Antec Soundscience Rockus 3D 2.1 Speakers
by Dustin Sklavos on November 18, 2010 12:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Audio
- Antec
- Soundscience
- Rockus 3D
Music on the Rockus 3D
Music playback testing was done much more comprehensively than I had previously; I tried just about everything. The first issue I took with the Rockus 3D, but one that became progressively more minor as I became accustomed to the character of the sound the system produced, was that the high end feels a bit tinny. Double-blind with the Bose, the Rockus generally sounded better and produced clearer, more dynamic sound that was in many cases far less muddy. The problem is that some of that muddiness did mask compression and artifacting in some of the songs; you can't really fault the speakers for doing what they're told, but the highs can be so thin that it can get to the point of making some of the artifacts physically painful to listen to.
The sound also isn't quite as rich and full as one would hope. It certainly has worlds more depth than you'll get from a hundred dollar speaker set, but the highs and mids nonetheless can feel a bit thin and sometimes don't feel like they're separating quite as well as they could. You'll pick up nuances and details in the music better than you might with cheaper speakers; I just wish the sound had more body in those regions. When you get to the lows, the subwoofer does a solid if unexceptional job of picking up the rear. Not having a more fine-grained control over the subwoofer's power beyond the three presets hurts, but even the highest preset can feel a little weak.
Across different types of music, I found that industrial and electronic music could actually feel the thinnest in the highs and mids, but softer more instrumental fare works far, far better. If "Spitfire" by The Prodigy produces a good if not outstanding listening experience, something more downtempo like Red Hot Chili Peppers' "Otherside" can sound quite lovely.
Trying to buff up those thin highs and mids through the equalizer is an exercise in futility, though, and this is one of the Rockus 3D's biggest perks and worst flaws: the speaker system is calibrated to sound as good as it possibly can from the factory, a point the Antec rep was keen on mentioning and something that I can confirm in practice. The Rockus 3D is never going to sound better than it does shipped from the factory, and tweaking the equalizer in either analog or digital connection modes only seemed to make it worse.
That said, across the board the Rockus 3D sounded better than the Bose Companion II's attached to the Xonar DX.
While playing music, however, just go ahead and keep your finger off the 3D mode. It allows the speakers to suddenly produce a tremendous amount of body, but it more or less massacres the arrangement of the instruments in whatever you happen to be listening to. On a couple of songs I felt like the listening experience was slightly improved by 3D mode, but in almost everything else the distortion completely ruined them. Listening to music in 3D mode on the Rockus is akin to watching a standard-aspect movie stretched across an HDTV.
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Agamemnon_71 - Thursday, November 18, 2010 - link
The GigaWorks T3 is in the same pricerange as these ($249 at Amazon). I own them and (in my subjective way) love them. From what I've read here I cant see in what way the Rockus can compete with them.I personally hate optical connections, not because of the cost or quality of the cables, but the often low quality of the circuits encoding/decoding the signal. In my ears it sounds tinny, just as this review points out.
I will always prefer a good analog source and connection, and the Xonar being a proven quality soundcard should be just that.
To me it looks like Antecs stab at good 2.1 system falls somewhat short of its pricetag.
SilthDraeth - Thursday, November 18, 2010 - link
Anand, Jared, Dustin, I would like that you continue the audio reviews. You even have a huge section on the forums dedicated to audiophiles and they argue as much or more than than the politics and news crew.I find reviews like this one helpful. I have some tone deafness, and wouldn't know properly reproduced sound if I heard it. Heck real life sound I miss out on a lot of anyways. What I like to know is, can I turn the volume up loud and not have it get all statically. Can I possibly lower the explosions in movies, so I can better hear the talking... though, I guess that is why I use subtitles.
I think, however, as I stated in my first paragraph, that you should continue the audio reviews if you are able to perhaps invest some resources into the tools and equipment needed to test said devices. Also, dissecting the devices, as a poster or two mentioned, so people know what drivers are in a speaker, would help out a lot.
In the end Jared, you might be right though, it might be worth just ending the audio reviews, either that or just flat out ignoring all the audiophiles with sticks up there asses. Since they will never be satisfied.
