Logitech Z623 Computer Speakers: review

by Bill Palmer

When it comes to 2.1 computer speakers, the Logitech Z623 is pretty straightforward – but in this case that’s a good thing. There’s nothing too different or left-field or flashy about this particular three piece speaker system, as all black unit comes with a rectangular, almost cubic subwoofer and a pair of node shaped satellites which stand about eight inches tall on your desk. But the Z623 is aimed for users who are more interested in what their speakers sound like, as the audio quality is obvious the minute you fire them up.

At this price point you’re looking for high quality audio in the higher and lower ranges, and just as importantly, the ability to control the ratio of treble to bass. The latter part is taken care of by a bass knob on the right satellite which allows the bass to be positioned anywhere from barely-there to downright thunderous. The separate overall volume knob next to it allows the entire Z623 system to be cranked to neighbor-aggravating volumes (and then some) without a loss of fidelity. The short of it is that these speakers are worth every bit of their $134 price tag.

If there’s one thing not to like, it’s that a quick glance of Logitech’s full line of speaker offerings reveals that some of them have silver lining around the speaker grilles, slightly more unusual shaped satellites, or other features which make them physically stand out a little more than the Z623. But for those who like a conservative-looking set of all-black 2.1 speakers, or who simply place audio quality above styling one way or the other, the Z623 is a strong choice.

rating: 4.5 stars out of five • buy now: $134 at Logitech.com or $124 at Amazon.com.

review: Bowers & Wilkins Zeppelin Mini Dockable Stereo

While the original Bowers & Wilkins Zeppelin stereo system got its name for literally being shaped like a blimp, the Zeppelin Mini takes a far more conservative design approach by adopting a cylindrical shape which takes up a smaller footprint. But the Mini might evoke nearly as many oohs and ahs from those who spot it, thanks to a couple of design flairs of its own. Across the top is a curved mirrored surface, which tilts forward enough to cast a visible reflection of the room toward onlookers. And the iPhone or iPod, rather than docking within the unit’s space, sits atop it on a docking perch. The perch even rotates to allow you to watch video on your iPhone or iPod’s screen, making it perhaps the best-sounding mini movie theater experience ever.

The Mini’s audio quality is, in a word, brilliant – as it should be for this price (officially $399 but findable on sites like Amazon for $299). However, and perhaps it’s due to the efforts made to make the Mini so small, as it’s barely three inches front to back, something is lost from the absolutely stunning audio quality of its larger full-sized $599 Zeppelin. In fact, the Mini doesn’t even quite measure up to the best similarly priced systems on the market, as its audio is closer to that of iHome’s $199 iP3 than iHome’s $299 iP1.

I was about to be disappointed in the lack of on-board volume controls, until I found them tucked away on the right side of the unit – a clever design touch. I mention this because they’ve been so well integrated into the design that some users may not even know they’re there.

Hate to say it, but if you’re buying the Zeppelin Mini for $399 or even $299, you’re doing so at least partially for its design flair. And if you’re going to do that, you might as well opt for the larger model, which actually looks like a Zeppelin. Still, the Mini is a quite a high quality product – but it’s not in the top tier for its price range.

review by Bill Palmer

rating: four stars out of five • Bowers-Wilkins.com

Edifier Luna5 iF500 Encore for iPhone and iPod: review

Nearly all single-unit dockable stereo systems for iPhone and iPod follow the same design philosophy: a flat rectangular structure with the speakers placed at opposite ends of the unit. But with the Luna5 Encore, Edifier blows up the blueprint – almost literally – with a tall balloon shaped unit whose design doesn’t quite compare to any dockable stereo I’ve ever tested in five years of doing so. The pictures don’t quite do the unit justice. Rather than being fully spherical, the Luna5’s speaker housing is only about six or seven inches front to back, with the docking unit sticking out another several inches. Still, it’s something of a monster when sitting on your desk, which helps explain why it’s able to crank out such excellent-sounding audio.

