Poll: is it desirable to measure some "cheap" plastic PC speakers?

[Frank Dernie]

Lately a friend of mine sent me a link to Logitech Z200 speakers, asking me if they are OK option for a very tight budget (daily PC usage, YT, skype, multimedia consumption). I said if I were him, I would eat less and spare some more bucks and go for at least some starters in "personal monitors category", like Eris E3.5 or something like that..
That said, I think it is not a bad idea to have measurement also for some mass market plastic PC speaker, what do you think?
Logitech model mentioned above seems like a good candidate (high proposal on Amazon website, high number of rankings with relative high score..)

Looking on its product page / datasheet, you can of course read only some basic data:
- 10 Watts Peak/5 Watts RMS power produces room-filling sound. Each speaker has one active/powered driver that delivers full range audio and one passive radiator that provides bass extension.
driver size: 2.5 inches
fq - 80Hz-20kHz
Sound Pressure Level (SPL Max) - >88dB max

Personally, I would be OK also with some shorter test suite for this kind of, say, market segment (less points...).

The ones I have listened to sound better than I expected.
My job involved me being away from home a lot. I don't like headphones for listening a long time and ended up travelling with, firs,t a pair of Wharfedale "Active Diamonds", decades ago, they were not properly active but a simple 2-way with a stereo amp in one of the cabinets.
I enjoyed the music and later "upgraded" to a pair of AR "Powered Partners" which I though sounded so good when I was away that I questioned whether my expensive home system was worth it.
So one day I set up the ARs in my room with the portable player I had been using (probably a Sony discman back then) and compared.
To say the difference was huge is a big understatement, the ARs sounded pitiful by comparison.

I came to the conclusion if I like the music I can enjoy it on anything!
Whilst I do prefer a better system it is by no means necessary for my musical enjoyment.

 

[richard12511]

I vote yes. I have the Logitech Z500, and they don't sound bad.

 

[Willem]

Like Frank I have worked away from home for extended periods. Years ago, on a year's sabbatical to Cambridge UK I bought a pair of LS3/5as from Thomas Heinitz in London, later used as part of my desktop system until replaced by Harbeth P3ESRs (still have the LS3/5as, now lent to my son). For my more recent six month trip to Jerusalem the LS3/5as were too big and heavy to take on a plane, so I bought a pair of Wharfedale Diamond 9.0s, and a cheap lightweight amplifier (Tangent AMP 50). The sound was quite enjoyable, and much better than I had expected (I used the Wharfedales in the bedroom until recently, when one of them failed). The next foreign stay was to Princeton, but by that time intercontinental luggage allowances had become far more restrictive, so I decided to take the Tivoli Model Two 110 volt edition that I had bought some time earlier. When I was lecturing in Paris the year thereafter I similarly took the Tivoli. This is clearly not in the semi serious league like the Wharfedale Diamonds, but no less pleasant, to be honest, and still somewhat portable. At home my wife happily uses the Tivoli radio as computer speakers, for which they really are better than most plastic ones, even though quite uncompetitively priced.
So what is the moral of this longwinded story? Even serious music listeners who are used to a very good system at home like to hear music when away from home, and that inevitably involves small and lightweight speakers.

 

[stevenswall]

I voted yes, but With a Caveat:

***Do not test any computer speaker that doesn't have a unique design, waveguides, etc. as archaic boxey boxes 'engineered' to boxy sound like boxes being boxy sound too boxy bad because they are boxy and their massively diffracted diffractions diffract all over while the reflecting internal reflections reflect internally into internal reflections that also reflected, internally, off the boxy box designed based on legacy designs that feature archaic geometry and prehistoric, pre-engineering engineering that shows a lack of engineering.

Two $150 speakers where the company didn't purposefully try hard to be unimaginative and lazy, or didn't have to be cheap at the cost of literally everything including the dignity of their engineers, product manger, and brand as a whole:

-Klipsch Pro Media, they tried non-parallel cabinet walls and a waveguide to control the dispersion.
-Harman Kardon Soundsticks, they minimized diffraction and use a small ported line array, again without parallel cabinet walls and the driver interrupts the continuous pattern.

 

[stevenswall]

I voted No. Not because I'm not interested in such measurements. It would actually be educating to see how the top-selling "cheap" PC speakers perform. For me, it's a matter of priority, Amir can't test everything. I very much prefer him focusing on tests of more expensive equipment for which spending $30 more doesn't have a 90% probability of significantly improving sound quality and where a lot of products are just snake oil.

We don't even have a single well-performing budget stereo amp tested yet that is not discontinued. Allo Volt+ D is super-hyped among budget amps (low power though) but wasn't tested yet. Topping A50 headphone amp was released some time ago and still not reviewed. DBR-62 speakers performed beautifully but a follow-up with their more budget (but newer) version B6.2 can't be done because Amir has too much backlog and has to deny accepting more equipment for reviews.

Please don't take me too personally, but I also think that sending discontinued/overpriced stuff for reviews isn't too helpful for the community, for example, expensive headphone amps just to see how much worse they are from the $100-200 nearly perfect devices released over the last 2 years.

I think the speaker measurements take hours on the machine in the garage and the electronics ones are done in a home. Not sure if he does the latter while the former is going, but it shouldn't directly compete with the other category the whole time a speaker is being tested. Personally I think testing legacy amps is pretty dated with how cheap active monitors are.

 

[JeffS7444]

I vote "maybe" if the speakers seem somehow exceptional and deserving of attention here.

 

[mhardy6647]

no -- but y'all might want to keep your eye(s) on experiments like this (these):

https://hifihaven.org/index.php?threads/diy-computer-desktop-speakers.5734/

 

[amirm]

I can only measure single piece speakers. There is no way to measure a sub+speaker together (well there is but that costs extra money for software).

 

[maxxevv]

I can only measure single piece speakers. There is no way to measure a sub+speaker together (well there is but that costs extra money for software).

The Creative T40 Series II and T100 are 2.0 setup, single piece designs. Though their electronics are not symmetrical like many of the better powered/active speakers.

 

[stevenswall]

I can only measure single piece speakers. There is no way to measure a sub+speaker together (well there is but that costs extra money for software).

What if the speaker was just set on top of the sub? (Wouldn't work with the SoundSticks but could with the Klipsch Promedia.) Or separate and then the equation to measure the score could be adapted to add the bass from the woofer? Not sure how much extension counts for.

 

[Mnyb]

Why not use cheap small monitors ? I discovered some years ago that there was no need for so called computer speakers , a completely unnecessary category , I low res pic off my old fostex pm0.5

 

[Doodski]

I voted yes with the caveat in mind that cheap plastic speakers is in my mind something like the JBL 104 small powered speakers. I suppose smaller less expensive speakers is OK for testing but with some limitations on price range.
https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...-one-series-104-powered-monitor-review.11076/

 

[Mnyb]

In a really tight budget it actually makes no sense these small sat+sub packets sold för computers ? in that budget i would opt for a small nearfield type of cheap monitor .
The fostex are kind of bland/muddy sounding at longer distance in a larger room , i also have a pair of adam A3X (thats where these stands under the fostex comes from) but they are good enough for kitchen speakers , they work at some distance to

 

[Frank Dernie]

I voted yes, but With a Caveat:

***Do not test any computer speaker that doesn't have a unique design, waveguides, etc. as archaic boxey boxes 'engineered' to boxy sound like boxes being boxy sound too boxy bad because they are boxy and their massively diffracted diffractions diffract all over while the reflecting internal reflections reflect internally into internal reflections that also reflected, internally, off the boxy box designed based on legacy designs that feature archaic geometry and prehistoric, pre-engineering engineering that shows a lack of engineering.

Two $150 speakers where the company didn't purposefully try hard to be unimaginative and lazy, or didn't have to be cheap at the cost of literally everything including the dignity of their engineers, product manger, and brand as a whole:

-Klipsch Pro Media, they tried non-parallel cabinet walls and a waveguide to control the dispersion.
-Harman Kardon Soundsticks, they minimized diffraction and use a small ported line array, again without parallel cabinet walls and the driver interrupts the continuous pattern.

I disagree with your caveat.
It would be particularly interesting to quantify how much a fancy enclosure (probably no more expensive to make if mass produced) offers at a low price point.
OTOH since the measurement system can't separate cabinet radiation from driver radiation maybe it is moot.

 

[stevenswall]

I disagree with your caveat.
It would be particularly interesting to quantify how much a fancy enclosure (probably no more expensive to make if mass produced) offers at a low price point.
OTOH since the measurement system can't separate cabinet radiation from driver radiation maybe it is moot.

Couldn't it measure dispersion and the cabinet radiation wouldn't show as a smooth bubble from the front?

And dispersion too... Most will be horrible, ones with waveguides should be okay-ish, and coaxial speakers might stand a chance of working well on a desk with an adjustable chair or tilted up at a user where the vertical dispersion is going to matter.

 

[xykreinov]

As far as price? Yes. There's always going to be many reasons to spend less money in general depending on one's situation. Cheap speakers get my vote. I also disagree that it's a waste of time considering how competitive the area can get, take Pioneer vs. Klipsch.
However, as far as "PC speaker" form factor, no. It's just not worth it if you can get an equivalent "full sized" speaker setup for the same money, which is commonly the case. I'm not a fan of companies charging for convenience excessively, and that's often what happens with things like Bose and Logitech desktop speakers.

 

[Frank Dernie]

Couldn't it measure dispersion and the cabinet radiation wouldn't show as a smooth bubble from the front?

And dispersion too... Most will be horrible, ones with waveguides should be okay-ish, and coaxial speakers might stand a chance of working well on a desk with an adjustable chair or tilted up at a user where the vertical dispersion is going to matter.

Not sure about dispersion being poor on such tiny speakers but the measurement method definitely is unable to separate the "dross" being radiated by the cabinet from the "gold" being radiated by the drivers, or at least nobody has explained how it could so far.

 

[Natal]

Lately a friend of mine sent me a link to Logitech Z200 speakers, asking me if they are OK option for a very tight budget (daily PC usage, YT, skype, multimedia consumption). I said if I were him, I would eat less and spare some more bucks and go for at least some starters in "personal monitors category", like Eris E3.5 or something like that..
That said, I think it is not a bad idea to have measurement also for some mass market plastic PC speaker, what do you think?
Logitech model mentioned above seems like a good candidate (high proposal on Amazon website, high number of rankings with relative high score..)

Looking on its product page / datasheet, you can of course read only some basic data:
- 10 Watts Peak/5 Watts RMS power produces room-filling sound. Each speaker has one active/powered driver that delivers full range audio and one passive radiator that provides bass extension.
driver size: 2.5 inches
fq - 80Hz-20kHz
Sound Pressure Level (SPL Max) - >88dB max

Personally, I would be OK also with some shorter test suite for this kind of, say, market segment (less points...).

I have those speakers for my desktop connected to a Dragonfly Red DAC and Loki equalizer. Remarkably clear mids with an tight bass after a boost. Sounds much better than the Klipsch 41m I previously had.