klipsch

For this week's giveaway we're pulling out an old favorite, the Klipsch Image S4 earbuds. Former CNET editor Jasmine France awarded them an Editors' Choice and said these 'buds "offer up sound quality on par with and better than sets that cost many times as much; they are a spectacular choice for anyone looking for new earbuds."

Normally, the Klipsch Image S4 earbuds would cost around $79, but you have the chance to get them gratis.

So, how do you try to win these earbuds? Let me enumerate the basic rules. Please read them carefully; there … Read more

The buzz in certain corners of the high-end audio community at this year's CES was that Audiovox was going to acquire Klipsch, and Klipsch's other speaker brands, including Jamo, Mirage, Energy, and Athena. The January 6 press release sounds like it was written by lawyers:

Audiovox Corporation announced today that it has recently signed a non-binding term sheet to purchase all of the shares of Klipsch Group Inc. and its worldwide subsidiaries ("Klipsch"). Klipsch is a leading, global provider of premium, high performance speakers sold through retail and installation channels. The transaction is subject to a … Read more

You don't see the phrase "world-class" associated with American-made consumer goods. TVs, iPods, computers, and cameras are mostly designed and built in other countries. The U.S. may be the world's leading consumer state; we just don't make the very best products here anymore.

High-end audio may be one of the few remaining industries where America still designs and builds the very best products. I'm proposing an all-American hi-fi system that could be installed in the White House. It would be the sort of hi-fi the president could, after a hard day's work … Read more

Technology can lower the price of a lot of things, but when it comes to speakers, the very best ones are really expensive, so if you want a world-class speaker be prepared to spend well over $10,000.

That said, you can buy a pair of very respectable speakers for less than $1,000. The following list is in no particular order, but since $1,000 is still out of reach for a lot of folks this top 10 will feature speakers ranging in price from $29 up (all speaker prices listed are per pair). And since the prime weakness of affordable speakers is they lack true authority in the bass, I've included one overachieving subwoofer, the Epik Empire to round out this list. I've covered bargains before, but this is the first top-10 list for speakers that sell for $1,000 or less.

Zu Audio Omen ($999). Zu is one of my all time favorite American speaker manufacturers, but they've never made a speaker as affordable as the Omen, which will be released November 1 for $1,500. The speaker is finished in real maple veneer and manufactured in Ogden, Utah. Zu speakers are extremely dynamic, lively performers, and they produce razor-sharp imaging. Right, $1,500 is priced over my self-imposed limit for this top-10 list, but for just this week (ending September 17) the company is taking preintroduction orders for the Omen for just $999.99, saving you $500! Zu is selling the Omen with a 90-day money-back guarantee.

Magnepan MMG ($599) This 4-foot-tall, 1.25-inch-thick flat-panel, made-in-the-U.S., bona fide high-end speaker will knock you for a loop. Magnepan's larger speakers, like my reference MG3.6, are only sold through dealers, the MMG is sold direct, and it's a great way to get a taste of what makes high-end audio so special. If you've only heard box speakers, the MMG will be a major treat for your ears.

Dayton B652 ($29) That's not a typo, the Dayton B652 sells for $29 a pair. It was $25 when I first wrote about the speaker a few months ago, but since then a lot of audiophiles on a budget have raved about this little speaker with a 6.5-inch woofer. Seriously, I know a few guys with very high-end speakers who love the B652 and swear its price/performance ratio is off-the-charts good. … Read more

I worked in the high-end audio business for 16 years before I started writing about home theater and high-end audio. I've heard literally thousands of products, and while I've forgotten most of them, there were lots of standouts. I remember the first time I heard a high-end turntable, a Linn LP-12, and was shocked not only by its sound quality, but how it somehow hushed record surface noise, pops, and clicks. Yes, they were still there, but the noises didn't intrude as much as they do with lesser turntables.

When I was selling hi-fis, some of my customers would ask me to recommend a speaker or some other product for them. They'd say, "What do you like?" or "What's your favorite $500 speaker." Fair questions, but my answers wouldn't be all that useful. Personal taste, music preferences, room size, aesthetics, and other factors all play their roles, so my favorites wouldn't likely match my customer's needs. My role as a salesman was to help them find just the right speaker, amplifier, or turntable to fit their exact needs, not mine. It's like asking someone to pick a color for a couch or an ice cream flavor.

John Atkinson's very positive review of the Harbeth P3ESR speaker in the August 2010 issue of Stereophile magazine put me on this line of thought. The very first line of the review, "Everyone wants something different from a loudspeaker." sums up the situation nicely. Atkinson went on to point out that some listeners crave accuracy, some dynamic punch or deep, room-shaking bass, while others prize precisely focused stereo imaging. And unless you're very rich, you can't have it all, you have to prioritize the things that get your juices flowing, and downplay other aspects of sound.