In fact, this is one of those stereos you can crank so loud that your neighbors will be ready to call the police, and you still won’t notice any dropoff in the pristine-ness of the audio quality, even in the lower ranges. In fact the bass is set a bit higher by default than most systems, but that’s fine because the bass and treble can be separately and significantly adjusted via the included remote. Even with its large overall size, it turns out the Luna5 is not as wide left to right as most of its similarly priced competitors, so it actually takes up less desk space. The downside to that tradeoff, however, is that the lack of physical separation of the speakers is immediately obvious when you listen; it sounds like all the audio is emanating from the same spot, because it is. Contrast this with most competing (rectangular) $300 systems, which offer noticeably better stereo separation despite also being single-unit systems.

The Luna5 comes with a built in FM radio, which is a good thing. And it allows for eighteen programmable presets, which is also a good thing, because there’s no way to manually tune the radio stations via the on-board controls; anything beyond accessing the presets has to be done from the remote. Actually, the remote is on the powerful side, with the ability to navigate up and down the menus of your iPhone or iPod, meaning you can access nearly any song on your device, without having to reach for it, so long as you’re close enough to be able to see you device’s screen. On the other hand, the remote is about a foot tall, slightly larger than even the oversized one that came with my cable TV box, which doesn’t make a lot of sense because my cable box remote has about three times as many buttons.

At the end of the day, the Luna5 Encore is one of those products that I really like, but can’t bring myself to give more than four stars out of five because everything that it does right also comes with at least a little bit of a caveat. As a minor example, the on-board volume buttons are easily accessible right near the lip of the dock, but the accompanying LCD screen which displays the volume level and the radio station is obscured behind your iPhone or iPod when viewed anything other than the left side. These are the kind of gripes that probably wouldn’t even register when testing a $100 system. But at $300, users are likely to be picky about the details.

After spending some time with this particular product, my general recommendations haven’t really changed: the iHome iP1 is still our highest rated non-portable system at $300, and the Altec Lansing MIX is still our highest rated $300 portable system. But if those products aren’t for you, or if you merely favor the shape or aesthetics of the Luna5 Encore, then it’s recommendable in its own right. It’s got its flaws, but they’re minor, and they’re essentially overshadowed by what the product gets right – so long as stereo separation is not atop your list of priorities.

Rating: four stars out of five · $299 · Edifier.com

review: Altec Expressionist Ultra

Depending on the brand and hardware design of your computer, its audio output can range from respectable to pathetic. And while this can be remedied by any decent off the shelf sub-$100 computer speaker system, Altec Lansing is asking you to think bigger – in terms of price and size – with its $199 MX6021, more memorably known as the Expressionist Ultra. To say that this system is large is an understatement, as the subwoofer is literally as large as a small minitower, and the two satellites each stand about as tall as an iPad.

Having spent quality time with the company’s own $99 Expressionist Plus last year, I can tell you that the $199 Ultra is larger and more expensive for good reason: the Ultra sounds stunning and puts the Plus to shame. I was particularly impressed with just how loud I could crank the Ultra without a hint of degradation, and once I positioned the three units sufficiently far enough from each other, how easily the audio managed to consume the entire room even at a moderate volume. Cranked way up, this system could likely serve as the audio source for an entire house party.

Interestingly enough, however, the defining aspect of the Ultra may not be its audio quality as the inclusion of a controller knob (pictured above) which takes on the shape of a small truncated cone and provides volume and power control.

Placing these controls on a knob instead of on any of the three speaker units makes sense, as speakers this powerful are likely to spread far enough apart that none of them might be within each reach of your computer chair. As it is, the wired controller can stretch up to about six feet from the sub, making it easy to set it on your desk next to your computer.

The entire visible surface of the knob is a notched ratchet for cranking the volume up or down which snaps back to its default position when you let go. Unfortunately, the implementation isn’t quite as intuitive as I might have hoped. Turning the knob and holding it will cause the volume to continue increasing (or decreasing) until you let go, which sounds good in theory. But if you just want to adjust the volume a smidge, you have to turn the knob by the amount you think you want, immediately let go, and if you didn’t get guess right, crank the knob again (by this time it’s snapped back to default). It has the effect of feeling like you’re using a rotary telephone; simply going with a free-spinning knob would have been more intuitive.

On a brighter note, the knob includes bass and treble controls, which are too often overlooked on a system like this. They work in the same manner as volume control (press the “Treble” or “Bass” button and then crank the knob), but oddly enough have to be turned in the opposite direction of the volume control; turning up the treble or bass requires turning the knob toward a clearly visible “minus” sign, while turning them down requires turning the knob toward the “plus” sign.

