The Sony SRS XG300 mini Boombox speaker has several buttons across its top panel. Plus, there are also a couple more inside its rear port compartment. The back compartment also has audio and power inputs, and USB play and charge out ports. All this is behind the sealing cap.
The buttons on the top include
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- Power,
- Pairing,
- MEGA BASS,
- Play-Pause, and
- Volume DOWN,
- Volume UP.
Plus in the back, we find these buttons:
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- Battery-Battery Care, and
- Light.
So here we give our version of these Sony SRS XG300 buttons details. Herein, for each button, we cover what it does along with how and when to press it. Find also below, descriptions of button combinations, codes, and chords that initiate more speaker functions than pressing a single button does. Thus with this information, you can fully enjoy all the features of this excellent sounding wireless speaker.
Summary of the Ports on the Sony SRS XG300
In the port panel, sealed with a semi flexible cover, we also find a USB-C DC input charging port. There’s also a 3.5mm audio input port for either a microphone or other player device. Plus, we have a single USB-A port. This output port supports the power bank function, where you can connect a cable between it and a mobile device to recharge that device.
But here, we focus on the use of the buttons, and not the ports. So let’s get to them.
Sony SRS XG300 Buttons Explained, Each One in Detail
First, there is one row of six buttons on the top of the XG 300, and all buttons there have a unique shape as we see in the next picture. Then there’s also the buttons in the back compartment, which we’ll get to later.
The Power Button
We begin our Sony SRS XG300 buttons tour with the Power button, on the far left edge of the buttons panel, in the first group of three buttons. We indicate this with the pink arrow in the next picture. Note its round power symbol shape with the plum line through its top.
Turning the SRS XG300 ON and OFF
Press and release the Power button when the speaker is OFF, to switch it on. Press and release it again, to turn it back OFF. The Power lamp lights up when the speaker powers up, as we show in the next picture.
The speaker makes rising electronic notes sound when you turn it on. It also plays a sort of ding-dong sound if it automatically pairs with a device upon power up, and announces, “Bluetooth connected,” as well
The unit plays a falling sequence of notes when you turn it off.
So, to know for sure that this speaker has turned OFF, you must check the Power status lamp, mentioned above, or the party lights found on the sides of the unit. When the speaker is OFF, all lamps should be dark, unless you’re charging the unit. When OFF in that case, the CHARGE lamp still glows solid orange.
The Pairing Button
This button is essential when you want to connect the XG300 to a source device, and then stream music on that device to this speaker.
Activating the SRS XG300 Pairing Mode
With the speaker powered ON, you press and release quickly the Pairing button. You then hear the speaker say, “Bluetooth pairing.” The speaker is now in pairing mode.
You need to do this anytime you pair the Sony SRS XG300 with a never-before-paired Bluetooth source device.
When in pairing mode, the pairing status lamp blinks in a pulse-pulse-pause, pulse-pulse-pause pattern. And while that’s going on, the 300 sends out its name and other connection handle info over the Bluetooth air channels. Then, this allows nearby BT devices to find and pair to it.
When a device subsequently connects to the XG 300, the pairing status lamp stops flashing, and starts glowing a steady blue.
The MEGA BASS Button
The Mega Bass button alters the output sound. The SRS XG300 has three sound effect modes that you activate with this button, including the following…
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- The Mega Bass (default) mode.
- The Flat (mode,
- The Stamina mode.
Normally, the Flat and Stamina modes are both off, and Mega Bass mode is the default. So the white Mega Bass indicator lamp normally glows.
The sound appears to emulate a flat response but with significant bass boost.
Finally, Stamina mode seems to bring up the midrange and cut back on the deep bass and high treble sounds.
Trimming the very low and very high response conserves battery power and thus, allows the speaker to play longer per charge.
Activating Flat Mode
To take the speaker out of Mega Bass mode and into Flat mode, quickly press and release the Mega Bass button once.
Activating Mega Bass Mode
Now to get back to Mega Bass mode from either Flat or Stamina modes, quickly press and release the Mega Bass button once.
