Hands-on review: Majority Quadriga Internet Radio Music System

The Quadriga connected music system, from Cambridge-based brand Majority, is the Bard’s big brother with similar specifications, but with the addition of a CD player and more powerful speakers.

Depending on your aural predilections – and perhaps your age – the need for a CD player would likely be what influences your choice between the two models, as they are otherwise essentially the same. Sure, the Quadriga sounds louder, but the Bard still has the potential to annoy neighbors when cranked.

We put the Quadriga through its paces, mainly because we have hundreds of CDs that have sat in a cupboard for far too long, their only compatible player in these modern times is now the car stereo. Rediscovering the collection in a domestic situation was thrilling enough – and the Quadriga sounds really good. The CD player is not a symbolic addition. The sound is rich and full, pumped out by the dual mid speaker drivers and 4-inch (10cm) tweeter accompanied by a 6-inch (15cm) subwoofer. very immersive listening, from a lively and well-defined bass up through the audio spectrum, to the high frequency “pixie dust” region. It never sounds shrill or overly digital. Dare we say analog-like?

From any source and with any style of music, the sound projected well into the room and the plentiful volume on tap meant that – as well as being louder than you’ll probably rarely, if ever, need – there’s ample headroom clean to avoid distortion.

Like the Bard, the Quadriga also offers Bluetooth 5.0 and Spotify Connect, as well as DAB, DAB+, FM and Internet radio tuners (an extendable antenna is included in the box for optimal radio reception), as well as physical connections (RCA level line, aux-in, a USB flash drive socket, 3.5mm jack, digital optical inputs) and a dedicated podcast hub for instant access to your favorite shows in one place. While it can’t play vinyl records or cassettes directly, the Quadriga still offers ways to connect other players to its audio playback engine (e.g. Bluetooth your modern turntable to the unit, or connect directly via the line-in RCA jacks analog). The Quadriga covers virtually all audio formats. There is also a 1/4″ headphone jack.

The Quadriga’s “black rectangle” form factor is easy to fit into a room. It’s about the width of a standard turntable, but not as deep (27cm deep x 43cm wide x 12.8cm high). There’s a large, bright TFT color display in the center of the unit, providing visual feedback on operation, connection, album art from streaming services, and so on. A row of buttons below the screen facilitates most functions, used in conjunction with the right-hand rotary knob as a selector and volume control. The overall design is a nice blend of classic hi-fi stereo equipment, but with plenty of modern smarts.

There’s even a well-specified remote control, so you can perform the most common tasks without getting out of your chair, including turning it on and off. There’s also a CD eject button on the remote, though of course you’ll eventually have to get out of your chair to actually retrieve and change the CD itself. I am sorry about that.

The Quadriga is heavy, reassuring. Talk about a decent build quality, with a metal plate folded around a solid wood internal frame. The two front-facing speakers are on either side of the centered screen (not a touchscreen), with the subwoofer at the bottom.

When you turn it on for the first time you are encouraged (by the Setup Wizard) to set up the system correctly, including menu language, time and date format, checking for firmware updates, and connecting to your local wireless network . You don’t have to do this – ever, as it happens – if you’re in a hurry to start listening to your old CDs, even if you’ll miss out on many of the advanced Internet-related features. You can just connect the thing via Bluetooth, connect other devices, insert a CD without any problems.

We took exactly this eager approach for at least the first two weeks we spent with the Quadriga, playing music via Spotify, Apple Music and Vox (for 24/96 hi-res FLAC files) via Bluetooth, as well as rooting via the our dusty CD collection to play forgotten favorites. We got lost in music very quickly. As we said above, pretty much everything sounded great, even the weaker old mp3 files and lackluster streaming bitrates.

When you finally get the system configured properly (you can call up the Setup Wizard at any time), you can start tapping into and exploring the 25,000-plus global Internet radio stations that Quadriga can pull down. The device supports 40 presets, so you can save your favorites as soon as you find them. This is great if you already know you like a certain radio station from a certain territory that is otherwise only available locally.

Being a compact unit with all three speakers positioned so close to each other, you’ll never get a large stereo spread, unless the music has been mixed extremely wide. However, if you sit directly in front of the unit, looking at the screen, and look for a track with extreme stereo panning, like The Jimi Hendrix Experience’s “Crosstown Traffic” (or pretty much anything from the “Electric Ladyland” album, which shoots all the way around the gaff across the stereo plane) you’ll clearly hear aspects of the mix traveling back and forth from speaker to speaker as intended.

Another test we did was to play the original Beatles “extreme L/R separation” stereo mixes of the early albums, where you can distinctly hear John, Paul and most of the guitars are into a speaker, while the drums , bass and claps are in the other. Sure enough, the Quadriga produced a great representation of the song and recording intent, almost despite the extreme panning of the mix. (Side note: obviously, you’re better off with mono mixes for most Beatles albums).

There are some additional features that are nice to have, if not essential. A sleep timer allows you to play music for a specified amount of time (15, 30, 45, 60, 90 or 120 minutes) before the unit turns off. There’s even an alarm clock with snooze function, if you want to use the Quadriga as a waking beast. Finally, there’s an equalizer on board, so you can adjust the unit’s sounds to your preference – choose from the provided presets or customize them completely. Majority also offers a three-year extended warranty, once you register the unit, which is great, as well as planting a tree for every sale you make – of any of its products, in fact – which is highly commendable.

The Quadriga is a great all-round music system. It solves almost all problems of listening to legacy music collections and works well with other equipment to bring everything together around one device. While it has a number of useful additional features (such as those mentioned above), with an all-rounder unit like this, how it plays is the ultimate test and most critical request – and the Quadriga sounds very good indeed. No disappointments. Very easy to recommend.

Majority quadriga

279.95