No matter if you are playing a video game on your computer, or watching a movie, or especially if you are listening to some music, you will definitely need some computer speakers. Of course you can also use some headphones, because they are really small and can offer a great sound quality, but today we are going to focus just on the computer speakers.



There are so many types of speakers that you can use, and here are some examples of desktop computer speakers. First of all you can use some small and simple stereo speakers, and this is what most of the new computer come with. But if you want something a little more powerful and also not too expensive, then you can choose to buy a 2.1 audio system. This one also has two small stereo speakers, but besides them it also has a subwoofer. The subwoofer will be a slightly bigger speaker that will bring only the bass.

And the low frequencies offered by the subwoofer will complete the mid and high sounds brought by the satellite speakers, and this way your music will sound much better. But if you want the whole range of sounds, and beside this also a surround sound, then you should definitely choose a surround sound system.

There are two types of surround sound systems : the 5.1 and the 7.1. The first one is composed out of 4 satellite speakers, a subwoofer and also a center channel and the 7.1 has is almost the same, with a subwoofer and a center channel but with 6 satellites instead of 4. So a surround sound system is not something just for your desktop, but is a system for your whole room.

The best placement for a 5.1 surround system is this one: a satellite speaker in each corner of the room, the subwoofer under the desk and the center channel on the desk in front of you. It will be a little difficult at the beginning until you set up all the cables and make sure to place a satellite in each corner of the room, but after that there won’t be any problems.

If the surround sound systems are not such a good option for you because you don’t want to have wires and speakers all over the room, and you still want to have a rich and powerful sound, then the floorstanding speakers are the solution for you. These are really big and heavy speakers, but they usually are very thin, so they won’t take so much space from the room.

It is recommended to have 2 of them, and place them in front of you (one in the left and one in the right…or any other way you want) and because they are really powerful they will offer you a great sound experience. They won’t need a subwoofer or any other components because if you take off the detachable grill you will see that it has many drivers. Some of them are for the high frequencies, others are for mid range and others are for the bass, so this way you will have the complete spectrum of sound from just one unit.

But enough with the theory, let’s take an example of floorstanding speakers and discuss more about them. There are many of them on the market, and today we’ll choose a model produced by JBL, the ES 80 speakers. These are powerful speakers that can bring down the house. They feature advanced and innovative technologies so that you (the buyer) can enjoy a great music quality and have the sound from a live concert, or the sound from a night club right into your room. These speakers are available in three different finishes : black, beech or cherry.

You can leave the grill on them and have a more elegant design, or you can take them off to have a more aggressive look. And now here are the technical details for these speakers: -crossover frequencies – 700 Hz, 3.6 kHz – 24 dB / octave; 12 kHz – 18 dB / octave; - frequency response – 45 Hz – 40 kHz; -power handling - 100 Watts Continuous  / 400 Watts Peak; - max recommended amplifier power – 200 watts; - Midrange Transducer – 100 mm (4 ") PolyPlas, shielded; - High Frequency Transducer - 19 mm (3/4 ") Titanium-laminate dome, shielded; EOS waveguide;-         Ultrahigh-Frequency Transducer - 19 mm (3/4 ") Polyester-film ring-radiator, shielded; EOS waveguide; -Nominal Impedance - 8 Ohms; -Dimensions (H x W x D) 1084 mm x 223 mm x 330 mm / 42-11/16 " x 8-3/4 " x 13 "; - Weight 21 kg / 46.3 lb

So if you are not an audio specialist, and these figures don’t say anything to you, then you should know that the Frequency Response from 45 hz to 40 khz shows just what we said earlier – that these speakers will offer a complete range of sounds, from a very deep and low bass to ultra high frequency sounds. The power handling of 100 Watts Continuous / 400 Watts Peak shows that they are quite powerful, and will be more than enough for an apartment room. But it won’t be just you to enjoy the sound at loud volumes, and your neighbors will enjoy it too (or maybe not J )

The computers had developed so much in the last decades. Many years ago they were just some big and unpractical devices, but today they become really small with state of the art technologies included. And along with the computers all of their components had evolved too.



For example the monitors got thinner and thinner, and also with a larger display, the hard drives got bigger and bigger (in terms of disk space), the RAM memory also got bigger and so on with all of the components. To enjoy some sound at the computer you will need some speakers, and the computer speakers have really evolved too. Many years ago the computers had just some very small and weak speakers that were integrated on the main board. But today all of the speakers for a personal computer are external. And they are capable of giving a very good and realistic sound, without even having to be so big. The computer speakers today have all sort of shapes, sizes and characteristics.






