I had a cool but dinky looking set of 4.1 speakers that I recently gave to my cousin because of lackluster sound quality. I then set out to find the best speakers available. To my surprise, there are very few quality computer speaker systems made anymore. The emphasis is all on style, and 5.1 channels.

2 months after my search began, I came across these babies on ebay. I read a few reviews, and won them b/c of the comparison to Klipsch. I can say that I am VERY glad that I bought them. They don't have the Klipsch bass response, as this sub only handles down to 45 hz with a max output of 125 watts using a 6" woofer. If you listen to a lot of rap music, i'd say these are not for you. But for ANYTHING else, they are simply amazing. Very smooth bass response that doesn't distract from the music.

The speakers produce very clean highs with 1" horn tweeters, and the best mid's i've ever heard from computer speakers, with the biggest midrange driver on the market. I've read that horn tweeters are more powerful and disperse sound better with only a fraction of a loss in quality when compared to dome tweeters. This set rivals the Onkyo 5.1 system in my home theater. And all this from a built in sound card in my laptop. (Makes me want to upgrade)

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and I cant get enough of these. When I first got them out of the box, I was afraid of their large size, as my last speakers were about the size of a small flashlight. It's something I've grown to love, however. Their size is intimidating, which I think makes the music more enjoyable (what you think is better, IS). They also look very old school... like they were made in the 80s. Again, something i've come to like.

Ok, now the bad. The cables are REALLY short. You'll have buy at least one, if not 2, RCA extension cables for each speaker. And also, as stated above, the speakers are FREAKIN HUGE. You'll need lots of desk space. The speaker controls of Volume, Fade, and Tone are mounted on the right speaker, so that will need to be within an arm's length of sitting position.

Last but not least, the power amp gets HOT. I played music for about an hour straight about 45% volume (not really pushing it), and the back panel was scorching. I think perhaps this is one of the reasons why Telex discontinued this product. Heat is the death of all electronics. I took the panel off the back of the sub, and they have not included a fan or heatsink. I don't know why more companies don't include them because they cost virtually nothing to buy and implement. Anyhow, I'm solving this problem by removing the amp from the sub. Details aside, I'm going to build a separate enclosure with a few cooling fans to prevent overheating. Hopefully it will extend the life of the system.

There you have it. If you're interested in this product, I highly recommend it, though I would strongly suggest remedying the potential overheating problem with at least a dedicated box or oscillating fan on the amp. I'm a musician and an audiophile, and sound quality is very important to me. I was considering buying a few monitors, but these are even better, and more practical for my application. These have met and exceeded my expectations. Get them while they're still available. They're no longer in production.