Mackie FreePlay Live Personal PA with Bluetooth

I purchased a pair to setup in a bluetooth connected stereo setup. It was not intuitive to setup the pairing between the speakers, had to use the instructions. Basically hold down some buttons on the primary and then hold down other buttons on the secondary.Sound is really more than I expected. I set them up in the middle of the desert on a table and was about 50 feet away. With the volume almost all of the way up the sound was crisp and clear. Not a lot of bass on these but that is not what I expected or wanted.Most of the time I will be using these to play music and plug in a mic for a MC. They are very light and portable. Bought the bags as well to carry them.I think that these will easily work especially as a pair for a crowd of around 100 indoors or a typical backyard no problem.

I'm not a newbie with sound equipment - I've been the sound tech at my church for 13 yrs, I shoot and edit video for live music / orchestra performances with multiple sound sources, etc., etc.I ordered this speaker to help me in class as a teacher as I've had several vocal operations and cannot project without stress and pain. My school had Bose S1 that they let me use until I could get something else. After the usual deep dive, I chose this one and it's a Mackie so I knew the quality of build and potentially sound would be above average. When I played some of my reference music through it I was gobsmacked (good oldie word). I was not expecting the air and smoothness of bass from this speaker given its size. Listening to beautiful bass and vocals from Blues and Decker on it is pure joy. U2's One with Mary J Blithe - wow. Anyway, you get the picture. And that's not even its primary designed use for live performances.For my teaching, it's great - I use the Senn Ew100 and a cardioid mic (not omni) so that there's no feedback as I move around the class. Students can hear me loud and clear and I have no stress in speaking.If I have 1 'meh', it's the bt distance - I think it tops out at around 10m inside a building. Not sure about clear line of sight. I don't know if the freeplay home sounds this good but if it's even close then that would be a great bt speaker at half the price.

Sounds great

I guess I am an early adopter of this new model and that may have its ups and downs. I don't know if my reservations about the product could be fixed by a firmware upgrade or app upgrade, both or nether:The Good:1. The general sound (without reverb) is good and clear. It's loud enough, given its small size for a small to medium size room. If you were working a club with much noise, you would probably want more.2. With respect to portability, the size and weight can't be beat. The handle works well. It would be nice if the tote bag was included.3. Battery seems to charge easily and it sounds the same under battery as it does plugged in. It's important that it charges while plugged in and you can use it whether plugged in or not.The Not So Good:1. The reverb is just OK for my taste. You might like it. It's a bit dark for me and sustains too long. The previous FreePlay (that I have not used personally) had a choice of reverbs as well as delay but this does not seem to have that. Perhaps that could be changed with a firmware upgrade or perhaps not. Only the designers would know that. Too bad to lose features with a new model.2. Some of my guitars are pretty low output and I have to max the fader on them to get anywhere near acceptable volume. I've also tried several mics and some of them also seem to have volume problems. I was under the impression from something I read that the FreePlay was supposed to have some sort of internal circuitry that automatically compensated as an input pre would. If that's the case, I don't think it's working.3. The app - The app for the previous FreePlay version does not work. The new one is pretty basic. As I said before, it has no option for modifying the reverb other than turning it on and off and adjusting the amount of Send from each input. More options like the previous model had would be nice. Also, I think I would prefer EQ sliders like the previous version over the graphic EQ "bouncing balls" the current app has... just personal preference. One other thing, the app should have a setting to keep the screen on. If you are trying to adjust setting on the fly during a performance, it is unworkable to have your phone locking all the time. I'm using another "Screen On" app to get around this problem, but it would be nice if the app provided that.Summary:I don't know? If it wasn't so darn light and clean sounding (aside from the reverb), I would send it back. I still may, but I'm letting it settle in. Maybe some quick firmware tweaks or app tweaks will save it.

We do private weddings in remote areas and this did everything we need... Selling points for me.... can use a standard mic stand with the adaptor it comes with, remote control on your phone is fantastic and weighs only 8 lbs. Sounds great, works well so far, very satisfied with this product.Follow Up 2021 - Great product when works. Now battery not charging. Not portable, useless. Mackie support sent replacement battery, unit still won't charge battery. For price, poor quality and unreliable, no durability. Avoid, go Bose S1 Pro, less hassles and reliable, based on my experience with Bose L1 Compact I've used for years, solid and reliable.

I bought 2 of these units as an ultra portable set of speakers for small parties. Overall, the portability and weight of the units are good. Connectivity, distance of use is good. Pairing of the units to work stereo functioned properly. App functionality was so-so. Sound quality was ok. I had 2 major issues. First, one of the units would not charge properly. I called Mackie and not even they could tell me how to read the charging indicator as there is no information in the manual. By comparing the 2nd unit, I was able to determine what I should be looking at to determine charge status. Secondly, the battery life is no where near advertised. I ran them on 2 tests till they died. At medium volume and at full volume, I got at best around 4.5 to 5 hours which is not the 15 hours as advertised!