It’s pretty much an accepted observation that most movie going audiences will tolerate several minutes of slightly out-of-focus or scratchy film but will put up with less than 20 seconds of poor quality audio. The first defining mark between amateur and professional video production is the quality of the soundtrack and care taken with the audio recording. So, that’s what I was thinking when I decided that I needed some high quality speakers to connect to my MacBookPro.

I’d been stretching an audio cable across my desk to connect my mbp to my home-stereo when playing music or video because the built-in speakers, while being way better than the ones on the iBook, were just way too underpowered. I’d been looking at the M-Audio products, in part, because I already was using aFireWire Solo, an M-Audio recording interface, to connect my guitar, mic, and headphones to my computer. I’d seen the StudioPro4 model at the local CompUSA and was pretty impressed with the sound quality.But i wanted to go to Guitar Center to see what other similar speakers might be available. Boy was that risky.

I bravely ventured into their faux “recording studio” room where they had speakers lining the walls. Imagine my surprise when I found that Guitar Center didn’t have the same model that I’d been considering at CompUSA (a common tactic that frustrates comparative shopping). I listened a similar speaker, a model “DX4,” but I noticed that there were definitely ranges of frequencies that weren’t making it with the DX4s. I clicked around between several models, then asked the salesman what he recommended. He recommended the next model up, the Studiophile BX5a. It’s amazing how much better 70 watts sound versus 17 watts. Duh. Granted, the BX5as cost twice as much as the DX4s, but the sound quality was that much better. I told the salesman that I needed to think about this and walked away for a couple minutes and looked at the price of cables in needed to make these speakers work with my FireWire Solo. Ha, like I wasn’t going to buy the damn things. I circled around the general area of the store several times, compared the various speakers offered, looked at cables, picked out some cables, and then made the decision. When the salesman handed the box over to me, I was impressed with how heavy these things were. There was a bit of hickup getting the silly FireWire Solo box to work, but after that I had more power coming from these new speakers than my home stereo. Of course I had to spend the evening watching IP-TV on the 19″ LCDs with the sound up on the new speakers. Damn. Sounds good to me. JBB