Sound

We first connected them to our PC where we used the Creative X-Fi soundcard to play our test files that have everything from a 20Hz to 20KHz sample, and Jagjit Singh to Jamiroquai. A word of caution here-- remember these are midrange desktop speakers and not party animals and so by no means meant to be stressed to the max as the distortion gets crazy at this level. While playing music, the Altec Lansing VS2521 created a positive impression and produced better sound across frequency ranges. We played some smooth jazz and ghazals, and could hear decent mids and bright highs with a deep bass at moderate volume level but like we said; distortion is inevitable if you hit maximum volume.

The sub-woofer outperformed the other two (Creative Inspire T3100 and Logitech X-240). We got deeper and more bass here, and the two-way speaker design on its satellites definitely has better balanced and more natural sound. But if we could ask for more, it would definitely be for crisper mids and to reduce the rather bright sound and make it sharper. Overall, it's better than the other two in terms of music. The Creative Inspire T3100 which does not have as open a sound as the Altec Lansing but does produce better highs than the Logitech and the sub delivered a very punchy bass at moderate volume level. Overall, the bass was tight and highs were sharp, at times going so sharp that it overshadowed the mids. But it's definitely a better set than the Logitech X-240.

The caveat once again here is that when the volume is cranked up halfway, distortion is enormous. At the same volume level, there are better choices than the Logitech and Altec Lansing is one of them. The Logitech X-240 is good for listening to vocals but it ends there. The one-way speaker satellite though delivering crunchy mids lacked decent highs and the subwoofer sounds underpowered.

The main problem with the Logitech pair is the mids overpower everything else, and that's not the only thing we want to hear, right? Soundstage is the worst of the three here, followed by the Creative with Altec Lansing delivering the best soundstage. For movies, from soundtracks and background scores to different sound effects, the Altec Lansing fared the best as it has a good engulfing effect. For dialogue, the Logitech was good but the bass and highs were not impressive. Creative sharp highs and the punchy bass impressed us but soundstage and the absence of warmth made the Altec Lansing a better choice here. For gaming, we like the Creative and Altec here.