To Activate STAMINA Mode
From either Flat or Mega Bass mode, you turn on Stamina mode by pressing and holding the MEGA BASS button (for about three (3) seconds) until the white STAMINA indicator lamp lights up as we see in the last picture.
The Play-Pause-Call Button
The multifunction Play-Pause-Call button looks like a right-pointing arrow / triangle with two vertical lines to the right of that. There is also a phone receiver icon just above that symbol.
We find this button in the group of buttons on the front right area of the speaker, immediately to the left of the Volume DOWN button, and to the right, across the speaker, from the MEGA BASS button, as we point out with the green arrow in the next picture.
How to Use the Play-Pause-Phone Button to Stop and Start Program Play
Press and release this button quickly to pause audio play. Rapidly press it again to reverse the pause action, and resume playback.
Note that the Play-Pause-Call button is not a mute button. That is, pausing play in this way stops playback on the source Bluetooth device to which this speaker is currently paired. It does not merely just cut the speaker volume while the stream continues going. If streaming, the play stops. So, you won’t miss any content when you pause the speaker, as the source device (your phone, tablet, or computer) remembers where the content was paused. Then it picks up playback where it left off, when you press the play pause button.
How to Use the Play-Pause-Call Button to Change Songs
To skip ahead to the next song in the playlist you’re listening to, quickly press and release this button two times.
To start the currently-playing song over again, quickly press and release this button three times.
If you want to skip backward in the playlist to the start of the previous song, get to the beginning of the current song. Again, to do that, press the Play-Pause-Call button three times. Then as soon as the song starts over, quickly press and release this button again three times.
How to Use the Play-Pause-Call Button to Answer a Call on the XG300
If you have your 300 paired with your phone, and a call comes in, you can pick it up on this speaker by quickly pressing and releasing this button once. Detail: The phone ringing sound comes through the XB300 and the program you were playing pauses.
The 300 then becomes a speakerphone. I.e. You’ll hear callers on the speaker, and they will hear you via the built in mic. See the location of this tiny condenser microphone in the next picture. It’s in the front, just below the Pairing button.
To end the call, just press this button again. Doing so hangs up the call and resumes music play.
How to Use the Play-Pause-Call Button to Call Up a Voice Assistant
When paired with an Apple device, you may press and hold this button on the XG300 to get Siri’s attention. Note that you must first enable Siri on the source device (phone, tablet) for this to work. Note though that this will not work if you pair more than one device with the speaker at the same time. But it does work on Android phones and tables as long as you, also, set up those devices to do so.
The Volume DOWN and Volume UP Buttons on the SRS XB43
The XG 300 also sports Volume Controls. On the right center portion of the button panel, just right of the Play / Pause button, the Volume buttons look like minus and plus symbols. We point these these out in the next picture.
When pressed, these lower and raise the output volume respectively, by reducing or increasing the volume setting on the paired source device. Moreover, you have 50 volume level steps on this unit.
Note that you can also change volume on this little Sony boombox speaker by adjusting volume on your source BT device. And from there, you can also do this in the Sony Music Center app as well.
No other accessibility sounds play when you adjust volume on the 300. But the green Power lamp normally blinks once, each time you press and release these controls. However it quickly pulses three times when the speaker is at maximum volume and you press the Volume UP button to raise the sound level further. The Power lamp also does this when the speaker is at lowest volume, and you try to turn it down further by pressing the Volume DOWN button.
How to Raise (Turn Up) and Lower (Turn Down) Sony SRS XG300 Volume
With the speaker paired and playing, press and release the minus shaped Volume DOWN button to decrease its audio output level by one step. Press the plus shaped Volume UP button to increase audio output. Or, you can press and hold the buttons to rapidly raise and lower the volume.
Note that these loudness controls affect the volume level setting whether the unit is paired or not. Also, the volume setting may change from paired device to paired device. That is, each paired device remembers its own volume setting. So you might need to re set the sound output when you unpair the speaker from one source device and pair it to another.
Sony SRS XG300 Back Panel Buttons
We find two buttons inside the port compartment on the back of the speaker, behind the port chamber door. They are the BATTERY-BATTERY CARE, and LIGHT buttons.