Audiophiliac readers and friends query me about this all the time. "What's the best .....?" or they want a recommendation and the plain fact is, there are no simple answers to those questions. You have to listen for yourself, but brick-and-mortar stores, where you can actually compare A vs. B vs. C speakers are fading fast. People shop online to get the best deal, and rely to some degree on reviews to point them in the right direction.… Read more

Few big-screen-TV buyers are willing to invest in bona-fide home theater systems with a receiver, five (or more) speakers, and a subwoofer. Most folks are satisfied with the sound from the tiny stereo speakers built into the display. That's sad, since based on what I've heard from the displays being reviewed at the CNET offices the sound is at best barely passable. In fact, the quality of the built-in speakers is getting worse with each passing year. Great-looking high-definition video matched to lo-fi sound doesn't work for me, but we all have our priorities, don't we?

Those considering stepping up to a $300 sound bar speaker are more sophisticated buyers, and by the time we get to home theater in a box systems, with five or more speakers and a subwoofer, we're getting to the elite buyer class. I'm not joking, HTIB buyers can deal with a tangle of wires, and nearly all the setup hassles associated with a receiver-based home theater system. If you want an even higher quality home theater system with a receiver and full-size speaker/subwoofer system plan on spending close to $2,000. Sure, you can spend less, but you'll just wind up with something that doesn't sound much better sounding than a really good HTIB.

Here are my recommendations for the best-sounding affordable home theater solutions. (Editors' Note: The following list is Steve Guttenberg's personal opinion, based on his evaluation of sound quality and audio performance. For a more complete list of CNET's official product recommendations [which takes design and features into account], check out CNET's in-depth list of best home audio products.)… Read more

When it comes to speakers, size does matter. Big speakers clobber little ones in two ways: they can play louder and make more bass. But since the market demands increasingly smaller speakers the question comes up: can small speakers ever sound better than big ones? Well, the answer is sometimes and in some ways, but great-sounding small speakers are never cheap.

The best-sounding small speakers I've heard in quite some time came from a pair of Anthony Gallo Acoustics Reference Strada speakers ($995 each). The speaker is comprised of two small, stainless steel spheres, each with a 4-inch woofer; the spheres straddle a cylindrical tweeter that produces exceptionally broad dispersion. The Strada doesn't make much bass, so I heard it with the matching Gallo TR-3 cylindrical subwoofer. The system was sweet, detailed, dynamically alive, and very, very natural sounding. But it costs over three grand and doesn't have the muscle of a hefty floorstanding speaker for the same or fewer dollars.

So if you plan on never, ever listening to loud music or having a party, and room-shaking bass isn't a priority, wee speakers might be the way to go. How tiny is tiny? Obviously, size is relative, but I'd rate any speaker that is either less than 7 inches high, or has a smaller than 4-inch woofer as a tiny speaker. If your room is large--say anything bigger than 15 by 20 feet (300 square feet)--don't even think of buying small speakers. … Read more

People buy home theater-in-a-box systems for a lot of reasons, but sound quality isn't one of them.

The problem with HTIBs, even the very best ones, is they don't come with great speakers or subwoofers. Denon has a solution at hand: the S-5DB. Think of it as a HTIB that doesn't come with speakers or a subwoofer. No HTIB ever made has speakers as good as the better ones I've reviewed from Aperion Audio, Atlantic Technology, Definitive Technology, Energy Speakers, Klipsch, Mirage, or Polk. You want great sound? You gotta have great speakers.

The S-5BD combo … Read more

Sure, iPods and Zunes can sound perfectly fine, but no one ever claimed they were bona fide portable high-end audio devices. Their "good enough" sound isn't entirely their fault: they're too small to house a battery potent enough to power a high-quality headphone amplifier and a high-resolution 24-bit/96kHz digital-to-analog converter.

The Hifiman High Fidelity Music Player HM-801 is the Hummer of portables; it's big enough to get the job done. It's 3 inches wide, 4.5 inches high, and 1 inch thick; that's about the size of an old Walkman cassette player from the 1980s. Hifiman doesn't say how much the HM-801 weighs, but it feels substantial.

If Apple wanted to build something as good or better, it could, but the potential market for something that sounds better than an iPod is probably insignificant, and certainly too small for Apple or Microsoft to bother with. They're too busy jamming more features into their players, and sound quality never makes the cut. Besides, the market demands ever cheaper products, and real quality is never cheap. so the HM-801 is downright pricey.

That's another way of saying it's aimed at the sort of music lover who's already invested in a set of top-of-the-line Etymotic, Grado, Klipsch, Monster, Shure, or Ultimate Ears headphones. If you have and you're using an iPod or Zune, you're not hearing all the sound quality you paid for with those headphones.

The HM-801 was conceived as an audiophile player, so non-sound-oriented features are pretty scarce. The HM-801 has a user removable headphone amplifier circuitboard/module that makes future upgrades easy as pie. Hifiman already has one such upgrade in the works, a $170 board specifically designed to maximize detail and resolution of high-end in-ear headphones. Looking inside the HM-801--it has removable panels--so you can see it features top quality components, like a Burr-Brown PCM1704U digital-to-analog converter and Burr-Brown OPA627 Op-Amp. This is a level of technology normally found in audiophile home componentry, and never before used in a portable music player. … Read more