Edifier Soundbar - USB-powered portable speaker system
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Edifier Soundbar - USB-powered portable speaker system
UK price: £49.99
Pros: For a moment you think it's a bar of chocolate...
Cons: ...but then you're disappointed
Verdict: the sound has to be far, far better than this for £50
Rating: 
Available from: amazon.co.uk
Product Review
Fifty quid? Forget it. I paid £50 for the other Edifier speaker system that I reviewed somewhere else on these pages... and that stomps all over this one.
This ‘soundbar' is like a Toblerone but without the chocolate. What good is that? In fact, what's so cool about a triangular metal box that sounds exactly the same as the internal speakers in my MacBook?
The Kitmaster cunning test: I played music on my laptop and then quickly switched to other speakers in the middle of the track. Switch to the Edifier MP300 and the china ducks on the wall vibrate. You suddenly notice instruments. I notice my head nodding automatically with the music.
Then switch to this silly Soundbar Toblerone tube and, well, there's hardly a discernable difference in sound from the laptop. It's no improvement at all. Oh, slightly more bass if I really concentrate. There's a dedicated bass port in the Edifier and the laptop probably just has four tiny little speakers. But trust me, the sound is hardly any better.
So, this 10 and ½ inch or 260cm unit is only any good if you want to add speakers to something that hasn't got them, like an mp3 player or phone. But hang on, the way it works is that you plug one lead from the Soundbar into the USB hole in a computer, the other into the headphone hole. If you've got a computer handy you don't really need these speakers at all. If you haven't got a computer handy the Soundbar won't work anyway.
It's a neat sturdy triangular metal box I suppose. And the thing comes in a black fabric bag to carry around like a something 10 inches long that's mysterious and rude. But it's not actually worth buying.
And by the way, that other Edifier, the MP300, sounds good, needs to run off mains power but uses headphone output just the same. And one other word of warning, the apparently well-built MP300 has developed an intermittent fault where one channel cuts out. It went wrong about a year after I got it. I emailed them about it. And got no reply.
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