California's premium headphone maker Audeze has launched its first non-headphone product on Indiegogo. The Filter portable personal conference speaker uses machine learning to cut out background noise on-the-fly, while its planar speaker tech delivers top notch audio to the user.
The Filter has been designed for folks who might find themselves having to call at the office once or twice a week instead of every day, and work from home the rest of the time. The device can also be used while on the move too, without having to worry about what's going on around you cutting into the meeting.
As its name suggests, the Filter makes use of adjustable dual-beamforming microphones and AI noise cancellation technology to ensure that backgrounds noises don't spoil the conference call or video chat wherever you're set up to take the call, while the company's acclaimed planar magnetic speaker technology delivers incoming audio to the user in the home office.
"This is a product designed for the hybrid workforce," said company CEO, Sankar Thiagasamudram. "You can use it at home to take your online meetings, but it’s small enough to slip into your backpack for your conference call or huddle rooms at work."
The unit's neural-network-on-a-chip noise cancellation tech has been trained on 500,000 noise samples so that it can recognize and cut background sounds in real time without adversely affecting the voice clarity of the solo worker or small team on the call. Meanwhile, the user is treated to audio from a 70 x 105-mm planar magnetic speaker that features Audeze's own low-distortion, high-efficiency Fluxor magnets, Uniforce voice coil and ultra-thin diaphragm for the promise of "unrivaled clarity" for the listener.
The Filter is about the same size as a smartphone at 6 x 3 x 0.4 in (152 x 76 x 11 mm), is wrapped in a sturdy aluminum housing and boasts a per-charge run-time of around 15 hours. It's split design has a touch control panel on one part and a speaker unit on the other that can be raised off the table top and angled toward the worker(s).
There's USB and Bluetooth 5.0 for connecting a smartphone, tablet or computer, and the device is reported compatible with conferencing apps like Zoom, Microsoft Teams, Skype and Google Meets.
Though crowdfunding campaigns do carry a risk for project backers, it's a pretty safe bet that Audeze will deliver on its already-funded Indiegogo, with pledges starting at US$175 (a saving of almost 30 percent on the expected suggested retail price of $249). If all goes smoothly, shipping is estimated to start in February 2022. The walkthrough video below has more.
Source: Audeze