The inclusion of a headphone port on the knob is nice, as it allows you to temporarily switch over to headphones without having to disconnect the speakers from your computer in order to free up its audio port. However, in my tests, some (but not all) of the earbuds and headphones that I tried with the knob’s headphone port produced a bit of static on the line, leaving me to end up using my computer’s headphone port after all. Your mileage may vary; I couldn’t find any rhyme or reason on this.

Finally, and not to pile on, but this speaker system can’t even be turned on unless the knob is connected (unplug it and the entire unit shuts off), meaning that if you like the speakers but not the concept of the knob, you’ll be stuck finding a place to stash the knob out of the way. And then there’s the series of orange lights on the front of the knob, which strobe back and forth like the front of the Knight Rider car whether music is playing or not.

So I’m conflicted as to how to sum up the Expressionist Ultra: its audio is more than worth its price tag, but only if you’re going to spread out the three units and crank it up enough for the audio quality to matter. I like the inclusion of the knob, but I’m less than thrilled with its too-clever execution.

As with all products, you’ll have to decide for yourself as to whether this product is right for you – but perhaps even more so with this particular product than usual.

Review: Altec Lansing MIX

New in iProng Labs: a hands-on review of the brand new MIX portable stereo system for iPhone and iPod (also known as the iMT800), from Altec Lansing, which runs on batteries, has an FM radio, and is available for $299…

by Bill Palmer

Back in the early days of the iPod, there were portable dockable stereo systems and then there was Altec Lansing’s iM7, a giant all-white $249 cylindrical tube shaped system that ran on batteries and could be hoisted on your shoulder like a ghetto blaster and was bigger and badder (and better sounding) than any other portable dockable system on the market.



But like so many iPod accessories from the early days, the iM7 eventually went by the wayside and was never really replaced by anything comparable, either from Altec Lansing or from anyone else – until now. The MIX, also known as the iMT800, may not look much like the old iM7, as the MIX has a black body with silver handles (two on the front, one on the top) and the same gold trim currently featured on the company’s earbud line, but it embodies the iM7’s original spirit. Shaped trapezoidally from the top, rectangularly from the front, and feeling a bit lighter when you pick up than you might have expected, the MIX is an intimidating monster of a system. And that’s before you turn it on.



Any product like the MIX is going to require a necessary amount of potential skepticism right out of the box, not only because it costs three hundred dollars (at a time when most vendors are scrambling to produce less expensive versions of their most popular products), but also because the company is asking you to carry around something this large: is it easily carried? Does it offer enough battery life for the portability to be put to good use? Is the included remote decent? And, of course, the most important question of all: is the audio quality strong enough to make any of the above even matter, or is this one of those products that throws in the kitchen sink in an attempt to hide the fact that there’s no kitchen?



Eyeballing the MIX, I expected it to weigh fifteen to twenty pounds, so I was relieved when I picked it up and found that it weighed closer to ten. The handle on top allows you to carry it in one hand at your side (or if you really want to, on your shoulder), while the pair of handles on the front allows you to carry it front of you with both hands. But perhaps more important than than flexibility is that you can carry it around with your iPhone or iPod docked in the unit, thanks to a metal roll bar (padded on the inside) that slides down onto the top of your device and holds it securely in place, within what is otherwise a standard Universal dock. This feature drew immediate skepticism as I recalled how the proprietary secure enclosure on the old iM7, which worked flawlessly with the iPod models that were on the market at the time, ended up being increasingly unusable with later iPod models that just plain didn’t fit into the enclosure, and ultimately likely led to the iM7’s early demise. But the roll bar here on the MIX is a different beast. Instead of trying to contain your device within the unit as the iM7 did, the MIX allows your device to be on the outside of the unit but still securely in place. After having tested it with everything from the iPhone to iPod nano, I’m left to conclude that the roll bar is designed such that any future iPhone and iPod models will also be fully compatible with the MIX, provided they’re not physically larger than the largest current models. For those of us who never could quite get the iPod nano to work satisfactorily with the iM7, the importance of the MIX’s apparent forward compatibility cannot be overstated.



