Best computer speakers ever?

[MisterDuck]

Personally, I think the Monsoon MM2000's blow both the klipsch's and logitechs out of the water, at least in terms of sound quality - especially in a computer environment, since they're much more oriented towards a small area of use. I think the 4.1's and the logitechs have poor bass definition, and are a generally unbalenced speaker. They also lack the clear, crisp highs that I particularly enjoy, although they're not shabby in that department. Either way, I think the highs on the Monsoons are *far* better, but that's just my opinion. I'd probably be happy with any of the three systems, to be honest, although from a price/performance standpoint, the Logitechs and the Monsoons (about 215) are the clear winners.

Comparing high end home theatre to three hundred dollar computer systems just isn't fair. My father has a high end system (Rotel amp and preamp, marantz cd player, Vanderstein speakers along with high end cabling - about five grand in sound stuff. He considers it "entry level" audiophile) and when you listen to that system, you see very quickly that it's just comparing apples and oranges. One system is designed to use with a computer, with a single user, and the other system is meant to reproduce music in the most accurate, rich way possible. Hell, I have an onkyo reciever and infinity studio monitors (give or take a six to seven hundred dollar system), and my dad's system absolutly blows that away - even comparing those two is just unfair. The definition, bass extention, the clarity of the highs are just an order of magnitude better. I've been to high end audioshops (my father is a nut) and listened to speakers that were 100,000+ dollars for a pair, each of which is driven by a floor standing tube amplifier (give or take fifteen grand a piece - they looked like heat sinks about the size of a full tower computer) and connected by silver speaker wire. Did it sound awesome? You bet your ass it did - absolutly unreal would be more like it. Is it fair to compare it to a pair of three hundred dollar computer speakers? Hell no.

So I think for all fairness, this comarison should be limited to systems that are less than five hundred bucks and oriented at a multimedia/single user environment. No preamps/amps/whatever - just self powered speakers and a computer.

 

[hconnorjr]

i'm an audiophile myself with a fairly pricey system and i'm trying to decide what to do about about a computer sound system.

on the one hand, i could buy a cheap yamaha amp and some b and w or klipsch speakers and use a line out from the sound card. its a conservative, but probably excellent choice. cost about 300 dollars.

on the other hand, i could just buy a pair of decent computer speakers and try to get them to do the job. this raises the issue of how computer speakers perform. i spent an hour at staples the other day and was pretty underwhelmed. most fit into the boombox category. of course they cost about as much as a boombox too. less than a hundred dollars, the lot of them.

as most of you folks probably know, speaker performance is measured by how well it deals with high, medium and low frequencies as well as how accurate it is in each of those ranges. again the speakers undewhelmed, although one set was better than the rest (an 80.00 planar). the problem with most was the typical woofer/subwoofer box and the two high freq front speakers. this design was mass-marketed long before computer sound was popular. the problem is that it skips the middle frequencies (surprise surprise).

the staples salesperson liked one of the setups ("Kickin") but that had more to do with its ability to rattle the glass as far as the front door. it had crappy accuracy and the bass was boomy.

here's the problem: you can't get highs middles and lows out of a small footprint speaker. even at the audiophile level. i've listened to the above 1000.00 baby's and they are accurate, but the physics deny them the lower frequencies.

theoretically, though the most accurate speakers are planar, electrostatics. they can use the entire planar area to reproduce, which can be quite significant, even in a small footprint; they handle high and middle ranges well. also in theory, any manufacturer who is going to mess with this technology ought to combine it with an accurate low freq box . . .

in fact the monsoon mm1000s sounded best to me. i've decided to buy a set and give them a try. if i hate them, well, there's always the buy/sell/trade forum.

hope you enjoyed the rant.

 

[Shuelessjo]

The best speakers as of next month are going to be from Cambridge Soundworks. They are going to be named something like, "MegaWorks". It is a 5.1 system. The best I can describe them is....The power of Klipsh and the clarity of Cambridge in a 5.1 setup.


JOSEPH

 

[Aosh]

<< The best speakers as of next month are going to be from Cambridge Soundworks. They are going to be named something like, "MegaWorks". It is a 5.1 system. The best I can describe them is....The power of Klipsh and the clarity of Cambridge in a 5.1 setup. >>



Speaking of which...anyone know when MegaWorks is supposed to come out?