Sennheiser TeamConnect Intelligent Speaker Review

In the world of smart speakers, Sennheiser introduced an intelligent speaker for meeting rooms. The TeamConnect Intelligent speaker is claimed to be the ultimate audio solution optimized for midsize Microsoft Teams meeting rooms for up to 10 people. As you know, Sennheiser is a well-known brand in meeting room solutions, the new device is indeed an innovative solution for making meetings more focused. Let’s find out its capabilities –

Design and setup

It is a rounded speaker with a sleek profile. At first look, it can remind you of other smart speaker brands available in the market. The top doesn’t have any branding, it houses seven beamforming microphones. There is a capacitive mute button that allows you to mute or unmute at any time during the meeting. The bottom holds an Omni-directional speaker that covers a radius of 3.5 meters.

The setup won't take much of your time. It comes with all the required connection cables. The speaker combines a non-detachable USB Type C cable that connects to a hub holding a USB type C port at one side along with microUSB and power ports at the other end. Connect the power to the hub and MicroUSB cable to the Microsoft Teams Rooms (MTR) console.

If you want to mount the speaker in one place, you can use the included screw mount or adhesive pad. Once you equip the Microsoft Teams room with the TeamConnects Intelligent speaker, your meeting participants are ready to go after the one-time installation.

Performance

Sennheiser TeamConnect Intelligent Speaker works without additional devices like laptops or smartphones. it supports up to 10 participants in one meeting room. Participants can control the meeting over the console and hands-free with the speaker's flawless integration with the voice assistant Cortana.

The intelligent speaker lets you create a live transcript of who said what in the room for each meeting. It can distinguish up to 10 different voices and display them as captions in real-time for remote meeting participants and people that are hard of hearing. The Office 365 Cloud securely stores the transcripts as text documents that you can access later for reference, share or delete at any time.

I used the device for our internal meetings and the experience was amazing. The omnidirectional speaker is powerful enough to fill a small room. The sound quality is impeccable, you can hear all the voices clearly. The integrated beamforming microphones are flawless in capturing participants' voices. This intelligent speaker is capable of distinguishing up to 10 different voices. It can display them as a caption in real time for remote meeting participants and people that are hard of hearing. Using the Cortana voice recognition, you can automate your meeting experience as well.

Overall, it’s a perfect solution for small meeting rooms, but you have to deal with multiple cables. Though the setup is simple, you will see multiple cables connecting you to the speaker and MTR console, hope soon we would see a wireless or single cable solution from Sennheiser.