GRAND VIDEOKE Symphony 2.0 Review - The Smart Videoke With Voice Commands!

How I Met Your Mother is one of our all time favorite sit-coms ever made, and in its first season's episode: The Pineapple Incident, Ted tells Carl the bartender that Karaoke is Japanese for empty orchestra which Ted comments to be 'hauntingly beautiful!' 

GRAND VIDEOKE Symphony review

Over the years, it has become a staple for Filipino familes to have Karaoke night during special occasions and to sing Karaoke with friends during a night out of fun. So, creating a product that enables familes to have their own personal Karaoke at home is an interesting proposition.

Enter GRAND VIDEOKE Symphony 2.0, a flagship grade Korean made Videoke with compact design, powerful features, and dual microphone system. Will this be the right machine for you? Find out in this review.

Disclaimer: This unit was provided by GRAND VIDEOKE for an honest review

Unboxing / Accessories

The Grand Videoke box

The GRAND VIDEOKE Symphony 2.0 surprisingly has a huge box and we were surprised at what was included inside the package.

The handy bag that's perfect for travels

It has its own own handy bag, two microphones, two sets of batteries, HDMI and RCA cables, power plug, song list, song storage, remote control and video input cable.

The rest of what you'll find inside

Equipped with both HD 720P video, HD sound and over 5,157 songs plus the handy bag makes this one of the best package around. Lastly, it comes with an easy to understand "quick start guide" which you need to read to operate the machine properly.

Build Quality / Design

The Symphony 2.0 in its full view

The build is noticeably tough with sharp angles and smooth curves that reminds us of a clarinet with piano black finish designed in Japan. The finish of the body itself feels a little too smooth as it attracts fingerprints and at times we felt that it didn't feel as premium as it should be.

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Fortunately, the microphone is solidly constructed with tough metal grills on top. We dropped the mic quite high once and didn't even have a scratch or dent. That's quite surprising.

The mic is solid, wonderful to hold, and comes with easy to use controls!

The shape of the grip allows for a tactile but grippy feel that gave us this feeling of reassurance that it won't slip through our fingers. Overall, we like its ergonomics.

The controls and microphone slots on the side

After unboxing, we decided to set it up to our LED TV where it was surprisingly easy to set up with just a couple wires to plug-in. The power socket, the HDMI and the RCA cables. We also liked that there are dual slots for microphones that's perfect for duets. It even has a 3.5 mm female port where you can plug your favorite headphones with mic for your personal videoke.

Sound Quality

One of the highlights of this device is its sound quality. It comes with probably the most refined tunes I heard on a Videoke machine that's not inside a Karaoke bar. We found that almost all the songs we play has that clear, loud, and deep audio performance with nice tonal balance. It is musical, detailed (hear the separation of tunes well), and simply easy on the ears.

Arguably, this is the best sounding portable Videoke ever heard yet!

With the exception of few new songs, the Dream sound module from France really works and gives you that feeling of being on stage.

The microphone performance is also clean and clear. It is also not prone to noise that gives you that condenser grade like quality.

Note: We also never experienced annoying static noise from the microphone.

Performance

We found that the interface has a slight learning curve (If you don't read the manual). It may take you 10 to 20 minutes to get used to the way the interface works but when you do get it, Switching from song to song and doing several commands will be a breeze.

It would be better if they offered a cheat sheet for the different extra functions of the different buttons to help the user get past the learning curve faster.

It was a little ironic that using the wireless microphones were easier to use than the remote control itself which I think is a good thing because the less you have to pick up to use the better.

The voice command interface

The GRAND VIDEOKE Symphony 2.0 has several unique features like Voice Commands (3 years of development to make it accurate), Real Sound and Multiplex features. The voice commands were surprisingly accurate when navigating the menus and when selecting English songs. Filipino titles and artists gave the voice commands a hard time but when it works, it works fast and accurately.

Aside from the voice commands you can easily navigate to the search for your songs. You can choose to search by title, artist or album. There are mainstream English and OPM songs with some Visayan collection. The amount of content in this thing is staggering! In fact we were surprised to see some songs from early this year (2016).

Voice Commands (press "Voice" button to activate)

• GV Search Again- to activate searching screen again
• GV Start-start the song
• GV Reserve- reserve the song
• GV Cancel- close selection screen
• Up/Down- direction for selection screen
• Back/next- screen moves to previous/next page for

Real Sound songs are songs recorded with real instrument that were instrumental in giving us the feel of us on stage! The Multiplex songs on the other hand adds vocal recordings to help you practice before you decided to give it all on stage!

The GRAND VIDEOKE Symphony 2.0 has a large number of Visualization options that show behind the subtitles. From HD video of the world to Korean Dramas and from 3D dancing characters to K-Pop Idols! The possibilities are endless!

You can even increase the song library with the use of SD cards and the USB drives which will help in the long run! We now see where most of the money paid for goes to and it goes to the licenses of the different Intellectual properties and we almost never see this with its competitors!

Pros - Generous complete package, great audio quality, volume is loud, many visual choices, easy to navigate, voice command works, many built-in songs including the latest ones

Cons - Plasticky construction of the body

Verdict

It is a smart portable videoke machine! The GRAND VIDEOKE Symphony 2.0 comes at a premium price point where the competition is below its price. However, in terms of over all package, like the added accessories and the biggest catalog of songs and digital content, no other product comes close!

So if you are okay with the fingerprint magnet finish, the learning curve to navigate, and the worth it premium price tag, then this is a must own for those who love to get down.

For the price of 24,999 Pesos, there's no need to rent big and bulky Videoke machines anymore.

Note: The Symphony 2.0 is also available thru straight credit card up to 24 months with 0% installment. It'll be at 1,041.62 Pesos per month only.

GIZ Rating: 4.25/5 Stars