Tag : flex hi, compact travel, mac b, fi stereo, usb portable, speaker pc

Company : JLAB List Price : $69.95 Amazon Price : $39.95 Used Price : Average customer review :

Features

• Plug and play for PC and Mac. Uses only USB power, no wires or batteries!
• Easy to use. Incredibly compact and portable. Great for travel!
• Produces crystal clear sound with a 2-watt digital amp and 2 high output, full range micro drivers.
• Patent pending flexible design allows you to totally customize your listening experience by flexing the speaker into virtually any position.
• This amazing gadget was featured in the NY Times, on ABC News, and on virtually every gadget site in the world.

Product Description

Need better sound from your laptop? The stylish new B-Flex is a compact stereo speaker on a USB flex cable for laptops and desktops. Plug and play for PC and Mac with no batteries or wires! Easy to use, great for travel, mp3’s, DVD’s, presentations, and gaming! Features a 2 watt digital amp that acts as its own sound card. Uses 2 full range paper cone micro drivers for crystal clear sound. The patented flex design allows you to position the speaker for optimum listening enjoyment. The only product of its kind, the B-Flex has been featured in the New York Times, on ABC News, on Gizmodo, and many others. Makes a great gift! A White unit is also available.

Customer reviews

Terrific Little Speaker with Clear, Strong Sound
After reading several dozen consumer reviews describing laptop speakers I puchased this one. You simply plug it into your laptop, or USB hub, swivel the gooseneck to position the speaker where you want, and you’ve got an excellent speaker that fits in a small laptop utility bag.

The only complaint I have is that there is no quick volume control; once you’ve plugged it into your USB port, it overrides the laptop’s volume control “knob”. You have to open the volume icon in your Control Panel every time you want to adjust the speaker volume, which can be too slow when you’re being blasted by a loud video.

This is not to say that there is anything wrong with the volume modulation in the speaker itself, just that there seems to be a wide volume range across items I view–YouTube, email messages with videos from friends, etc.

If this speaker had a volume control knob it would be perfect!

NOT RECOMMENDED FOR DELL LAPTOPS
After several weeks of light, mid-volume use, the speaker stopped working on my Dell Latitude D500 and I began receiving error messages noting a “device malfunction”. After trading emails with J-Lab customer service, I was instructed to return the speaker by mail (at my expense) for a refund. The refund I received was 80% of the original purchase price because, according to J-Lab, the device was still “working” upon receipt. The representative handling the return acknowledged that there has, in fact, been a history of compatibility issues with Dell laptops– in other words, a “working” speaker may not always operate correctly when connected to a Dell laptop. Is trying this speaker on your Dell worth the risk of paying two sets of shipping charges, losing 20% of the purchase price, and spending time emailing representatives and repacking/mailing the device? If not, maybe it’s worth considering alternatives.

Are we listening to the same speakers?
We bought this speaker for our Gateway M505 Media Laptop on a recent trip. The M505 has reasonable speakers for a laptop, but their volume level isn’t quite strong enough for us to be happy–we’d always find ourselves straining to hear dialogue from movies.

From reading the reviews I honestly thought this would solve our problem in a nifty self-contained USB-powered fashion.

For us it didn’t.

We found the speakers to be nearly identical to the M505 speakers, and while the B-Flex did give us the tiniest improvement in volume, it wasn’t enough to really give us adequate volume, or the “big sound” many reviewers have mentioned. