Excellent Buy For The Money
Written: Sep 17 '03
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Product Rating:
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Pros: - Powerful bass
- Above average satellites
- Amazing price
- Ideal for movies/gaming
Cons: - "Boomy" sub
- M3D useless
- Speaker wire
- Lacking mids/highs
The Bottom Line: With some tweaking from graphics/parametric eqs, a NEAR equivalent to higher priced alternatives.
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| bonka's Full Review: Logitech Z-560 4 Speakers |
Most users usually move up to these from their paper cone tatterboxes. Obviously, the jump is significant.
Known for their active subs, the 560's pound the ground. Bass shakes with authority, aesthetically good looking, and the satellites are quite good considering its price.
Now, Logitech has rated these to be 400w RMS. If you actually believed that, then Logitech's marketing dept. got the best of you. No way do these speakers output 400w RMS. More likely, 400w Peak. I figure these to be more around the 200w range in terms of RMS rating. Anyways, they are still very powerful for a computer multimedia setup. Now, if you think Logitech is the only one who overextends their ratings, you're wrong. Altec Lansing, Klipsch, among others all do it. Face it, raw numbers sell.
Now back to the point, this set's ideal strength is its power output, therefore it should be a no brainer that it would be very ideal for movie viewing. Although the lack of a center channel is somewhat a drawback, the draw of realism from your favourite dvds is fabulous. Appreciation for these speakers don't come unless you fit in a Bond movie in there.
Gaming also brings the same upsides. Explosions are loud and exaggerated and vocals are clear. I don't game at all but these would make most gamers quite happy.
However, it's when it comes to music playback that the 560's show it's weaknesses. Now if you are a basshead and like bass heavy music, you'll think I'm criticizing with unsubstantiated purposes, but I kid you not, the satellites require heavy tweaking to get them to sound on par..
Any sort of bass heavy music (Techno, rap), and the active sub booms with joy. Unfortunately, because of its lack of tame, the same cannot be said for music with a generous amount of percussive and/or wind instruments. These are not your speakers if your mainstay is jazz and/or classical music. Granted, you really have to fiddle around with them to get it close to right, but it would not compare to something like the Boston Acoustics BA7800's and the VideoLogic Crossfires/Digitheatres. The satellites lack the fullness to really enrich midrange heavy audio.
Now, the satellites on the 560's are not the best computer multimedia speakers in terms of sound quality, however, they are better than most satellites within a similar price range or higher. Midrange is average and highs are lacking. I've tweaked mine with parametrics/graphics equalizers, and although the improvement is noticeable, it is not night and day and in my perspective, still behind the betters of the BA7800's and the VideoLogics. I'd recommend you remove the speakers grills though. Not drastic, but it certainly helps aiding in improving the color and brightness of the satellites. At around $120USD, you're getting near sound quality at a fraction of the cost.
Logitech has made a name for themselves with their "active" subwoofers. I mean active in terms of their "boominess". The subwoofer is best described to be boomy and lacking definition. Fortunately, the 560's subwoofer is noticeably sensible to placement, so it's best to move it away from a corner or a desk. I've found that it reduces the boominess but does not remedy it.
Are there better alternatives out there? Sure there is. Is it worth the extra hundreds of dollars to get top end audio from a computer application? It's up to you. Frankly, I found the huge difference in price and neglegible difference in audio quality/purity improvements to be insufficient for me to purchase better computer speakers. if you're looking at high end sound, you should think about a real home theater setup rather than wimpy 4.1/5.1 sets that merely acts as an alternative.
However, the superiority and popularity of the 560's comes from its price and what it delivers. Room shaking bass with above average sound quality to boot. Designed to fill an open space, these should be sufficient for a large bedroom, since they are one of the loudest playing 4.1 speakers available without distortion. The 560's have their drawbacks, so you will have to spend a few good hours finding the closest sweet spot you can get to neutralize the subwoofer and adding better colour to the satellites.
Recommended:
Yes
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Epinions.com ID:
bonka
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Member: Warren
Location: Vancouver
Reviews written: 7
Trusted by: 1 member
About Me:
The Swedish chef says "borgy, borgy, boo."
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