Adequate solution for a year or two

I just moved to Germany and decided to replace my trusty mm50 Logitech speakers with something a little bit boomier - that is, with higher volume and bigger bass. The mm50 had excellent sound quality, but the speakers are joined together which reduces the stereo effect when watching movies (the set was either behind my laptop or off to one side).

Thus I started shopping for a replacement set with good quality sound yet a somewhat portable size as I plan to move again within the year. After much reading online and comparing product specifications, I decided to stick with Logitech and buy the Z4 set.

:-: Design :-:

The Z4 speakers look superb. The material is shiny black and silver, yet it doesn’t attract dust as much as other electronic devices. The speakers themselves have rubber surrounds and seem bulletproof. I’ve dropped a speaker a couple times from my living room table onto the parquet floor and there’s no hint of a scratch.

The subwoofer box is made of quality materials - very heavy - and while it’s not shiny like the speakers, it looks fine as-is, if not ordinary. I have it set on the floor, on the corner of the room, almost out of view.

Lastly, as many people mentioned elsewhere, the wired remote is very helpful in facilitating volume adjustment, including the bass on a separate knob. The blue LED is a bit bright, but I found it doesn’t bother me when watching movies as I’ve placed it an arm’s length away.

The remote also has a line-in and headphone jack, but I quickly forgot them as my headset has an USB input.

:-: Sound Quality :-:

I spent a couple days visiting the local Media Markt in Hamburg and comparing these speakers with a set of JBL Spyro 2.1 speakers (which I decided were too bright and lacked bass power) and a JBL Radial set (which I ultimately decided where too expensive at 240 EUR). In the end the good reviews won me over, as well as the value price of 70 EUR.

When I arrived to my fourth floor apartment (no elevators in Germany!), I must say that I did wonder if I made the right choice. The highs were simply missing on these speakers, the mids were a bit muffled, and the lows weren’t as powerful as I had hoped. I guess living in a concrete building prevents the floor from moving as much as a wooden frame house in California! But then I knew these where only multimedia speakers for a computer, not a home theater.

Fast forward three months and I must say the quality of the sound did improve quite a bit. The mids are still slightly muffled, the highs are not really there; however one can adjust the graphic equality in Windows Media Player to clear things a tad.* The bass is nice at higher settings, but it drowns out the speakers (it doesn’t suck power from them, but the sound is just average). I listen to all types of music, from pop to classical, hip hop and reggae, techno and samba, and for 70 EUR this is a fine set for a one year solution (or a dorm or a PC game arrangement).

However, if you are looking for a longer lasting solution, especially one to watch movies on a flat panel monitor, I would strongly encourage you to look at higher priced sets. These multimedia speakers are not up to the task in the audio quality department.

* I noticed that higher quality MP3s sound better on this set than standard 128 kbps files. The quality of the initial recording will also make a difference.