But there are sexier features to talk about than a roll bar, and plenty of them. The orange LCD screen displays track information for your iPhone or iPod, as well as any track info provided by the FM radio station you’re listening to, along with an old school pull-out metal antenna for said radio purposes. And the feature that Altec Lansing is promoting the heaviest is the pair of line-in ports on the top of the unit that allow two additional audio devices to be attached. Such ports have traditionally been posited merely as a method of connecting a non-dockable device such as an iPod shuffle or a non-iPod, and are usually buried quietly on the back. But Altec is taking an entirely different tack here, instead promoting the idea of using the MIX at a party and allowing a couple of friends to connect their own iPods or iPhones while yours is in the dock, and using the on-board controls or the included remote to toggle between them at will. As such, the top well for the handle can be used as a makeshift quasi-dock, or the devices can simply be laid on top of the unit.



Speaking of the remote, the portability motif is extended here with a spring-loaded belt clip at the end of the remote itself which will allow you to carry it around at a party without losing track of it. And borrowing a good idea from the old iM7, the MIX‘s remote can be tucked away into a slot on the unit itself when not in use. Also on the remote are four preset buttons for the radio, along with an EQ adjustment button (the latter of which is also built into the on board controls).



But in the end, what matters above all else is audio quality. Judging the MIX’s audible output is best done by comparing it to other similar products on the market, and frankly speaking, there are none. It’s tempting to try to draw parallels between the MIX and iHome’s new iP1 because they share the same price tag and roughly similar size, but the two products really have nothing to do with each other, as the iP1 is a stationary system based purely on impeccable audio quality, whereas the MIX is a portable system that takes the kitchen sink approach. That the iP1 sounds better than the MIX is as expected as it is irrelevant for review purposes, other than to emphasize the self-evident fact that features like portability and built-in radio do cost money, and as such products with those features should only be purchased if you plan to put those features to use.
The more relevant comparison is whether the MIX is really worth a hundred dollars more than Altec’s own $199 MAX, and the answer there is a resounding yes. While the MAX sounds great for its size, the MIX blows it away with four front-facing speakers and a side-firing subwoofers. The short of it is that the MIX is by far the best-sounding portable stereo system for iPhone and iPod currently on the market at any price.



And I suspect that’s what will ultimately make MIX users the happiest. The “party” angle, with the extra aux ports, while it makes a great marketing push, isn’t going to make or break the product; even those who buy the MIX with partying in mind will still likely log most of their hours with the MIX back in their office or dorm room. But regardless of whether you plan to put the party aspect to use or not, the bottom line is that would be a category-killing five star product even without the partying angle.



So what puts the MIX over the top? In an era where more and more portable stereo systems are coming with built-in lithium batteries, something I generally favor, a unit of this size wouldn’t last very long on a lithium battery (as evidenced by the MAX’s paltry three hour battery life, and it’s not nearly as big). But the MIX, which runs on eight D batteries? Thirty hours of real-world use, which makes me pleased that, in this instance, they didn’t go the lithium route after all.

*****

Learn more about the Altec Lansing MIX (iMT800) at AltecLansing.com

*****

Review: iHome iP1

New in iProng Labs: a hands-on review of the iP1 dockable stereo system for iPhone and iPod from iHome, priced at $299…

review by Bill Palmer

With an impressive rollout at CES in January that included a hands-on demonstration by legendary record producer Tony Bongiovi, and seven months of subsequent anticipation before it finally officially hit the market, iHome’s space-age looking and not-inconsequently priced iP1 was destined to be the biggest new accessory to hit the iPhone and iPod market in 2009 – or the biggest flop – and nothing in between. Could a company known primarily for its “great sounding (for its price tag)” iPod alarm clocks in the hundred dollar price range manage to successfully conquer the high end of the dockable stereo market with one ambitious first swing?



After we spent some time with the iP1 inside iHome’s sound room in January, we were betting on the affirmative, as we found it surprisingly easy to peg the iP1 as the best-sounding dockable stereo system in this price range we’d ever heard – and that was before the “B” button was even demonstrated for us.



But just as anyone can sound decent while singing in the isolated confines of the shower, any speaker system can sound better in an acoustic room than it does in the real world. I needed to hear the iP1 outside of a constructed sound room and in more typical end-user surroundings, in this instance sitting on a kitchen table. And after having put the system through its paces with my iPhone, my iPod nano, my music, and my surroundings, I’m even more impressed with it now than I was in January.



