The market for desktop PC stereo speakers is somewhat saturated these days, and that’s not at all a bad thing. It means we have choice. Choice of style or substance, to splash out or to be conservative with our cash or vice versa in both cases.
Sure, you could go down to your local electronics store and pick up a pair of basic, but decent sounding speakers, for about £20-30, but that’s all they’ll be: decent. That’s why I like having the choice of going a little bit more premium, if you will, and that’s why I was eager to take a look at the Edifier Prisma Speakers after enjoying the Soundbar from the same company, so much late last year.
Unit & Styling
When I first received the Prisma speakers and opened up the packaging, I was actually surprised to find that the casing for them was indeed plastic, rather than the aluminium shell on the recently reviewed Edifier Soundbar. Having only glimpsed at the press shots beforehand, I guess it was quite a wild assumption to make, but nonetheless, I was a little disappointed as they would look even better in sparkly silver next to my MacBook Pro. However, that’s not to say that they aren’t a great looking pair of speakers, because they are.
It’s difficult to say what shape they really are, but whatever it is it’s a great design, and the elegant curves and black-white colour contrast means it sits perfectly in almost any environment. I’ve had them next to my TV, my laptop, my desktop PC and they haven’t looked out of place in any case.
This is a great opportunity too, to talk about the down-firing sub-woofer. Everyone who has laid eyes on it has made some sort of off-the-cuff comment about space ships or something-or-other, because in truth it could easily resemble such space age design, but it’s tasteful. My only gripe with the thing, though, is the size. The triangular shape of the unit means it’s as wide as it is long, meaning you don’t have any room for maneuver when trying to find a slot for it to fit, and with limited space, that’s a problem. Having said that, if you can find somewhere for the enormous unit to go, it looks gorgeous. Actually stunning.
When you turn the speakers on, there is tastefully positioned red lighting surrounding the power button, which resides on top of the sub-woofer, which I have to say was a little irritating when using them as TV speakers, which I from time to time watch in the dark and they were a little eye-catching, but I do mean a little. It was no reason to put me off the speakers, put it that way.
On top of that, there is also a volume dial, which connects to the sub-woofer, via a cable which in my view is a little too thick considering it was the only one on show. A little more discretion from the cabling would have been preferable, but again, not a major issue. The volume dial itself is silver in colour, placed on the small plastic base.
Sound Quality
Judging the sound quality of speakers is a more difficult task than you might imagine. A lot of it just comes down to instinct rather than the detail. By listening to audio on the speakers, you know just how good they are and if they are acceptable in your eyes ears.
Of course, you can take a guess at how good the speakers are by the quality of the drivers and the other necessary parts, but it’s unnecessary in my view. Just trust me. These are great sounding speakers. I’ve reviewed a number of speaker units in the past and I have to say these are probably the best sounding stereo speakers I’ve encountered.
They can reach very high volumes (unnecessarily high to be honest) without losing clarity, but I know a lot of that has to do with the quality of the audio. A great test, which I have used before in these reviews, is just to throw my highest quality music at them, and see if the difference in quality between that and a compressed file is noticeable. It is. Very. And whilst we’re on the topic of music, I’ll throw in a pretty irrelevant point, that there is a headphone jack too.
Value & Summary
Priced at £89.99, these the Edifier Prisma speakers are by no means the cheapest set about, not even close, but in my view they do represent at least some value for money. They are comparable in style to even the most expensive speakers, and for the price, the sound quality is virtually flawless.
The quality of the enormous sub-woofer is enough to justify a huge premium on top of your every day PC speakers alone, and with added features such as the volume control, just take it up another notch.
Using the words ‘quality’ and ‘plastic’ in the same sentence is usually somewhat of an oxymoron, but in this case it genuinely feels a well built product, and it looks great too, though in my opinion it could be improved by using something a little more metallic, but that could just be me. Thankfully, though, if I were buying these speakers, they are available, I believe, in both silver and dark colours, meaning you can fit them to your own work space accordingly. Once again, the beauty of choice.
My only gripe, as I mentioned before, is the size of the unit. It’s not just the sub-woofer, its the speakers as well, they are hugely tall, and command a lot of space, so unless you have a lot of space to fill on a desk, these probably aren’t for you, as it would be difficult to wall-mount them due to the almost pyramid-like shape.
If I were actually in the market for a new set of PC speakers, as I imagine some of you probably are, and I wanted to just take it up a rung on the ladder and splash out a little, these would definitely be ones I would consider. Compared to it’s rivals in terms of quality, the Edifier Prisma Speakers come up trumps in terms of price and in a lot of cases in looks too.
