silverorange stuff

I live and work from a fairly small apartment, so I was looking for a set of speakers that could easily be powered from my laptop or ipod and which could fill a reasonably tight space with a lot of sound. The Logitech Z-2300s live up to those requirements extremely well. The handle variable volumes surprisingly well and maintain clarity and warmth at both extreme highs and low volumes. One of the criticisms I've had of various speakers is of over-clarity where you end up with a very clinical sound. These speakers are ideal in creating precise sound without sacrificing warmth.

For a cheapish set of speakers, these come with a surprisingly large sub-woofer. At eight inches square, it may not sound massive but it looks pretty big sitting on the floor next to me. I only mention this because I'm not a huge fan of the speakers' 'modern' chrome appearance and it's a little hard to hide the sub-woofer's sheen. However, compared to some of it's x-treme brethren, I guess it could be described as subdued. None the less, it produces some impressive bass that isn't muddled even at high volumes. You can also control the relative bass quite easily with the handy remote volume control.

The handy wired remote control.

Which brings me to the cool wired remote control. One thing I hate with most PC speaker system is the lack of decent hardware volume controls. These speakers thankfully come with a wired remote you can put anywhere within about a three foot radius of the sub-woofer. It not only has a massive smooth volume knob (!) but you can also control the relative sub-woofer volume, turn off the power, and plug in a set of headphones. Very very nice.

The one annoying thing is that the satellite speakers and the wired remote all come with reasonably short fixed cables. That means you can't easily extend their reach. Not a big deal, but it would be nice to be able to stretch the wired remote all the way over to my desk and still mount the satellites on my bookshelf.

The biggest pro and one of the most annoying cons of these speakers are closely related. First, the bad news. At least in Canada, it's difficult to locate them. You can get them from NCIX but their shipping is $50. In Toronto, I only found them at the last computer shop I tried and then only on a floor model. But... this is totally understandable considering their outstanding price — only $150 CAD for a fantastic set of speakers. You can hardly go wrong.

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