Although the iP1 would be worth its price tag even without the “B” button (the “B” stands for Bongiovi, who designed the technology for iHome), it’s the ability to fire up this button that puts the iP1 over the top into category-killer territory. While I’ve seen plenty of cheaper stereo systems that included a button that would either enhance the bass or expand the spatiality of the audio, such options have generally had a synthetic quality to them, much like how a digital zoom on a camera is better than nothing but is really just a poor man’s substitute for a true optical zoom. But with the iP1, the Bongiovi button is a whole different creature, monitoring the music’s frequency spectrum for peaks and valleys and accentuating them appropriately.



If that sounds like a bunch of technical mumbo jumbo, then all you have to know is that it works. The catch is that the worse-sounding the music, for instance an older recording that has lost something when compressed into AAC or MP3, the more the B button can do for it. But even when testing out the iP1 with current albums that were purchased straight from iTunes (which are typically encoded right from the master recording), there was almost always a noticeable and desirable improvement when the B button was activated. I suspect that much like how the “enhance” button in iPhoto will occasionally turn a photo purple in its attempts to improve the color and light balance, there is perhaps the oddball occasional song that actually sounds worse with the iP1’s B button activated – but after having tested more than fifty songs from various eras and genres, I couldn’t find one. In any case, as its name implies, the B button effect can be turned off with the touch of a, well, button, if and when it’s not desirable.



The aesthetics of the iP1 are daring beyond just choice of shape or material. In fact the entire unit only has one solid face, that being the thick slab of tinted clear plastic that constitutes the unit’s front face. Two large cylindrical speakers protrude from the back of the front face, with a black slab between them, and the unit reclines on the cylinders. Despite not having a true back, top, or sides, the unit is plenty stable and is arguably the first speaker system so far in the twenty-first century that actually looks like it belongs in the twenty-first century, looking ultra-modern without feeling gimmicky. Ultimately, aesthetics are something each user will have to judge on their own, but I found that the unit looked equally impressive in a trade show sound room and on a cluttered kitchen table.


Down to the details, the iP1 comes with a remote that includes adjustable bass and treble along with iPod/iPhone menu navigation and, of course, another B button on the remote. Also in the box are a pair of open-face speaker grilles for aesthetic purposes. And built-in video-out allows you to play your iPhone or iPod’s video on your television while using the iP1’s audio.



The iP1 eschews Apple’s official universal docking system of custom-fit inserts for each iPhone and iPod model, in favor of a simple protruding shelf for docking your iPhone or iPod, along with cylindrical rubber stopper that twists out to rest against the back of your device. Some super-cheap systems sidestep the universal dock simply to avoid the cost of licensing it. But here it makes sense both from an aesthetic and functional standpoint, adding to the minimalism of the unit and staying consistent with the exposed styling.



When it comes to competing dockable iPhone/iPod stereo systems in this price range, I’ve spent time with them all. It’s not a surprise that the iP1 sounds better than the identically priced system from Bose, as the Bose unit has always been a nice $200 product saddled with a $300 price tag. And although it’s not a fair comparison since none of Altec Lansing’s dockable units costs more than $200, the iP1 blows them away. A more fair comparison based on price would be Apple’s own recently discontinued iPod HiFi, which sounded fantastic and sold for $349 but didn’t come all that close to sounding as good as the iP1.



None of this is to denigrate any of the competing products out there, some of which are excellent in their own right. But improbable as it may seem for a newcomer in this price range, the iP1 immediately becomes the new king of the hill even before you consider the B button technology – similarly, come to think of it, to how iHome’s original iH5 product immediately became the best-sounding $99 dockable iPod stereo system out there before you even considered its alarm clock functionality. The iH5 sent the industry scrambling for an answer which eventually brought a whole wave of impressive competing $99 products to market. And the same thing will likely happen now, as the established vendors in this price range attempt to recover from having been simultaneously leapfrogged in design, audio quality, and underlying technology.



But that’s all down the road, perhaps at the next round of trade shows. For now, the bottom line it that the iHome iP1 is the most impressive iPhone or iPod accessory of any kind to come to market in 2009. And although you never know for sure, I expect that’ll still be a true statement by the time the year comes to an end.

