Panasonic SC-EN5 CD Mini Audio System
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- Included Accessories: Remote Control Batteries
- Playable Disk Types: CD (Audio) CD-R CD-RW
- Number of Discs: 1
- Sound Type: Stereo
- Functions: CD Player Radio Tuner
- Output Power: 5 Watt
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Compact desk stereo from Panasonic combines functionality and good looks
Pros
Aesthetics, small footprint, decent sound, variety of functions (cd, tuner, aux, clock, alarm, sleep)
Cons
Headphone port is in the back; It's less than Bose.
Recommended it?
Yes
The Bottom Line:
I recommend this system because it is compact, good-looking, practical, and offers good sound for the price.
Sometime back in 2005, I was browsing an office supply store, one of those that don't have music blaring overhead, and my ear caught some radio tunes playing just around the corner. Since office supply stores generally don't specialize in stereos, the curiosity got the better of me, and I decided to investigate.
I came upon this sleek-looking, compact Panasonic stereo, which immediately grabbed my attention. It had a slanted silver/gray front panel, a digital display with a warm orange backlight, and the two detached speakers that were slanted and colored to match the main unit. The front of the main unit also had one orange and 3 green indicator lights, as well as chrome-polished buttons.
The sound coming out of the speakers was above average: clear, civilized, and reasonably colorful, even complete with some simple equalizer adjustments. Once I made certain that the system had a headphone port, the whole package looked overall promising to me, and I decided to buy it!
I've been using this system for about a year now, and I am happy to report that my experience so far has been only positive. I haven't had a single problem, and all functions still work as advertised. I was, in fact, pleasantly surprised by a few new functions that I've discovered over the course of ownership, but I have no nasty surprises to report.
Functionality
Speakers are attached to the main unit by the standard wire-and-clamp arrangement. Enough wire is provided with the speakers to allow you to place them at the corners of your desk, if you wish. You could always extend the wires if you wanted to place the speakers further away.
To play a CD, press a button, and part of the front panel will slide upward, so make sure you have enough clearance above the system, wherever you decide to place it. When you click the CD into place, press the button again, and the panel will close - convenient, whisper-quiet, no-drama type deal. A few buttons on the panel allow you to play/navigate your music, as well as adjust volume. Aside from the store-bought music CDs, the Panasonic also accepts CD-R and CD-RW (burned CDs).
To play radio, the unit has a nice, long antenna attached to the back of it. A detachable AM antenna is included in the package as well. The digital tuner is clear, simple, and convenient, allowing you to either do manual tuning or switch through your (30 available) presets. My office usually gets really poor signal reception, but the Panasonic is still able to catch a few radio stations here, which really surprised me because most of its predecessors failed.
To play an auxiliary device, the unit has a small, headphone-like plug in the back. Personally, I've never experimented with the AUX option, but the instruction manual has no stated limitations regarding what can be plugged in. I read reports that people were able to use their MP3 Players with this Panasonic, but I did not personally confirm such reports and thus cannot vouch for them.
The headphone port is in the back of the unit, surprisingly. That is very inconvenient, and I have no idea what the folks at Panasonic were thinking when they put it there - perhaps some design logistics prevented frontal placement - but better to have a poorly placed headphone port than none at all, in my opinion.
Now for the fun part. There's a remote control! It comes with a battery and has plenty of functionality to add to your system, which you cannot otherwise access - so do not lose it.
Like the system itself, the remote is rather small but features plenty of buttons. You can set the digital clock, set the play timer (you can set the time at which the system will power on and start playing and the time at which it will stop), and engage the sleep mode. The remote also lets you control the playback from your sources (i.e., radio, cd, aux) and includes buttons like volume, seek, play/stop/skip, equalizer (off, clear, soft, vocal, d-bass) and the live virtualizer sound effect.
Sound
Panasonic certainly tried, and I'd say the sound is above average for this price point. The speakers are clearly far below Bose, but at this price point, I wouldn't exactly expect Bose sound. However, this isn't a flat-sounding can of sardines either. The highs are clear, and the midrange, while somewhat "vacuumed," does provide enough range and color to let you hear most (not all, but most) of what you were intended to hear. The bass is a problem with stock speakers, but that is always the case with cheap speakers. To reconcile, Panasonic included a d-bass option in the equalizer to boost the bass. Yes, the difference is quite striking, but since these speakers aren't really designed to handle this bass, it sounds synthetic and muddled to me. Still, it helps. For some kinds of music, you won't need this bass boost, but it's useful to have, especially for pop, metal, and various radio.
To be fair, I must note that I come from the more expensive audio toys, so my assessment is probably more critical than average. But even to me, the sound quality is definitely acceptable, and most people will regard it as pretty good. Before I had my expensive audio toys, I didn't have a problem with this Panasonic. With the inclusion of d-bass and live virtualizer, Panasonic really tried to make the most of these limited speakers. The virtualizer does provide an interesting sound effect, and for some music sounds pretty cool. Poor man's surround sound, I call it. Other equalizer effects can be browsed to find the setting that works best for the music at hand. Chances are, you'll find what pleases you more.
One thing I do to get better sound out of this system is use the headphones! With good headphones, this system can provide good sound, indeed, which tells me that the speakers and not so much the main unit is the limiting factor. Low-resistance headphones or earphones would probably be the best option with this system, so you could get more power from it. I was pleased with the sound I got through my headphones - a more lively midrange and a much more natural bass even without the d-bass boost.
