Speaker Recommendations

[Fluff]

I'm seriously reccomending you try the Aego M they are good for the money you pay. And have a quality finish. And feel solid. Have a listen if you get the chance.

http://www.ccrane.com/radios/radio-accessories/acoustic-energy-aego-m-series-music-system.aspx

The only possible criticism would be that they are a tad bright with higher frequencies, with more emphasis here than on the mid-range, but that’s only to be expected from such small satellites. Also the lack of an iPod dock means that you have to add remote control facilities. But considering the price, remarkably only £99, that’s not too painful. Even if you factor in the price of the Onkyo dock these still work out less than the Acoustic Authority speakers

http://www.trustedreviews.com/article.aspx?page=6742&head=0

[Jessterw]

That's right, dump on me again (as usual.)

I used real speakers for awhile on my computer, with a mini receiver (until the receiver broke.) Gaming with that setup was frighteningly awesome.. a whole new experience. I was trying to get you to expand your viewpoint.

At the $30 price point, it's pretty much all such poor sound quality stuff, that starting a thread about it is like asking for recommendations on whether to eat at McDonald's or Burger King today.. it's only worth about 5 seconds of your time to decide which piece of crap to buy.

Honestly I'm not trying to dump on you, but when you not only ignore the reason behind me asking and then assault my decision to go with a cheaper pair...

I don't game on my PC (an iBook). I use it for work and everyday activities like web browsing and email. I listen to music on it only in passing and usually with a quality pair of headphones on (same pair I recommended to Damian for his dad). As I said, any real music listening is done via a pair of 'real' speakers.

My viewpoint didn't need to be expanded. I needed recommendations, because, while these pieces of crap may all be about the same, I've found that sometimes you can be surprised by what you find.

az is right, I have three kids, a wife, an anniversary approaching, a cross-country move planned, and any number of other drains on the decent income I make. I'm not poor, but I have better things to spend money on than a pair of speakers that will never be used to even 1/3 of their capability.

McDonald's or Burger King? No question there, I go to Braums

[KvHagedorn]

Alright, alright.. I'm sorry if you felt assaulted. I'll be more gentle next time.

[Fluff]

Didnt realise you can get all that for less than 30usd

Altec lansing about $30

http://www.digitaletc.com/item.php?ref=fr&productid=6667

Logitech R-20 seem to ba about 20 usd

The people at acoustic energy must be making a mint.

[KvHagedorn]

The people at acoustic energy must be making a mint.

Not necessarily. There is a huge variance in the quality of speakers in general. You really need to watch out for charlatans like Amar Bose, but this guy has given a very bad name to the industry. Did you know that B&W employs 2 1/2 times as many people in its R&D department than Bose does? They are a much smaller company as well.

Aside from engineering, the components used in manufacture factor greatly into the cost of the final product. A Bose Acoustimass set costs very little to make. It's practically all plastic with the same kind of paper cone tweeters that you would find making the sound in a 25" CRT television set. They sell for a lot because they are marketed to the max. Amar Bose is the only person in the Audio industry in the Forbes 400 Richest list, and he got there by psychology.. pulling the wool over people's eyes. B&W, on the other hand, takes a craftsmanlike approach to building their speakers. It is very expensive to make a teardrop-shaped cabinet out of 2" thick choice wood, but this drops resonances to nearly zero. It's more expensive to put the tweeter on top of the cabinet, but this greatly reduces first reflection distortion in the high frequencies. This isn't bullshit, folks. It's advanced technology melded with art.

As for Acoustic Energy, I couldn't say. They probably do make more profit dollars per unit shipped, but at $99 they sell fewer units than a $30 speaker set would.. but they probably couldn't sell any if they did not show a benefit for spending more.

[Jessterw]

By the way, those quality speakers I mentioned I already owned... they're the B&W DM303 (black vinyl ones instead of the maple). Not high end by any means, at least not at that end of the spectrum. They weren't cheap either at almost $300 a pair when I bought them a few years back.

You could call them entry-level high end



Here's a decent review of them:

http://www.soundstage.com/revequip/bw_dm303.htm

[KvHagedorn]

Those are pretty decent speakers. The advantage at each price point in the B&W line is that you are getting the benefit of R&D done on the bleeding edge.. all the way down to the least expensive speakers they make. The 600 series speakers now use the Nautilus tweeter, for example. It's hard to beat them at any price point.

[agallag]

I think jw was actually thanking those few of us who actually helped (with no thanks to the unhelpful ones like KvH, me, agallag, Jammrock...)

Hey now, I did say a little something helpful in my post, right after the unhelpful bit.

[Jammrock]

What a sad state MURC has entered when people can't joke around any more...

http://www.logitech.com/index.cfm/products/details/US/EN,CRID=2173,CONTENTID=9819

Retail you can get them for ~$30 from ChumpUSA or Best Buy. Or you can grab them from ZipZoomFly for $25 w/ free shipping and no tax.

[Mehen]

my altecs don't look as nice, but I garauntee they would sound better.

[Jessterw]

Thanks again for the offer Mehen, but I went ahead and grabbed the Logitech pair I linked to earlier from Amazon. Don't really need a subwoofer for what they're being used for, but I'm not fussed.

Sorry if there was any confusion, didn't intend to sound put-off by the "non-helpful" comments. Definitely wasn't... well, save for one but then it was expected

[Claymonkey]

I listen to music on it only in passing and usually with a quality pair of headphones on (same pair I recommended to Damian for his dad).

Those headphones were awesome by the way. My Dad loves them and I want to steal them