So, I got mine a few weeks back, so I thought I'd provide some feedback. I also just purchased a Subwoofer to go with them, but more on that later.
As they are, they work well for what they are, as in fairly thin speakers that can fit snugly on a desk. My desktop currently doesn't have space for most powered desktop speakers, let alone a pair of decent bookshelf speakers, so as I mentioned, that was my impetus for ordering them.
I don't have any qualitative measurements, but the mids and lower highs sound adequate for the price and form factor; the lows are admittedly anemic, however. If you attempt to really crank them, despite being powered speakers, you're only going to get about 75-80 dBa from what I could measure on my phone, far lower than what many, nicer passive and active bookshelf speakers can achieve. Still probably louder than one needs for casual listening, but I know I like to crank my speakers sometimes to fill larger spaces while not immediately near my desks or Hi-Fi. Without a Subwoofer, they're admittedly really best for listening to YouTube videos, such as podcasts, perhaps when your head or ears are tired from using headphones.
Once you add a subwoofer, however, they definitely open up, allowing for what I could tell are clearer highs and the ability to drive the speakers higher (this is noted explicitly on Drop's website). I bought the 12" 150w Monoprice Subwoofer when it was just now on sale for around $120. I was able to listen to several genres of music I'm familiar with, and while the setup isn't really close to my Elac Uni-fi U5Fs in my Hi-Fi, they're more than adequate at reproducing music.
One caveat to their sound is that I had actually been using PEACE and a headphone EQ without realizing it. When I turned off the EQ, they definitely sounded worse, which makes me realize these aren't an out of the box, well-tuned experience; that's definitely something you'll find in a nicer set of bookshelf speakers. That being said if someone eventually creates an EQ for them, they could sound even better than with the random EQ I have set. I believe the EQ I had applied was for my Sennheiser HD 6xx cans.
I've seen a lot of discussion about the heat on the primary (right) speaker which contains the amp, but even after driving my unit quite high for several hours, I didn't notice excessive heat. It's warm to the touch, but nothing even close to a hot laptop in my experience. Electronics in my experience can run hot and are designed to do so, so unless we begin to see units failing suddenly from said heat, I personally am not worried about it. If I had to guess, it felt similar to a lukewarm cup of tea. Similarly, while the cable adjoining the speakers is proprietary (as opposed to a standard RCA cable like some active desktop speakers I've used in the past), its length is listed on the website, so one can guesstimate if it is long enough for their desk. While it is an odd, custom shape, the spacing between the connectors is far enough one could reasonably rig up their own connector, or just sacrifice the cable it comes with and make their own longer cable. Not exactly a plus, but the cable and connection as it is seems strong.
My only real issue is that I hooked them up to the bypass line out of my Drop THX AAA 789 amp, and so if I wish to listen to headphones, I have to unplug them from the wall. Not ideal, but the output sounded better than my motherboard's output and even the output directly from my iFi Zen DAC. It's not an ideal setup, but I plan to just use a smart ac switch compatible with Alexa to control it using voice. I had done this prior with my ancient Dell 2.1 speakers I had hooked up anyways.
So where does that leave me? Am I happy with them? Yes, absolutely. Did I end up buying a Subwoofer that costs about as much as the speakers themselves? Also...yes...I think for the price of what I paid (about $280 including the speaker grills), you could easily find a pair of suitable bookshelf speakers that sound as good if not better, or even a Desktop 2.1 setup. Most people would likely be better off finding a way to incorporate larger, less proprietary speakers into their desk configuration, or even mounting them on their wall. That being said, I'm honestly impressed, especially once I added the subwoofer, with what they were capable of. While I expect a second generation product to be better, once everyone's constructive criticism is taken into account, the product as it stands is capable if you need something that truly fits the criteria of very small power speakers. If you don't truly need that, however, do look elsewhere, or follow to see if they release an updated unit in the coming years.
