Skip to main content

Hal 9000 meets premium sound in the new OD-11 Cloud Speaker

hal 9000 meets premium sound new od 11 cloud speaker
Image used with permission by copyright holder
When it comes to classic speaker designs, few are as iconic and distinctive as Stig Carlsson’s OD-11, a solid block of sound from the 70’s that offered performance, and aesthetic sensibilities that were far ahead of its time. Recently, Carlsson’s fellow Swedes at Teenage Engineering decided it was time for the famed “Carlsson Cube” to stage a comeback, morphing the vintage-yet-futuristic design into modern wireless block of sound in the new OD-11 Cloud Speaker.

One of the things that made the original OD-11 such a great performer was its omni-directional sound pattern, which allowed the cubic cabinet to disperse powerful sound throughout room. The new OD-11 Cloud holds on to that design with the configuration of its dual premium drivers, including a long throw pulp cone woofer, and a ferrofluid-cooled cone tweeter. The speaker also packs 100 watts of class D analog power on board to blast sound from a low 28Hz, up to 20kHz.

Recommended Videos

The speaker is also built for the new age of audio, and that means wireless streaming and more. An on-board “brain” in the form of a processor called the Ortho Engine allows the speaker to do some fancy tricks, including controlling DSP, streaming via Wi-Fi with Airplay support as well as Bluetooth, and even reading your Twitter feed via a built-in voice synthesizer – if you’re into that sort of thing.

Of course, the cloud also comes into play via an iPhone app that allows the speaker to source music from your preferred cloud-based service, with the ability to add more services through future updates. And once you’ve set the OD-11 up for cloud playback, the speaker’s Ortho Engine is designed to remember “everything you have played since the day you first turned on the OD-11,” and will also source sound from the cloud with or without your phone connected.

We don’t know about you, but this speaker is the kind of device that reminds us we’re planted deeply into the future these days – and damned if the future isn’t awesome. If you’d like a piece of that state-of-the-art feeling – with a neo-retro twist – you can order up your own OD-11 Cloud Speaker from Teenage Engineer’s website today for a cool $900.

Ryan Waniata
Former Digital Trends Contributor
Ryan Waniata is an audio engineer, musician, composer, and all-around lover of all things tech, audio, and cinema. Hailing…
NYT Connections hints and answers for October 11, 2024
The logo for Connections.

From the people that bring you the crossword and Spelling Bee, Connections is the latest NYT Games sensation that has the internet abuzz. Although the game is still word-based, Connections is fundamentally different than many of the other games released by NYT Games and can be uniquely frustrating as a result. It tests your ability to group words together into coherent categories and presents a different challenge every time you play it. And, like Wordle and so many other NYT Games, you can share your results with friends and compare them as soon as you're done.

Connections is still in a sort of testing phase at the moment, but given the game's success to date, it seems clear that the game could have the kind of legs that make it a long-running success that people integrate into their everyday lives. Like Wordle, and unlike the crossword, it's a relatively quick game, which means that playing it doesn't have to eat up your entire day. That's part of the reason so many people have gotten devoted to it and why you may be seeing more Connections results in group chats and on your social media feeds than you were a few weeks ago.
How to play Connections
The premise of Connections is relatively straightforward. The game gives you 16 words that are totally unsorted, and your job is to sort those words into four categories of four. A group of words may be combined because they're all associated with another word or thing, like "car parts" for example, or because they have something else in common, like "ends with x." The categories can be almost anything, and the smart folks behind Connections work extra hard to make sure it's hard to file things away neatly into categories. There's plenty of ambiguity, which is why you get four wrong guesses before you lose the game.

Read more
Want to spook yourself? Check out some of the best horror movies ever made
From The Thing to Get Out, these are some of the most riveting horror movies ever made
The Shining

A great horror movie is often something distinct from most of the genre's offerings. Few genres have been more historically reliable at the box office, and that's in part because a pretty good horror movie is all audiences need to get their thrills.

The movies on this list, though, stand out above others from the genre. The very best horror movies leave you unsettled not just while you're watching them, but also for weeks afterward. They remind you of how horrifying the world around you can be, even as they also offer delights that can make them endlessly rewatchable. Without further ado, these are the best horror movies ever made:

Read more
Prime Big Deal Days Samsung The Frame Deals 2024: Still available
Samsung's The Frame on a wall surrounded by paintings and docarations

Update 10/11/24: If you were planning to buy Samsung's The Frame TV during Amazon's Prime Big Deal Days but you weren't able to, you're in luck because most of the discounts that were offered during the shopping event are still online. If the specific size that you want is still on sale, you better hurry with your purchase as we're not sure how much time is remaining before these prices return to normal.

Some Prime Day deals are still available after the close of Prime Big Deal Days, including some spectacular Prime Day TV deals. For this page, we've focused specifically on Samsung The Frame TV deals that you can still shop.

Read more