iPod Speakers - Harman Kardon or JBL On Stage?
Discussion
I heard someone saying how great their iPod speakers are, how wonderful they sound... so I had a listen and I had to bite my lip. I don't know what make they were (I forget now) but they were around the £100 mark and quite frankly they sounded shocking.
The speakers were far to small to offer a decent mixture of sounds, they were scratchy and tinny and when the volume was pumped up (to the relatively low db count) they were very scratchy and poor quality.
Personally I use my stereo hear at home, pre-amp it and with decent bitrate MP3's sounds quite good (the stereo I have is perfect to my ears, nice and bassy with good higher notes, although I do notice more of the tracks with ear buds). Similiary I have an old (now knackered amp) which attached to speakers made a great jukebox for the garage - much better quality than the little things and I got the amp for £5, the speakers for £2 the pair (2nd hand, tremendous bargin/find
)
The speakers were far to small to offer a decent mixture of sounds, they were scratchy and tinny and when the volume was pumped up (to the relatively low db count) they were very scratchy and poor quality.
Personally I use my stereo hear at home, pre-amp it and with decent bitrate MP3's sounds quite good (the stereo I have is perfect to my ears, nice and bassy with good higher notes, although I do notice more of the tracks with ear buds). Similiary I have an old (now knackered amp) which attached to speakers made a great jukebox for the garage - much better quality than the little things and I got the amp for £5, the speakers for £2 the pair (2nd hand, tremendous bargin/find
)I would agree that most I have heard around the £100 mark are a little lacking in bass and volume. Have you considered the new Bose system (link below). It is pricier at £250, but might be a better bet.
www.bose.co.uk/new_from_bose/nfb_page2.asp
www.bose.co.uk/new_from_bose/nfb_page2.asp
er eh??? 
'the king is wearing no clothes...'westy04 said:
Bose, Bose and Bose again.
A collegue of mine tried most of them, but the Bose was superb. They are more expensive, but you pays your money and make your choice.
Nope, JBL Control 1's and a decent cheap amp. (Cambridge ought to do it. I'd also look for a better source. My Son (13) was very disappointed by the iPod and its ilk until he heard the Sony NW-HD3. He has one now and is very happy. The onboard audio electronics are superior to the iPod which lets face it is a computer product not an Audio one.
I bought the Logic3 sound station for my iPod. i was going to buy the altec lansing system, until i heard one in the local apple centre along with the Logic3 System. the Logic3 system has much better sound quality it seems, but also has a little sub behind the iPod, but more importantly only costs £50, instead of £100 for the Altec system.
parrot of doom said:
Garbage in, garbage out; the iPod will never sound good on anything.
It is ok on a car stereo, but when plugged into a decent home stereo the flaws become apparent.
The sound can be improved slightly by encoding music in AAC format.
On the other hand it is a very conveinient way of selecting tracklists when connected to a stereo - saves the effort of searching through 500+ Cds to find a particular track...
parrot of doom said:
Garbage in, garbage out; the iPod will never sound good on anything.
Thankfully with my rapidly deteriorating hearing (see todays other ipod thread) I can't tell the difference between my ipod through my stereo and the CD player (though I can tell the difference between CD and LP). Anyway I like the band "Garbage".
Is the Bose system really rubbish? I'm thinking of buying a speaker system, mainly for holidays and for a bedroom system, and was thinking of that £50 Logic thingy, then saw the Bose and was going to try and get it way cheaper than £250 somehow. Now someone's mentioned JBL and I'm all confused 
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