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| Product: Monsoon MM-1000 speakers |
Company: Sonigistix |
| Web: www.monsoonpower.com |
Phone: 877-722-8346 |
| Platform: Win3x/95/98/NT |
SRP: US$229
Street Price: same(?) |
Cred Rating: | Special Award: Object Value |
There are a number of flat-panel speaker systems on the market, but unfortunately, they sound as flat as they look. Sonigistix's Monsoon MM-1000 speakers offer cool 21st century style and high-definition sound that can hold their own against most other computer speaker systems.
The Monsoons are a three speaker system, with two 12.5 watt sliver-thin satellite speakers that sit on your desktop and a 25 watt subwoofer that goes under your desk. The Monsoons use a patented "magnetic planar technology" (everyone seems to have a patented audio technology these days) licensed from Eminent Technologies. Among other things it directs sound forward and backward from the speakers, which allegedly helps reduce undesirable sound reflection (off of the desktop, the monitor, etc.). Whatever the tech behind it, the resulting sound is quite impressive, especially if you're in the "sweet spot" sitting in front of your monitor. It took awhile, futzing with the satellites to get the right angle. It's best if the speakers are exactly the same distance from the monitor and angled so that their center-points intersect just in front of your face. The healthy 25-watt amp in the subwoofer gives these babies lots of support at even high volume. It's a real shame there's no treble control. You get only volume, bass and bass "punch," which jacks bass response 6db in the 55Hz range.
One of the more curious features on the Monsoons is the remote control "puck" that attaches to the subwoofer. It allows you to adjust volume and to mute the speakers. It can be used as a footswitch (though you can only mute/unmute with your foot) or it can be mounted on your desktop. It's a shame that the controls had to move from the satellites to the subwoofer, but it was a necessity to get the electronics off of the cabinetless satellites. Some flat-panel speakers get around this by having a special control unit that sits on your desktop. Given the sound these systems produced compared to the Monsoons, I'll take the remote. Luckily with the multimedia keyboard on my new Millennia Max 500 (I'm not bragging, I swear), I have volume and mute controls right on my keyboard.
- Gareth Branwyn [6/25/99]
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