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E-Gear on
iHog from Speakal
Hannah Szabo, E-Gear
Review: Speakal's
iHog iPod Dock
October 17,
2011 By Hannah Szabo
I first heard
about Speakal's new iHog iPod docking station when I wrote an article about
its product specifications after its launch. I thought to myself, "Wow, what
a unique idea! -- an animal shaped iPod dock!"
Admittedly, I couldn't wait to review the iHog. I have always liked Apple
products for their style and ease of use. I have a very old iPod Classic and
the standard gray iHome, which works just fine, but isn't quite the
conversation starter like the iHog.
I received the pink iHog (it also comes in white). It is about the size of a
child's soccer ball and it fits nicely on a desk. Its large eyes and belly
serve as the speakers and its mouth lights up if you press a function
button. From a purely aesthetic point of view, it's really cute and it fits
right in with my eclectic decorating style.
I put my iPod in the universal docking station (it plays every kind of iPod
device) and prepared myself to be blown away. To an extent, I was. The sound
quality that the iHog boasts really is amazing. Every song that I listened
to was clear and the bass was not overwhelming. The hog's ears serve as
touch-sensitive volume controls and worked well. They live up to their
promise of being incredibly sensitive and at some points, I found myself
accidentally muting my songs instead of just turning the volume down.
However, I did experience some difficulties getting my dinosaur of an iPod
to connect with the iHog. The iHog would play my songs and would control the
volume, however, it would not let me stop songs or skip forward or backward.
Fortunately, when I tried a newer iPod that hadn't taken so many dives off
of a treadmill, everything worked exactly as Speakal promised.
Overall, I really like the iHog. Not only is it cute and whimsical but it
also functions wonderfully (if you have an iPod that is in decent shape).
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