receiver and want to add music to a far bedroom or porch? Or maybe you just want to add some surround channels to the back of a room or new Dolby Atmos speakers that wouldn’t be possible or cost effective to do with traditional wiring? If any of those sounds like you, Russound’s new XStream X1 wireless audio system might be the perfect solution.