*****

Learn more about the iP1 at iHomeAudio.com or pre-order for a discounted $249 at Amazon.com.

*****

Review: EOS Wireless for iPod

Wireless iPod speaker systems have arrived in various incarnations over the years, the most successful to date being Griffin’s $349 Evolve, whose pair of built-in speakers can be picked up and carried around with you while continuing to play the music coming from your iPod docked in the base station. Now EOS offers up a different paradigm in which the base station is a stationary speaker itself, there’s a wireless speaker in the box, and a second/third/fourth wireless unit can optionally be added.



It sounds good in theory, and from a wireless perspective, works automatically and flawlessly right out of the box. Dock your iPod (or, unofficially, iPhone) into the base station, start playing your music, and you’ll hear it coming of the base station along with the wireless speaker(s), wherever you’ve placed them. If that’s in another room or even outside, no problem, as long as it’s less than about 150 feet away. Each unit has its own adjustable volume, and the base station includes a remote control.



Two things hold the EOS Wireless back from its full potential. One is that the wireless speakers each need to be plugged into the wall for electricity (they can hang directly from the outlet, which is pretty cool, or be placed further away from it via the power cable). But unlike the Evolve, whose speakers are portable, these can’t be moved around the house on a whim without finding a new electrical outlet each time.



The other issue is the sound quality. We’re talking serious money here: $249 for the base station and the one wireless speaker; $149 for each additional speaker. Trouble is, though, that the base station itself doesn’t sound any better than typical sub-$100 iPod speaker systems on the market, with too much treble, not enough bass, and no ability to adjust that ratio. Fire up the included wireless speaker in the same room and it sounds better overall, but that already puts you at $249 before you start adding more wireless speakers. In other words, it’s only worth its hefty price tag if you plan to take full advantage of the wireless functionality – otherwise spend your money on one of the plethora of much better-sounding non-wireless systems in this price range.



Learn more at EOSwireless.com

iHome iP71 for iPhone and iPod

Where has this product been for the last six years? Ever since Apple launched the third-generation iPod with a bottom dock connector port six years ago, users have been able to purchase dockable speaker systems but have been faced with the perplexing if not quite nightmarish quandary: do I want to buy dockable speakers so I can play music directly from my iPod, or do I want to buy computer speakers and play my music from iTunes instead? And while some dockable iPod and iPhone speaker systems of the years have included a line-in port which technically allowed them to be connected to a computer, most of those systems have been designed in a way that made the whole thing awkward looking and oddly out of place.



But here comes iHome’s iP71, a speaker system whose shape and industrial design suggest that they’re the natural born soulmate of Apple’s Aluminum iMac and MacBook line, or a similarly themed PC. The pair of speakers sit on opposite sides of your computer, much like any other computer system, but with a single fundamental difference: the left speaker includes a built-in dock for iPhone or iPod. In other words, this gives you, hypothetically at least, the best of both worlds: you can, without having to change anything around at all, play music through the speakers from either your docked iPhone/iPod or iTunes on your computer – or for that matter, any and all other audio coming from your computer.



What if you’ve got audio coming from both sources at the same time? You hear them both. This is just the way you want it, as you might be listening to music from your iPhone but also want to hear any alert sounds from your computer. Syncing your iPhone or iPod with your computer while it’s docked is accomplished by connecting the iP71 to your computer with not one but two cables: an audio cable and a USB cable, the latter of which allows you to sync while docked. But while docking is generally something that happens automatically when you dock your iPhone or iPod, with the iP71 it’s manually triggered by a small button on the top of the left speaker.



This initially seemed odd at best, but I’ve actually come to prefer it to auto-sync; my computer often wants to install app updates on my iPhone, or go through a long backup process, and so syncing has become a much longer process than back in the old days where “syncing” simply meant a few songs. But these days there are plenty of times where I just want to dock my iPhone into the speaker system and play some music without first having to wait for a several-minute sync process to take place before I regain access to my iPhone’s music controls, and the iP71 allows just that.