Some of them are bigger, while others are really small, some are rectangular, others are round and there are even speakers with the shape of a gargoyle…but no matter how they look they have the objective to bring you a good and clear sound and to offer you a nice audio experience. Some of the speakers manage to do this, but others don’t. Some of them are more expensive and others are cheaper.

Usually the more they cost, the better they sound, but this rule doesn’t always apply, because you will find some speakers that are quite cheap and also sound really good. And unfortunately you will also find expensive speakers that don’t sound so good. Anyway…the best thing is to always search for the best deal, and make some research on the internet about what other users said about those speakers. Check out the overall ratings for each speaker, and also read individual reviews from users, and find out which are the positive and the negative aspects for those speakers. Depending on where you want to use the speakers, there are many types.

For your room you can buy some simple stereo speakers, or a 2.1 audio system and also a surround sound system. (5.1 or 7.1). For your room you can also buy some big and powerful floorstanding speakers, or some very small in-wall or in-ceiling speakers. If you want to enjoy the music from your computer in other rooms of the house, then you can use some wireless speakers, that will allow you to take them anywhere with you, in the specified range from the transmitter.



And you can even take the speakers outside the house, in your back yard or near the pool, and in this case you will need to use some outdoor speakers. So these were about all the categories of speakers, and there are also many producers on the market. Some of the big audio companies in the world are: Altec Lansing, Harman Kardon, JBL, Creative, Klispch, Bose, Boston Acoustics, Logitech and so on.

No matter what kind of activity you are doing at your computer, you will also need some sound for it. And to have sound you must have some speakers or headphones. But today we’ll discuss just about speakers. Any new computer usually comes with a set of default stereo speakers.



But these are not so good, and that’s why many people are choosing to buy some new speakers for their new computer. Beside some other stereo speakers you can buy an audio system for your computer. There are three types of audio systems, and these are: the 2.1 systems (that have 2 satellite speakers and a subwoofer), the 5.1 (that have 4 satellite speakers, a subwoofer and a center channel) and the 7.1 systems (that have 6 satellite speakers, a subwoofer and also a center channel).



So depending on what sound quality and power you are looking for, you can choose one of these possibilities. But if you don’t want something really powerful or you don’t have enough space in your room for a surround sound system, then you can remain with your stereo speakers or buy some new and better ones.

Some now let’s discuss more about how to hook up stereo speakers to your computer. First look at the back of the speakers, and here it should be a mini or RCA style port. Then look at the audio output port from your computer that should be a 3.5 inch or a mini port. If you already have a cable connect it to the speakers and to the computer, and it should work with no problems! But if you don’t have one  just buy a new one, because it is not expensive. You should search for a male 3.5 inch  to female RCA cable, that looks like this:



In case you want to hook up a stereo device (CD player, cassette recorder, radio etc). to the computer, here is what you have to do: first locate the input port from the back of the stereo device, that should be a RCA port. You must connect this one with the audio output port from your computer, but in this case you will need a different type of cable. You will have to search for a 3.5 mm stereo male to 2 RCA male, because both of the devices have female ports. The cable you need looks just like this:



So this is about all on how to hook up stereo speakers or a stereo device to a computer. The job is not difficult at all, and we hope that you managed to successfully connect the device and to enjoy its sound.

The audio industry has really evolved in the last decades, and today you can find some really powerful speakers that are capable of giving you a great audio experience. And we are not talking here about the large speakers that are used for concerts, studios or cinemas, and we are talking about the speakers used by the home users.



They got really advanced these days, and they are not so big or heavy. There are many kinds of speakers that you can use in your home, for example: stereo speakers, 2.1 systems, surround sound systems, floorstanding speakers , in wall and in ceiling speakers, wireless speakers and also home cinema systems. All of the speakers mentioned, except for the home cinema systems will need an audio source to work, for example a computer, CD or MP3 player or others. The great thing about a home audio system is that it has all the components you need, for both audio and video.



So usually, a home cinema system will have 6 or 8 speakers and also an audio / video receiver. The composing speakers are exactly the same as in a 5.1 or a 7.1 surround sound system. So it can have 6 of them (a subwoofer, a center channel and 4 satellite speakers) or 8 (a center channel, a subwoofer and 6 satellite speakers). The sound of all of these speakers combined, will give you a great audio experience, and you can feel just like you are at the cinema when watching a movie, or just like you are at a concert or at a club when listening to music.