Concluding Remarks
For a mainstream compact stereo at this price point, I think Panasonic did a good job. The build quality is solid: no flimsy buttons, no rattles, no ringing. The buttons have a nice, expensive feel to them. The system is also sleek-looking and should compliment your room or your office quite tastefully, in my opinion.
While I may have my gripes about the sound, I am being quite critical and perhaps comparing this system to those outside its price range. Overall, I believe that the sound Panasonic achieved here is above-average, and at this price-point, I was actually impressed. Afterall, I did listen to the system prior to buying, did decide to buy it, and had no buyer's remorse since.
I came upon this sleek-looking, compact Panasonic stereo, which immediately grabbed my attention. It had a slanted silver/gray front panel, a digital display with a warm orange backlight, and the two detached speakers that were slanted and colored to match the main unit. The front of the main unit also had one orange and 3 green indicator lights, as well as chrome-polished buttons.
The sound coming out of the speakers was above average: clear, civilized, and reasonably colorful, even complete with some simple equalizer adjustments. Once I made certain that the system had a headphone port, the whole package looked overall promising to me, and I decided to buy it!
I've been using this system for about a year now, and I am happy to report that my experience so far has been only positive. I haven't had a single problem, and all functions still work as advertised. I was, in fact, pleasantly surprised by a few new functions that I've discovered over the course of ownership, but I have no nasty surprises to report.
Functionality
Speakers are attached to the main unit by the standard wire-and-clamp arrangement. Enough wire is provided with the speakers to allow you to place them at the corners of your desk, if you wish. You could always extend the wires if you wanted to place the speakers further away.
To play a CD, press a button, and part of the front panel will slide upward, so make sure you have enough clearance above the system, wherever you decide to place it. When you click the CD into place, press the button again, and the panel will close - convenient, whisper-quiet, no-drama type deal. A few buttons on the panel allow you to play/navigate your music, as well as adjust volume. Aside from the store-bought music CDs, the Panasonic also accepts CD-R and CD-RW (burned CDs).
To play radio, the unit has a nice, long antenna attached to the back of it. A detachable AM antenna is included in the package as well. The digital tuner is clear, simple, and convenient, allowing you to either do manual tuning or switch through your (30 available) presets. My office usually gets really poor signal reception, but the Panasonic is still able to catch a few radio stations here, which really surprised me because most of its predecessors failed.
To play an auxiliary device, the unit has a small, headphone-like plug in the back. Personally, I've never experimented with the AUX option, but the instruction manual has no stated limitations regarding what can be plugged in. I read reports that people were able to use their MP3 Players with this Panasonic, but I did not personally confirm such reports and thus cannot vouch for them.
The headphone port is in the back of the unit, surprisingly. That is very inconvenient, and I have no idea what the folks at Panasonic were thinking when they put it there - perhaps some design logistics prevented frontal placement - but better to have a poorly placed headphone port than none at all, in my opinion.
Now for the fun part. There's a remote control! It comes with a battery and has plenty of functionality to add to your system, which you cannot otherwise access - so do not lose it.
Like the system itself, the remote is rather small but features plenty of buttons. You can set the digital clock, set the play timer (you can set the time at which the system will power on and start playing and the time at which it will stop), and engage the sleep mode. The remote also lets you control the playback from your sources (i.e., radio, cd, aux) and includes buttons like volume, seek, play/stop/skip, equalizer (off, clear, soft, vocal, d-bass) and the live virtualizer sound effect.
Sound
Panasonic certainly tried, and I'd say the sound is above average for this price point. The speakers are clearly far below Bose, but at this price point, I wouldn't exactly expect Bose sound. However, this isn't a flat-sounding can of sardines either. The highs are clear, and the midrange, while somewhat "vacuumed," does provide enough range and color to let you hear most (not all, but most) of what you were intended to hear. The bass is a problem with stock speakers, but that is always the case with cheap speakers. To reconcile, Panasonic included a d-bass option in the equalizer to boost the bass. Yes, the difference is quite striking, but since these speakers aren't really designed to handle this bass, it sounds synthetic and muddled to me. Still, it helps. For some kinds of music, you won't need this bass boost, but it's useful to have, especially for pop, metal, and various radio.
To be fair, I must note that I come from the more expensive audio toys, so my assessment is probably more critical than average. But even to me, the sound quality is definitely acceptable, and most people will regard it as pretty good. Before I had my expensive audio toys, I didn't have a problem with this Panasonic. With the inclusion of d-bass and live virtualizer, Panasonic really tried to make the most of these limited speakers. The virtualizer does provide an interesting sound effect, and for some music sounds pretty cool. Poor man's surround sound, I call it. Other equalizer effects can be browsed to find the setting that works best for the music at hand. Chances are, you'll find what pleases you more.
One thing I do to get better sound out of this system is use the headphones! With good headphones, this system can provide good sound, indeed, which tells me that the speakers and not so much the main unit is the limiting factor. Low-resistance headphones or earphones would probably be the best option with this system, so you could get more power from it. I was pleased with the sound I got through my headphones - a more lively midrange and a much more natural bass even without the d-bass boost.
Concluding Remarks
For a mainstream compact stereo at this price point, I think Panasonic did a good job. The build quality is solid: no flimsy buttons, no rattles, no ringing. The buttons have a nice, expensive feel to them. The system is also sleek-looking and should compliment your room or your office quite tastefully, in my opinion.
While I may have my gripes about the sound, I am being quite critical and perhaps comparing this system to those outside its price range. Overall, I believe that the sound Panasonic achieved here is above-average, and at this price-point, I was actually impressed. Afterall, I did listen to the system prior to buying, did decide to buy it, and had no buyer's remorse since.
