Hey all ive had my creative inspire 5.1 5200 for about 6 years now there been awesome speakers to me! but there finally on the way out, and for the love of my music i wanna upgrade, heaps of people i know have these speakers yes the Z-5500 5.1. i was just wondering how do they perform for the expensive $380aus price. Are they worth the money or just go for a custom amp/speaker setup... I also know if its possible to hook these speakers up to my this 42inch samsung tv above my head? Thanks all!!!
Since you talk about music (rather than gaming, films etc) go for an amp and a set of decent speakers
They're fantastic for gaming and if you need gaming speakers and also want to listen to music, I'd recommend them. If you're going to be primarily listening to music with them (especially if it's vinyl/lossless digital), I'd suggest going for some sort of entry-level HiFi. As for hooking them up to a TV - just grab one of those $4 dongles that changes L/R RCA plugs into a 3.5mm stereo headset jack, and match up the colors.
i have the z-5450 which is the model below so everything should be nearly the same. the control panel bit makes is so much easier as you just plug everything in then just select the input and for me it covers pc xbox and tv without any problems and the remote makes life so easy as you dont need to get up to change the settings
I've got the older model of these, they are fantastic, for music, movies and gaming. I'm just waiting for the Asus sound card to come out somewhere other than ocuk atm and fall to under £100.
I friend of mine has them (ive never seen them working) but he reckons there great for music and watching games, sub can definatley shake the wall and can be heard from down the road? load of sh*T?
Having had the chance to listen to music on those speakers on a few occasions, I can definitely say they go for quantity over quality. Who cares if they sound good, they will piss your neighbors off. </sarc> If music is your primary concern, get either an entry level hi-fi or some pro monitors
Have a set of the Z-5500's myself, have found them to perform very well, quality of sound is awsome, better than the creative inspire's which i had before. One of the things i love most about the logitech speakers is the control pannel and various inputs, 3 digital inputs wtf . I find them great for games, movies and even music, best when speakers setup in x2 mode, which sends the front the stereo signal to the rear speakers also (upmix i guess). I found the subwoofer to be a little bit over powering, can often hear it rumbleing though the house even on low volume, but even when have the volume to max on these, i have yet to hear them clip or distort, not even heard the subwoofer fart or distort, with excessive bass from a loud movies night. The amp on the back of the subwoofer can get quite warm, so i would recommend that it has some air flow, or at least somewhere for the heat to escape to. I found also a kinda of easter egg with the control pannel that you can change the skin of the LCD display, this changes the volume bar displayed on the lcd pannel, from a block that is same size as you increase the volume, to a block that is only 1pixel high at first, then the 2nd block is 2 pixels high, etc etc, so it looks like a slope as you increase the volume. the change in skin also changes the on off button from red in standby to purple. You can change the "skin" by putting the amp into standby mode, then holding down the input, effect, settings and mute buttons for a few seconds. Another feature is that you can pull up some Diagnostic mode. With your Control Center off, hold down the input and effect buttons for a few seconds. This give you some information about the audio stream for a few seconds when switching modes on your Control Center. Ability to boost the volume. Keep turning the volume control past maximum for a few seconds. It will then enter a volume boost mode, this give you a max boost of 11. (I have yet to try this with content playing... as its usually loud enough by then anyways.) Then there is super volume boost. You need to max out the normal volume boost mode first and then hold mute while turning the volume up. (Again I have yet to try this with content playing... it maxes out at boost of 22). You will have to hold in the mute button and lower the volume to enter normal boost volume before you can lower your volume as normal.
Hi, welcome to the forum. I would agree they are a great set of speakers, though if you can elaborate why you think there great, that would be cool and usefull to the reader
Yeah, they can get fantastically loud without distorting, but if you get them primarily for music then don't step into the hi-fi demo booth at any store or they'll seem slightly lacking. I can't put my finger on exactly what, though. Don't get me wrong - I'm very happy with my set, but I made that mistake once and now am half-looking-into getting something more dedicated for music (but keeping the 5500s for gaming).
Totally agree with Delphium. I also have the Z-5500 and the quality is superb. Plenty of power for the average home owner. The subwoofer produces nice crisp bass with no distortion that I can make out. I pretty much use these speakers for film, music and gaming and I can't fault them. Mind you I had an arguement with a friend of mine once over the diffrence between CD and Vinyl quality (still think CD is better IMO) so I'm not "into" sound in that special way. from me though for what it's worth.
I bought these speakers quite recently, and I have but one complaint, and that isn't even anything to do with the speakers. The sattelites are very powerfull, very good on the lows, not so much on the mids, and good on the high's. The sub, well.. I can fit my foot in the blowhole. Its an immence sub, it really is. It used to shake everything in the room (which is a bad thing, mainly because everything is blu-takked down now!), and the bass is so crisp and sharp. A lot of people have said that 5.1's aren't for music. I agree, although theyre not that bad, at all. I mainly listen to rock music (Think stereotypical emo music, there you go!) and it sounds really good, although my friends pro-stereo audio setup sounds a bit better, I can certinaly live with the logitech's, although you will notice the difference between a 128k mp3 and a FLAC or Vorbis encoded track. You also get enough speaker wire to stick the sat's on your neighbors roof if you want to. Logitech's RMA procedure is great too, if the set dies, they send you a brand spanking new set out. They do tell you to send off bits from the old kit, but TBH no one ever does (The guy on the phone actually told me that) mainly because they want it shipped to sweden... But, onto the complaint. Two complaints actually. Number 1: You only get stereo sound out of your sound card when using digital. Unless you have a sound card that support Dolby Digital or DTS encoding, like the Auzentech range, or the Asus Xonar (X-Fi's do NOT have that capability). Although it works perfectly fine using Analogue. Number 2: The pod is HUGE and feels tacky. Its actually bigger than one of the sattelites, although I suppose it does have a lot inside it. It gets quite hot at times too. Even if your primary use for the speakers is music, buy them. Then watch the pod race from Star Wars Episode 1 using dolby dts. You can thank me later. PS: Stick some pendulum on and sit infront of the sub with your back to it. Best massage I've ever had, however probably very bad for me Edit: Another thing about them, the fuse blows quite often. Me and my friend have sort of.. bodged our sets. We bypassed the fuse on the sub (A 2A slow-blow fuse) and changed the 5A fuse in the plug to a 3A fuse as it was obvious that 2A wasn't enough. Even though the 2A fuse was doing its job, it did it too often, and I don't like paying for overtime.
Used them for 5 days at my friend's house. Weren't as good as it was hyped up to be. Highs were strong but lacked clarity and Logitech seemed too unfathomably obsessed with low-frequency notes by including a senselessly large sub that does bass notes only somewhat satisfactorily. Overall, I wonder why this speaker set is so expensive for sound clarity equivalent to a $40 Altec Lansing 2.1 speaker set--and even worse than the Altec Lansing for higher tones from first-hand experience.
Havent tried the 5500's myself yet but I have their predecessor (the Z5500 was released 3 weeks later ) and love them! The control center is very convient and big enough so i dont even have to take my eye off the screen while gaming if i want to change volume as the dial is big enough for my hand to always find it! Classical music (heck, any music in my opinion!) sounds great though them although there is a slight hiss (hardly noticable) that some of the z680s were prone to when on but idle. Although I dont know if this has been fixed with the 5500s. If the Z-5500s are anything like their predecessor I highly recomend them!
