I got these swanky speakers after having been frustrated by $50 sets falling short in one area or another. I went whole hog, and I'm happy I did, just because upgrading sound quality affects so many different activities. You know they're good if you've read the other reviews. Fortunately for me, they're in a unique position of being idiot-proof to set up and use, as computer speakers are by design, yet also delivering best-in-class sound in the mid and high end. They're also downright handsome, standing almost level with my monitor that's propped up on books. They have indeed been giving me detailed, clean sound for a couple of years now, but I'm writing now to let you all know that it is sound that only sounds as good as the device I'm powering it with. My phone and tablet sound fine, but never remarkable. My computer sound card, the Xonar DG, is very capable, but, again, it cost $30, and it's more designed to power headphones.

But then I tried running uncompressed sound through an optical cable from my sound card to a great little DAC box (a $20 one from Orei) that makes everything pop just a little bit more. Little details in my FLAC albums show up more clearly. Whatever the source is, everything is just a tiny bit clearer, enough to convince me that these speakers might give anyone more detail in their sound if you aren't powering them as well as you could be. I'd recommend pairing these speakers with either a slightly beefier sound card than mine or a decent DAC to pass optical audio into, if you're looking for the best possible sound setup on the cheap, say, on a budget that doesn't allow for a decent receiver or several hundred dollar subwoofer. The bass response is just fine, but definitely sounds best if you stuff something into the ports and turn the bass knob up, like one of the earlier reviewers suggested.

Either way, whatever you are playing on them, they will sound great, but you may just need to think of what's powering them, and what kind of audio sources you have, if you want the very best sound possible.

These are terrific speakers, plenty of power and great sound quality.
They have a "green feature" that is the reason I'm deducting one star: they have a power-save mode that they go into automatically if no sound has played after some time (maybe 10 minutes), which basically turns the speakers off. When sound gets sent to them, they come out of the "sleep" mode.
The problem is, this waking up takes several seconds, so you lose the first few seconds of whatever was playing. This may not sound like a big deal, but for PC speakers, if you are not playing music or anything all the time, you won't get any system alerts. Those little sounds that chime to let you know there was an error, or you have email, or whatever the OS or application needs to alert you about. Those only play for a fraction of a second - so the speakers wake up, but long after the alert sound is done. So you'll never hear those alerts.
The other annoying effect from this is when you play a video or music - say a youtube clip - you always have to watch the first few seconds of the video in silence, then back it up and start it over after the speaker wakes up and starts playing sound.
This is fine - we all want to save the planet - but the feature should have an override; let me disable it if I'll be watching video clips or listening to music or want to hear the system alerts from my PC (basically always). For top-end speakers at this price, this was a real engineering blunder, not making this an option you can cancel if needed.

I had the cheaper Logitech 5.1 hooked up to a zxr as i am mostly a headphone user. But sometimes i just get a bit tired of headphones on my head. The amount of wires started irritating me so i picked these not expecting to much. I was quite amused so to speak and how loud these can get. The sound is just outstanding. Because they are tilted toward your head the sound does not hit your chest. For this price these are pretty much the BEST sounding desktop speakers you can buy.

They are also built extremely well. They sound so good it blew my z serious 5.1 out of the picture. No need for stereo mixing in games as i can tell were things are coming from they are just that loud and clear sounding.

Update. My right speaker started to rattle. Creative rma was some of the best and fastest i have seen. Opened a case within 24 hrs it was approved. Shipped back to them 3 day usps. They send me a brand new one the same day they received it. 8 days is all it took. Just great. This is why i always buy creatives high end sound cards and speakers.

Hey guys so first off I purchase both this set of speakers and the T-20's to compare. So here is my review:

These are not for Bass junkies. If you mostly care about feeling the beat, you should get a 2.1 stereo system. However, if you want a FLAT response set of speakers that are essentially budget studio monitors, these are your best bet. These speakers have a very natural and complimentary bass response that isn't weak but actually fits your music the way it was intended. Moreover, the dedicated tweeters ensure a crispness to the snares and high hats that many small sets can't match.

These are very balanced speakers that will output very high volume 95 db without breaking a sweat, and could easily be pushed higher without any distortion. The cones are made from a high quality woven design and the tweeters are silk dome. At $80 these are almost the best deal you can get but there is a catch. They are NOT BETTER THAN THE T-20.

The T-40s do NOT sound any better than the smaller version, the T-20, and will not get as loud as the smaller version because they have two cones trying to be driven with only 2 watts of extra power. However, they have a slightly "bigger" sound. So if you primarily listen to music on your speakers from 2 feet away at a desk, buy the cheaper T-20 as they are the best audiophile set you can get in this price range. However, if you want to use these primarily for watching movies across the room, the T-40s handle chaotic action sequences just slightly better, but honestly there is no difference in sound quality, only in the sound stage imaging with the T-40s needing to be heard from a little farther away.

FYI: I ended up returning these, and keeping the smaller set as I also had my friend who does mastering listen to them and they could also percieve no upgrade in quality between the sets.

I've had these speakers a couple of years now and I love the way they sound, but I absolutely HATE the non-optional power-saving mode that causes the speakers to automatically shut off if they haven't received a sound signal in a few minutes. Basically, this means you can forget about any sound alerts being heard from your mail client, OS, etc. Unless the noise is greater than 5 seconds or so, you won't hear anything. The first time you play a video, etc, when they are asleep, you have to scroll back five seconds to catch the beginning. So annoying. If it weren't for the auto power save, I'd give these 5 stars.