Skip to main content

Hi-Fi Corner: Meet the B&W T7, a perfect gift for the person who has everything

Got a certain impossible-to-buy-for someone on your gift list? We’ve got just the thing: Bowers and Wilkins has finally made a portable Bluetooth speaker worthy of bearing its storied name, and there’s nothing else quite like it. Check out the B&W T7.

Bowers & Wilkins may have taken its sweet time coming up with a portable Bluetooth speaker it could be proud of, but the result of the company’s patient work is a battery-powered Bluetooth speaker that incorporates just enough of the speaker maker’s proprietary technology to make it special, and sound quality with B&W’s signature character.

Recommended Videos

What sets the T7 apart from its competition is its honeycomb framework, which comes from B&W’s lauded 800 Series Diamond Loudspeakers, a fixture in the famed Abbey Road Studios in London. That pattern isn’t just for looks, it makes the speaker’s enclosure more rigid, which helps buck sound-muddying cabinet resonances. It’s effective, too, as we’ve yet to hear a speaker that is able to maintain such a clean sound from top to bottom..Even the Braven 850, which stands as one of our favorite high-end Bluetooth speakers, suffers from a bit of enclosure hum when the bass really gets going.

Armed with class-D digital amplification, and two 50mm full range drivers with matching bass radiators, the speaker reaches deep into the bass region, getting low enough to provide a truly full sound with crystal clear midrange and just the right amount of sparkle in the treble. For non-Bluetooth devices, the T7 offers a 3.55 auxiliary jack. The only thing the T7 doesn’t do is charge your device, but it sounds good enough that we’re willing to give it a pass.

The T7’s $350 price tag is steep, to be sure, but then again, so is the competing Bang & Olufsen A2, which seeks $50 more. And we think the T7 is just a bit more handsome.

Give this to your friend with impossibly good taste, and their bound to be thrilled. But even if they aren’t, you can always keep it for yourself.

Available at Amazon
Don’t ruin your cigars: here’s how to properly season a new humidor
Seasoning secrets every cigar lover could use
faceless man presenting a cigar humidor with cigars inside with gloved hands

If you're a newcomer to the world of cigars or just bought a brand-new humidor, you'll need to season it. And no, I'm not saying to add salt and pepper to it. If you've never heard of it, you might ask, "What is seasoning for a humidor?"

Don't think you need to flavor the box or anything — seasoning is really about getting the wood inside your humidor so as not to rob your cigars of precious moisture. Easy to understand, and getting it done is relatively straightforward as well. The trick is figuring out the "why," and we'll get into that in a bit. But let's first discuss seasoning a humidor.

Read more
The NBA’s ultimate celebration tool: The victory cigar
A look at the players and coaches who smoke to celebrate
Jordan smoking a cigar image on a bag

Sports are synonymous with celebration. After winning the biggest trophy of their lives, athletes want to indulge in the payoff that comes with seeing their dreams realized. Teams go into the locker room, where a waterfall of champagne hits them in the eyes, and swimming goggles seem to be a requirement, lest you walk around on the best night of your life half blind. While drinking is often the activity of choice after winning a championship, the NBA has an alternative symbol of greatness that other sports don't use nearly enough: the victory cigar.

Basketball is a team game, but it's also an individual canvas for solo superstardom. After winning an NBA championship, the coaches and players who sit atop the throne have long smoked a cigar in the locker room, during the parade, or even on the bench before the clock has hit zero. There's nothing quite like a good stogie to signify the ultimate win over the rest of the league, but how did the victory cigar get so ingrained in NBA championship celebrations? We want to take a walk down memory lane and look at some of the historical moments and people who made the cigar what it is within the NBA today.
Red Auerbach's victory cigar on the bench
Red Auerbach: The Story Behind the Victory Cigar + His Disdain of NBA Officials - Red on Roundball

Read more
The best medical shows of all time to binge now
From ER to The Pitt, these are the best medical shows ever made
Noah Wyle in the Pitt

Throughout TV's long history, the medical drama has occupied a somewhat unique place in the landscape. Medical shows are often some of the most reliable on TV precisely because there's so much drama built in to working in a hospital.

Personally, I've found the medical drama to be deeply comforting for years, even if I have no desire to be a doctor myself. Understanding the stress of people in the healthcare profession is fascinating in and of itself.

Read more