Sound quality: UE's Roll 2 had fair overall sound quality. What little bass there is has little impact is subdued and deep bass is lacking. Midrange is fairly even but is a somewhat gritty. Treble is extended but is somewhat smeared and a bit prominent. Doesn't do a good job of recovering room ambience and is somewhat congested. Bluetooth and wired sound quality are similar except that when wired upper midrange and treble is slightly subdued. Provides a decent volume level in a small to medium sized room but better suited for near field listening. The speaker is monophonic. As a stereo pair they can be placed to provide better stereo separation than many other models, and room ambience recovery improves to decent but the lack of bass keeps it in the fair range.
Ease of use: We found the UE Roll 2 ease of use to be very good overall. Bluetooth pairing requires the press of an unmarked button and then the selection of unit from Bluetooth selection list on source device; unit provides an obvious indication that the unit is in pairing mode as well as when pairing has actually occurred. The volume control are large high contrast buttons (+/-) which are also multi-function when both pressed indicating power level of unit also has max volume audible indicator. Switching sources involves plugging in the line-in cable then audio plays, but is automatically overridden by connected wireless audio playback, when wireless audio is stopped line-in audio resumes. Line-in jack is unlabeled and slightly difficult to connect found under a semi-rigid rubber flap.
