Polk Audio today announced its Command Bar, an Alexa-enabled soundbar, will receive a software update adding Amazonâs multi-room music (MRM) protocol. Itâs the first third-party smart speaker to do so.
The Command Bar is among the best sounding speakers featuring Alexa support, but it suffers from a lack of features when compared to Amazonâs first-party products.
Until now, it was an isolated speaker (plus sub-woofer) that sounded great, but couldnât join the party if you wanted to make the whole house jam to the same tunes.
Amazonâs MRM is one of those features you donât know you need until you experience it. Itâs triggered by telling Alexa to play the music you want ⌠everywhere. For example, you can say âAlexa, play 1990s hip hop everywhere,â and it will literally play a song by Tupac on every single smart speaker in the entire world.
Thatâs a lie. Itâll actually only play music on the Alexa-enabled smart speakers on your network that support MRM.
But if youâre like me, and youâve got an Echo Dot or similar device in every room but the bathroom (because Dots arenât waterproof), this is music to your ears.
Thereâs nothing quite like the joy I experience waking my family up at 0600 every morning by shouting âAlexa, play âMmmbopâ by Hanson everywhereâ at the top of my lungs. Now my Command Bar can join the choir.
The update begins rolling out today. For more information check out our review of the Polk Audio Command Bar here.
We reached out to Polk Audio and Amazon for comment and will update this story as necessary.
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