But beside the speakers a home cinema system also has an audio /  video receiver, that allows you to play all sort of formats of audio and video files. So today we are going to discuss about some home audio receivers. Let’s take a random model, for example the Pioneer VSX-1019 AH-K receiver. The price range for this product goes from 500 to 540 dollars, so it is quite expensive, but also good. The sound output mode is surround sound, and the surround system class is 7.1 channel.

It has a lot of features included and it is one of the best audio / video receivers for this price. It can even connect to an iPod or iPhone, through its USB port and allow you to browse the music by using onscreen graphical user interface. It allows analog video upconversion to 1080 p, and it has four HDMI inputs, allowing you to connect it to a High Definition TV and enjoy the movies at their best quality.

The dimensions for this receiver are 16.5 inch W x 13.7 inch D x 6.2 inch H, and a weight of 19.2 lbs. The color of the enclosure is gloss black, so it will look quite good, and will fit into your room. Here are all the built-in decoders of this receiver: DTS 96 / 24 , DTS Neo: 6 , DTS Express , DTS decoder , Dolby True HD , Dolby Digital , DTS-ES decoder , Dolby Digital EX , Dolby Digital Plus , DTS-HD Master Audio , Dolby Pro Logic II x and DTS-HD High Resolution. It also has an equalizer and a digital sound processor.



Some other features that it includes are: a sleep timer, iPod ready, dual-zone capability,  Windows Media Audio 9 Professional decoding and Multi-Channel Acoustic Calibration Circuit. (MCACC). This receiver also has a headphones jack for the times when you want to enjoy some music or a movie by yourself, and digital outputs, both coaxial and optical. It even has a radio tuner, that works on both AM / FM frequencies and digital, allowing you to store up to 30 radio stations. The supported digital audio standards are: MP3, WAV and WMA, and also JPEG photo playback. It also comes with a very useful remote control. Enjoy it!

The computers have really evolved in the last decades. Many years ago they were really big, and they were not capable of doing advanced operations at all. But during the years, things had change dramatically, and today the computers (especially the notebooks) are very small, very lightweight and also capable of doing some really advanced operations.



And they are continuing to become even better, with state-of-the-art technologies included. And you won’t even have to pay a fortune to benefit from these advanced technologies…and you will pay around 300 dollars for  desktop computer or about 500 dollars for a laptop.



So the technology is becoming available for more and more people, and in time there will be more laptops than personal computers. In terms of speakers, we can consider that the laptops got back in time. The older versions of computers had a set of built in stereo speakers, that were not sounding so good, and were not powerful at all. In the time the audio industry had evolved more and more, and the speakers became external.

Today there are many types of computers speakers, in all sort of shapes, sizes, prices and with all sort of features. The simplest are the stereo speakers, and even if they are the smaller and simple ones, they can also have a lot of interesting shapes. For example you can find some speakers that are looking just like a gargoyle, or ones looking like a dragon. After the stereo speakers, there are the 2.1 systems. These are composed out of two small stereo speakers and also a subwoofer. The subwoofer will bring the deep and low sound frequencies (the bass), giving a new dimension to the sound. After the 2.1 systems there are the surround sound systems.

They have even more components, and these are: a subwoofer, a center channel and 4 or 6 satellite speakers. With all of these components, you will be able to enjoy a great audio experience. Beside the audio systems, there are also bookshelf speakers, floorstanding speakers, wireless speakers, in-wall and in-ceiling speakers, outdoor speakers and other types. And as you can figure it out, all of them are external speakers.

We have mentioned earlier that the laptops somehow went back in time in term of speakers. And this is because a laptop comes with built in stereo speakers, just like the old models of computers. Of course they sound a little better than those old integrated speakers, but still they are not that good. But this is not such a big problem, and if you want a better sound quality for your laptop, than you can buy some speakers for it. If you want to enjoy the better sound just at your home, then you can buy some regular and more powerful stereo speakers, or a 2.1 system, or even a surround sound system.



But you will be able to use these only at your home, and when you’ll be on the road, you will still have to use the integrated speakers of the laptop. But there is a solution for this problem too, and this is to buy some USB speakers. These are usually small and portable speakers that can be used even when you are on the road. So you might wonder where they get their energy from, because you can’t connect them to an AC adapter when traveling for example by train. They don’t run with batteries either, and they are getting the power right from the laptop. They have just one cable, which is both for the audio signal and for power.