Labtec LCS 150 2 Speakers
- Max. Power Output: 0.7 Watt
- Number of Speakers: 2 Speakers
- Connection Type: Cable
Available From
Why are these offers here?
Smart Buy!
Lowest price from a Trusted Store
- Overview
-
Reviews
- Compare Prices
User ReviewRead All Reviews »
Spend a few more dollars.
Pros
Inexpensive, Small footprint
Cons
Mediocre battery life, expensive AC adapter, horrible sound
Recommended it?
No
The Bottom Line:
Don't buy these. Save a few dollars and get nicer speakers.
After moving from a borrowed "multimedia" monitor (the variety with speakers and mic integrated) to my own much nice 17 incher, I was forced to find a pair of speakers for my computer. That's when I found the Labtec LCS-150s -- small and reasonably priced. But when you've got the facts, they're not reasonably priced at all.
The Basics
Labtec's LCS-150 speakers look decent, and they have the
sorts of features you'd expect from pretty much any set of speakers. On-face volume control, powered or unpowered operation, and the ubiquitous bass boost button. The footprint is very small, requiring just a few inches square. Great for those cramped desks students tend to have.
How They Work
The package includes a rather detailed instruction manual, though everything is so straightforward it shouldn't be needed. Plug left speaker into right speaker, plug right speaker into line/speaker out jack, insert batteries if you want to run them powered. Volume knob adjusts volume when speakers are running powered. All very straightforward.
There are a few notable kinks in the system, though. For one, the power button is a very particular creature. If you don't turn the speakers on or off slowly enough, you'll end up with either a static hiss or a whine (this happened to me on two sets of these speakers). Seeing as it comes and goes after a while, I'm chalking it up to a shoddy product (solder? shielding? who knows.).
The other problem is the fact that the left speaker just doesn't pump out as much as the right. It's as if the signal is weakened for the left channel. Not fun.
How They Sound
In one word: Horrible. Horrible, horrible, horrible -- yes, emphasis is necessary here. For games making use of audio clues, you're out in the cold. The speakers together, no matter how you arrange them, tend to merge into a center channel, and the left channel isn't strong enough for you to catch action on your left side, anyway. If you enjoy music, you'll quickly throw these across the room. Perhaps even repeatedly. To get a halfway decent output, you have to run the speakers powered with bass boost on (it doesn't function without power). Even then, I find myself playing with equalizer settings in my software to take the tinniness and mud out of the output.
If you'd like an audible demonstration of how "wonderful" these speakers sound, tape a piece of waxed paper across your mouth, and then sing into a tin can (preferably empty). There you have it.
But I'm Not Dead Yet!
These suckers eat batteries for breakfast. And when the batteries get low, the power LED begins to pulse every time there's noticable bass in a song. Eventually you end up with something sounding far worse than the speakers unpowered, and get around to replacing the batteries.
Of course, you could be without batteries forever by purchasing Labtec's AC Adapter (any other, of course, is "not recommended or supported"). When you realize it costs $14.95 -- almost as much as the speakers -- it's no longer worth it.
Words of Wisdom
Don't waste your money here. Spend $10-$20 more, and buy yourself a nice set of Altec Lansing, Yamaha, or Cambridge Soundworks speakers. Even Labtec's speakers in the $30-$40 range far surpass their lower-priced models. You'd have to pay me more than $19.95 just to keep my mouth shut about the LCS-150 model.
The Basics
Labtec's LCS-150 speakers look decent, and they have the
sorts of features you'd expect from pretty much any set of speakers. On-face volume control, powered or unpowered operation, and the ubiquitous bass boost button. The footprint is very small, requiring just a few inches square. Great for those cramped desks students tend to have.
How They Work
The package includes a rather detailed instruction manual, though everything is so straightforward it shouldn't be needed. Plug left speaker into right speaker, plug right speaker into line/speaker out jack, insert batteries if you want to run them powered. Volume knob adjusts volume when speakers are running powered. All very straightforward.
There are a few notable kinks in the system, though. For one, the power button is a very particular creature. If you don't turn the speakers on or off slowly enough, you'll end up with either a static hiss or a whine (this happened to me on two sets of these speakers). Seeing as it comes and goes after a while, I'm chalking it up to a shoddy product (solder? shielding? who knows.).
The other problem is the fact that the left speaker just doesn't pump out as much as the right. It's as if the signal is weakened for the left channel. Not fun.
How They Sound
In one word: Horrible. Horrible, horrible, horrible -- yes, emphasis is necessary here. For games making use of audio clues, you're out in the cold. The speakers together, no matter how you arrange them, tend to merge into a center channel, and the left channel isn't strong enough for you to catch action on your left side, anyway. If you enjoy music, you'll quickly throw these across the room. Perhaps even repeatedly. To get a halfway decent output, you have to run the speakers powered with bass boost on (it doesn't function without power). Even then, I find myself playing with equalizer settings in my software to take the tinniness and mud out of the output.
If you'd like an audible demonstration of how "wonderful" these speakers sound, tape a piece of waxed paper across your mouth, and then sing into a tin can (preferably empty). There you have it.
But I'm Not Dead Yet!
These suckers eat batteries for breakfast. And when the batteries get low, the power LED begins to pulse every time there's noticable bass in a song. Eventually you end up with something sounding far worse than the speakers unpowered, and get around to replacing the batteries.
Of course, you could be without batteries forever by purchasing Labtec's AC Adapter (any other, of course, is "not recommended or supported"). When you realize it costs $14.95 -- almost as much as the speakers -- it's no longer worth it.
Words of Wisdom
Don't waste your money here. Spend $10-$20 more, and buy yourself a nice set of Altec Lansing, Yamaha, or Cambridge Soundworks speakers. Even Labtec's speakers in the $30-$40 range far surpass their lower-priced models. You'd have to pay me more than $19.95 just to keep my mouth shut about the LCS-150 model.