My issues with the iP71 are actually of a more basic variety: they’re $129 speakers that don’t sound quite as good as, for instance, JBL’s $99 Duet II speakers, and yet thanks the their slanted design the iP71 take up a much larger footprint on my desk. And while the iP71 does come with an full featured remote, it’s not enough to overcome the fact that the audio quality doesn’t quite measure up. Except that in my case it apparently is enough, as the iP71 speakers still haven’t left my desk even after I finished my testing – and despite the fact that I have a number of better-sounding speaker systems sitting around the office, the convenience of being able to play my music out of either my iPhone or my computer with no toggling needed. The iP71 doesn’t sound bad by any measure, it just doesn’t measure up to the best comparably priced sized speakers. But as a laptop user whose built-in speakers are unacceptable for music playback, I’ve grown tired of having two different speaker systems on my desk – and the iP71 is simply too convenient of a solution to pass up.



This product may not make sense to users who only ever plays music through speakers via their iPhone/iPod OR their computer. And like all combo products, you’re going to pay a little more for the flexibility that comes with it than if you were to simply purchase comparable computer-specific speakers and an iPhone/iPod dock separately. But if the iP71 sounds like a product you never knew you always wanted, don’t let my mere four star rating stop you; it hasn’t stopped me.



iHome iP9 for iPhone and iPod

Once upon a time iHome got the idea to build an alarm clock that not only docked with your iPod but allowed you to wake up to your iPod’s music, and an entire industry was born. A few years later and we’ve got companies releasing everything from extravagant several hundred dollar iPod alarm clocks with dozens of built-in features to inexpensive fold-up iPod alarm clocks that fit easily in your suitcase and everything in between.



And now here comes the iP9, the fifth generation of iHome’s own original iPod alarm clock (the original version was called the “iH5” if that helps you understand the nomenclature a little better), and while it doesn’t necessarily look that different from the original, it turns out the iP9 runs circles around it for the same original $99 price tag. And equally important for a certain segment of users, it works with the iPhone. Which wasn’t always a given.



First there was the iH9, which was essentially the same product as the iP9 but wasn’t shielded against cellular signals and was therefore essentially unusable with an iPhone (unless you count putting your iPhone in airplane mode to be “usable” anywhere but on an airplane, which I don’t). Then there was the $149-priced iP99 which was iPhone-compatible but was otherwise just a minimal step up from the iH9, meaning that iPhone users were essentially paying a $50 surcharge. But now the iP9 gets it right on all counts. It works equally well with the iPhone and the iPod, offers audio quality superior to any other sub-$100 iPod/iPhone alarm clock product on the market, the dual alarm clocks that so many iH5 users used to complain about not not having back in the day, and the remote control that used to cost $20 extra is now included the $99 package. In fact that remote control has also come a long way as it now offers EQ adjustment as well as the ability to navigate up and down your iPhone or iPod’s hierarchal menus (so long as you’re standing close enough to your iPhone or iPod to be able to read its screen). Throw in the built-in AM/FM radio with presets, and the value proposition keeps increasing.



Suffice it to say that iHome’s flagship $99 alarm clock product has come a long way in the four years since it first hit the market. Being picky would be asking why it now only comes in a choice of black or grey and no longer in the original white, but I suppose that would be like asking Apple why there’s no longer a white iPod on the market.



And of course there are other options out there. Altec Lansing’s Moondance Glow alarm clock (which is annoyingly still incompatible with the iPhone) offers superior qudio quality and a wider set of features, but it also comes with a $179 price tag which puts it in an entirely different category. And iHome’s own iP99 is still around, with its price now reduced to $129, but since it doesn’t offer $30 worth of additional audio quality I can only recommend the iP99 over the iP9 to those users who strongly prefer the iP99’s more tunnel-like styling. And of course Chestnut Hill’s $499 George alarm clock is in a category unto its own.



The bottom line is that the iP9 is the best sub-$100 iPod/iPhone alarm clock product on the market, an impressive fact considering that companies like Logitech and XtremeMac (and too many others to list) have been nipping at iHome for years with impressive alarm clock offerings of their own. And those competing products will continue to come to market as more iPod and iPhone users decide they want to wake up to their own music (and of course we’ll review those products as they do).



But right now my money is on the iP9. If $99 is your budget and you’re not looking for a portable alarm clock (iHome and various competitors offer those as well), the iP9 is hands-down the best alarm clock stereo system for use with your iPhone or iPod.