WhatYaWant - Thursday, November 18, 2010 - link
Com'on...it has nothing to do with audiophile. It has to do with doing a proper review. No audiophile would even waste time reading a review of a 250$ speaker./the non-audiophile looking for a nice review
sonci - Thursday, November 18, 2010 - link
I also have fun reading these articles on anandtech, the problem is that a lot of people are going to buy this crap based on the article..They cannot dissect drivers because it will reveal cheapy chinese noname speakers
I think they should have stoped doing audio when Anand claimed for the SQ of ipod touch "it cant be better than this" or smth like that,
speakers review are always subjective, but thats doesn't mean superficial,
as a good RMAA doesn't mean a damn thing for the SQ of a soundcard..
phaxmohdem - Thursday, November 18, 2010 - link
I am the (very) happy owner of a pair of Audio Engine A5's... and besides the obligatory shoutout to the awesomeness of the things since this is an audio article, I wanted to comment on the artifacting issue.When I first hooked up the A5's to my computer, and fired up Winamp, I was appalled. Sure it was loud, but it sounded like crap. The problem... 128k MP3. (CD quality my arse) I had never noticed how bad lower bit rate MP3 compression actually was until I had speakers clear enough to play what they were told with out the 'muddiness' you spoke of.
That said, if you get away from the YouTubes, and crappily ripped MP3 files, and bump some FLAC, CD, DVD, or BluRay audio through them and it is an almost religious experience.
In my personal opinion, if you listen to internet streaming audio, or MP3's @ less than 192Kbps, stay away from high end speakers. But if you are willing to take the time (and have the space) to convert your music collection to VBR, or 320K MP3's, or better yet, FLAC, then go ahead and take the plunge. Otherwise, you will be wondering what you just dropped a crapload of money on.
Agamemnon_71 - Thursday, November 18, 2010 - link
Agreed.Living in Sweden gives me access to Spotify and the bandwith needed for "quality" streaming at 320 kbps. It makes all the diffrence.
And my T3's runs circles around your A5's ;)
warisz00r - Saturday, November 20, 2010 - link
Creative speakers? Unless you are being sarcastic, there are a lot of brands out there that can outdo Creative speakers in their respective price points.Before moving back to my home country I used to own a pair of Audioengine 2s (the smaller brother of the 5s) while studying in Australia. Then and now, these are the best sets of speakers I have ever owned. It was just all-around better than the Logitech Z2300 (which I used to own, too) except if you value the amount of bass that a subwoofer can pump out.
From then on, I realized that any built-for-the-purpose, active or passive set of bookshelfs and monitors are always superior to any computer-oriented 2.1 systems.
Agamemnon_71 - Sunday, November 21, 2010 - link
I wasn't being sarcastic...just messing with you. The blinksmiley should have tipped you off :)I came very close to buying a pair of A5s instead of the T3s. What put me off was a few user reviews that talked about dead speakers and strange hissings in them.
The T3s are nothing like earlier Creative sets and Logitech has nothing like them. They are what these Rockus claim to be.
bji - Thursday, November 18, 2010 - link
Reading this articule and its responses make me happy that I am not an audiophile. I am so pleased that a pair of $90 Creative computer speakers are all that I need/want in terms of audio. Didn't even get a system with a subwoofer because I just find them annoying (to myself and to those in the next room as well).Sometimes it's quite blissful to be ignorant. I can't imagine the pain that I'd experience if I cared about audio and had to read articles about it and torture myself over how terrible any speakers that cost less than $1000 sound.
Probably I'm lucky that I spent my formative music years listening to cassette tapes which sound crappy no matter what, but still managed to enjoy the hell out of them because I cared more about the content than the perfect reproduction thereof. Everything since cassettes has sounded GREAT to my ears.
sonci - Friday, November 19, 2010 - link
Lucky you're not audiophile....but I just have to post this, buy a vintage deck like Nakamichi or Marantz and please try your cassette tapes...
they can beat the hell out of every compressed mp3 you have in your library..