PC Speakers

LeHah

LeHah

212 Squadron - "The Old Man's Eyes And Ears"
So, Dell was running a 20% off sale and I jumped on that like Uncle's Day at a whore house. I got almost $400 knocked off the price - making it a little over $1600. Now, the CRT monitor I'll replace down the line - whats the point in dropping another $133 on a 15" flat screen when you're gonna replace it anyway? - but the thing I didn't notice until after I purchased it was that my Dell wouldn't be coming with my originally intended speakers.

I had wanted the Klipsch Promedia Ultra 5.1 (here) but for some reason, Dell took them off the assembly of the 4700 model (I assume for the durration of the sale). Instead, they changed the layout of the speaker choices and I ended up taking Dell 5650 5.1 100s instead. Ew.

Anyway, now I'll also need to buy a speaker system somewhere down the line. What are the best PC Speakers on the market? Id skim Newegg but I don't know whats the best and I'm looking for something to wow even the most untechnical person. The Klipsch seemed to be it.
 
I'd just stick with the Dell ones that come with it. I haven't seen a reason to get fancy speakers since the once I got four or five years ago.
 
I use a lil' stereo microsystem... any decent 5.1 setup would be a step up for me.
the rest of my machine is nto that bad, though.
 
Heh. I nowadays make sure my computers have available a digital output. Which I then plug into a cheap A/V receiver I got (5.1, DD, DTS, coax and optical inputs, all for under $200 plus 5 speakers, cables, and subwoofer) on sale. Plugged computer into one of the digital outputs, and watching DVDs on the computer never was so good. Plus, the sound is great (A/V receivers have better DACs and lower noise than the PC case ever will).

I was dithering between going for a Klipsch 5.1 setup or the A/V receiver. Saw the sale and my mind was made up. You don't need a fancy one, just one with all the necessary kit (the clearance tables are an *excellent* place for the older models).

If you have an nForce board with a Dolby Digital encoder on them, you get surround sound via the digital port. Awesome.

(The Klipsch are excellent speakers. However, you're left at the mercy of the crappy DACs on most sound cards (plus the PC environment in the case interferes a *lot*. Nothing like hearing your hard drives on your speakers!). And yes, most sound cards use crappy DACs, unless you go for higher end manufacturers like M-Audio... (Creative's sound cards use rather average DACs for even their "premium" high-end soundcards. You'll want their Ensoniq line of cards for better DACs, but those are pricey, and lack game accelleration. At least with a digital output, you can move the DACs outside and still keep the accelleration).
 
Worf, Thanks for the good advice. I've read about the dacs being crappy on Creative boards, but you actually offered an alternative (pluggin in a receiver). Thanks!
 
Sound Card: Creative Labs makes the badassery, if your onboard doesn't cut it. I'm using a 5-year-old Soundblaster Live and it's kicking plenty of arse right now and taking quite a bit of sound load from my CPU.

Speakers: Altec Lansing makes the best subwoofers I know, but their satellites leave MUCH to be desired. Koss is probably the way to go, but I've never heard of the Klipsch ones. Creative Labs also makes speakers. DO NOT buy Logitech speakers, but that's pretty well self-evident in the fact for the same reason you don't buy Logitech ANYTHING (it loves to break).
 
Logitech makes the very best controllers and input devices. I think several people have also stated the reverse opinion with regard to your sound blaster there.

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Neither Creative (Soundcards) nor Logitec (Joystick) are the best you could find however. Creative is only good for games and even then their drivers are extremely bad.
 
ChrisReid said:
Logitech makes the very best controllers and input devices.
Click to expand...

Yeah, I had a great Logitech controller for years. The only reason I stopped using it was because it was an older two-button and I wanted to update.
 
$1600!!!? That's insane...you'd better list the specs:

I recently just bought my new pc for $750...not a Dell however.

AMD Athlon XP 3400+
Geforce GT 6600
512MB DDR PC3200
40x16x40/DVD-RW Drive
60GB HD
and all the standard accessories...
 
Maj.Striker said:
$1600!!!? That's insane...you'd better list the specs
Click to expand...

3.2GHZ
2GB DDR2 SDRAM (4X512MB,DIM)
256MB Nvidia GeForce 6800
160GB HD
SoundBlaster Audigy 2 ZS
16X DVD+/-RW Drive
3.5in Floppy & USB Memory Key 64MB
2 Year Warrenty
 
That seems way too much, especially without a screen. If you built your own you could probably cut $400 off that price.
 
KrisV said:
That seems way too much, especially without a screen.
Click to expand...

Theres a screen too. I got a crappy ol 17" CRT simply because I wanted to take advantage of the sale. I could've afforded a 15" flatscreen - but thats too small for my tastes. Id rather ditch a $50 monitor when I get a bigger flatscreen than dropping another $120.

Why did I go for a Dell instead of DYIing it? I've washed my hands of opening up the damned things. I've written a couple horror stories about fixing the dread machines and I'd rather not repeat them. I had looked around at other companies - Alienware, etc - but either I had had problems with that company in the past or they had gotten poor reviews.

The main reason is that I wanted a warrenty. I like the cushion of having a customer no-service at my back just incase something happens to explode.
 
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