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Boesky

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Jul 16, 2009
364
0
I like how mine sound. Are they supposed to be good quality?
 
They are supposed to be decent as far as laptop speakers go. The larger notebooks have better speakers than the smaller ones, so 17" > 15" > 13".
 
Well, I only have a lowly macbook white and I think the speakers kick ass. (compared to all the windows laptops I've owned anyway).

I would think a MBP would be superior or at the very least, just as good.
 
I have a 15" MBP and it sounds fine to me! I mean, what can you realistically expect out of a notebook?
 
For a laptop, they are fairly decent. However, this is a lot like saying, "He's a fairly sensitive person as far as Nazi's go". The MBP's speakers are terrible in general, just like every other laptop. There is no room for a halfway decent speaker, and not worth manufacturer's money to even try for part of the way there. Btw, the line in/out and converters are crap too, and very noisy, just like every other integrated audio chipset. If you truly care about quality, get some external speakers and feed them with an external interface or the SPDIF port.
 
I'm no audiophile but I think my 13" are pretty bad, but they get the job done.
 
Anyone have any recommendation for laptop speakers? This is purely for if I'm in my dorm room and I have my new 13" uMBP hooked up to my 32" TV and want to watch a video or play some music. I'm not trying to save battery by having the audio and video go through different sources, but have it be better quality with those 2 qualities. On amazon there are some logitech speakers for around $10 that look good, and I don't want to spend more than $20 on speakers, I'm not a big music guy that constantly listens to it, but I still want alright speakers.
 
Anyone have any recommendation for laptop speakers? This is purely for if I'm in my dorm room and I have my new 13" uMBP hooked up to my 32" TV and want to watch a video or play some music. I'm not trying to save battery by having the audio and video go through different sources, but have it be better quality with those 2 qualities. On amazon there are some logitech speakers for around $10 that look good, and I don't want to spend more than $20 on speakers, I'm not a big music guy that constantly listens to it, but I still want alright speakers.

You won't get a noticeable boost in quality for $20.
 
you can always solve the problem of poor speaker quality with a good pair of head phones!
 
iThink that the conclusion from everyone seems to be they are good for notebooks.
Exactly. I mean, how much room is there for speakers in a 13" computer anyway? I've owned a half dozen other PC laptops (HP, Dell, Toshiba, Compaq, Acer, etc) and the macbook is the only one where I can actually watch any video without an external sound hookup just to boost the volume.
 
classic beats unibody

I agree, the 17 MBP has the best speaker system from the whole lineup. They have more bass and also seem to have more range and dynamic.

I think they have more speakers built in as well: not only two, but three or even four, I don't know exactly, there is a thread here somewhere about that with pictures.

But I think they did not improve with the unibody generation, I suppose its quite the opposite: The classic MBP sounds better to me. (Maybe I want to here it that way - anyway, I really tried to be neutral when I compared...:)
 
I agree, the 17 MBP has the best speaker system from the whole lineup. They have more bass and also seem to have more range and dynamic.

I think they have more speakers built in as well: not only two, but three or even four, I don't know exactly, there is a thread here somewhere about that with pictures.

But I think they did not improve with the unibody generation, I suppose its quite the opposite: The classic MBP sounds better to me. (Maybe I want to here it that way - anyway, I really tried to be neutral when I compared...:)

I do agree with you on this. I guess since I moved from a 15" unibody mbp to a 17" unibody mbp I noticed the difference in loudness/quality in the 17" as to the 15".

But I did previously own a 17" SR hi res mbp and a 17" 1.67GHz powerbook g4 before as well and those had a bit better fuller sound.
 
I felt that my old 13" unibody MB's speakers were actually decent... Of course, that might've had something to do with the fact that the laptop I had before it was a polycarbonate 13" and that thing had the worst speakers I've ever heard.
 
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