De-smarting the Marshall Uxbridge
owl writes:
https://tomscii.sig7.se/2025/01/De-smarting-the-Marshall-Uxbridge
This is the story of a commercially unavailable stereo pair of the bi-amped Marshall Uxbridge, with custom-built replacement electronics: active filters feeding two linear power amps. Listening to this high-fidelity set has brought me immense enjoyment. Play a great album on these near-fields, and the result is close to pure magic! Over and above the accurate reproduction of a wide audio range, the precision and depth of its stereo imaging is stunning.
Dumpster diving electronics is a way of life, which sometimes brings great moments of joy. One of these moments happened when I stumbled upon... the Marshall Uxbridge Voice, a smart speaker, in seemingly pristine condition. And not just one, but two of them! One was black, the other white. What a find!
What to do with these babies? Intrigued by the question "what could be wrong with them, why would someone throw them out like that?" - I set out to investigate. Plugging in one of them, after a few seconds of waiting, a female voice was heard: NOW IN SETUP MODE. FOLLOW THE INSTRUCTIONS IN YOUR DEVICE'S COMPANION APP.
[...] At that moment I knew I was not into smart speakers. Or at least not into the smartness. The speakers were good. Oh, they were excellent! But they had to be de-smarted. Preferably with a single, dumb, analog RCA line input on their backs, so nobody but me gets to decide over the program material. That way I could also drive them as a stereo pair. No Bluetooth, no latency, no female robot overlord, just a good old-fashioned line input!
Seems like a modest ask. Can we have it? Well, time to look inside!
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