The Battery-Battery Care Button
A fast press of this button triggers the speaker to announce the percentage of charge left in the battery. A longer press switches between normal and Battery Care mode.
How to Get Battery Percentage Remaining
Quickly press and release the same button (the BATTERY-BATTERY CARE button) any time the speaker is ON. Then the unit speaks that percentage number of battery power left to you in a female voice.
Release it at that time. The voice can say one of the following…
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- 81% – 100%: “Battery fully charged”
- 81% – 90% (Battery Care mode): “Battery Care Mode, Fully Charged, Battery About 90%”
- 61% – 80%: “Battery about 80 percent.”
- 41% – 60%: “Battery about 60 percent.”
- 21% – 40%: “Battery about 40 percent.”
- 1% – 20%: “Low battery, please recharge speaker.”
The Battery Care Mode
In this mode, to lengthen battery service life, the speaker only charges the battery to ninety (90) percent. It considers that a full charge and stops charging at that point. This is supposed to extend the battery’s service life somewhat. Note that you can also control this option in the Sony Music Center app. Note that in this mode, the battery does not last as long per charge, since the battery only charges to nine tenths of full.
How to Activate Battery Care Mode
With the speaker running, press and hold the BATTERY-BATTERY CARE button until you hear the “Battery Care mode ON” announcement.
How to Turn off Battery Care Mode
Press and hold the Battery button until you hear the speaker make the “Battery Care mode OFF” announcement.
The Light Button
The speaker has party lights that flash, pulse, and undulate in time with the music, making many multi-colored patterns for an enhanced party space. These are ON by default, but turning them off saves battery power. This is handy when you’re running the speaker in bright rooms or outdoors during the day, where you couldn’t see the lights very well anyway.
How to Turn the Party Lights OFF
Turn these lights off by pressing and releasing the LIGHT button.
How to Turn the Party Lights ON
Then to turn them back on again, simply repeat what you did before. I.e. Press and release in the LIGHT button. At that point, the party lamps will resume their flashing, fading, and color changing patterns.
Sony SRS XG300 Buttons Combinations, Codes
Change Sound Quality
You can control how the speaker priorities its Bluetooth connections. Either it can favor connection stability over sound quality, or sound quality over connection stability. Now by default, the speaker favors sound quality over stability, and this is normally no problem, as long as you keep the 300 well away from sources of microwave interference.
How to Change to Prioritize the Connection Stability
With the speaker running, press and hold both the Power and Play-Pause-Phone buttons until the Power lamp flashes three (3) times.
The speaker then disconnects from the paired device and announces, “Bluetooth disconnected.”
Finally after several seconds, it connects again with the same device using the new sound prioritization setting, and announces, “Bluetooth connected.” At that point, the speaker then favors connection stability over sound quality.
How to Change to Prioritize Sound Quality
Again, press and hold the Bluetooth and Plau-Pause-Phone buttons at the same time, until the Power lamp flashes green two (2) times.
Reset Button Code Combination
You can reset the XG300 to factory default settings and state. To do that, turn on the speaker. Then press and hold the MEGA BASS and Play-Pause-Phone buttons, found on the top panel in the third and forth button positions from the left, at the same time until all lights on the unit go dark. See these buttons pointed at by the green arrows in the next picture.
You may wish to reset the speaker to correct any weird behaviors you notice from it such as failing to pair, sound distortion, cutting out, failing to power off when you press the Power button, and so on.
Note that resetting invalidates any saved connection info about this speaker on your source Bluetooth devices. So you’ll have to forget those connections on these devices, and re pair the speaker after a reset in order to play your audio content through it once again.
Final Remarks About the Sony SRS XG300 Buttons
Note that you can control many of these XG300 functions from your phone or tablet, instead of using the buttons on the speaker directly. For that, you need the Sony Music Center app. In that app, you can adjust speaker volume, turn it off, update its firmware, switch the party lights OFF and ON, and other actions. But how to use that app is beyond the scope of this post, though if enough of you want that information, we may develop a post that describes that later.
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Revision History
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- 2022-08-19: First posted.