Labtec Pulse 485 > Reviews > Labtec Pulse 485

Author's product rating:   

Sound quality	Satisfactory
Design	Good
Value For Money	Excellent

Advantages:	good value for money for an under £30 system
Disadvantages:	poor sound from the staelite speakers, volume controls are at the back

Recommend to potential buyers:

no

Full review

I just bought a new 17" TFT monitor and pc, so i thought it would be a good idea to buy some speakers. I set myself a budget of £30 and started looking on the internet, I find ebuyer to have a good selection of reasonably priced speakers. I was looking for something with a little power but on a budget as i had little money left over from the new PC and Monitor.

After searching through lots of different speakers I saw the Labtec Pulse 485 price at ~£20, and compared with other systems it offered 8w rms speakers where others were less, however the decidng factor was the sub. There were other systems costing more which only had two speakers, the Pulse 485 offers a 2.1 system with a 12w sub.

After unpacking the speakers which do look very nice with my set up as they match with a nice silver and black design, I got to work and made sure they sounded good. At first the sound was fantastic for £20 i thought i had a bargain.

However, after a few weeks the speakers have developed a crackle which isn't persistent but happens enough to annoy. The most disappointing thing with this system is that the controls for the speakers are on the back oof the subwoofer so you have to keep it with in a close vicinity to change the volume, although once you have the base set up the overall volume can changed using a multimedia keyboard with volume control.

Overall, for a budget speaker system the Pulse 485 are very good value, however the two satelite speakers are diaspointingly poor quality. If you are lookin for a cheap set of speakers then maybe the 2.0 systems without a sub would be a better alternative.

Value you for money, but if you are audiophile its worth spending a few extra pounds on a system with better quality satelite speakers.