Thanks for a great synopsis about a very interesting product.
I would like to address on point mad in the article, however.

The article states: ... "in testing we found that particularly high volumes did result in both distortion and greatly reduced battery life..."

What's the point? Did the reviewer expect the system to reach a certain maximum volume and not distort and not get any louder? Or continue to get ever louder? There is almost no way around this behavior in an amp/speaker system. The real question is how loud did the system play before the onset of distortion. Was it sufficient? From your description, it sounds like it was sufficient.

Increasing the output volume of any amp/speaker system will eventually lead to distortion. It is inevitable (assuming the gain is linear), because the system can't continue to play louder. Some systems limit the max gain to hide their max output level limit, but this means a low average level audio source will not achieve high enough levels. Some audio source levels will be too low, no matter what the standards are supposed to be. Not playing loud enough with a low audio source can't be fixed, while backing off the gain will eliminate the distortion as described.
The speaker designers could have put a compressor circuit in (essentially, non-linear gain). This gets you better max output behavior. Its a good solution for speakers like this, but seldom employed. And for most people, using your ear to recognize the max output limit is sufficient.

As for battery life...sound volume increases aren't linear. You need ten times the power to get double the apparent output volume. Therefore, play it loud and you'll drain the battery really quick. There is no speaker system design that drains the battery only twice as much for twice the increase in volume (sigh).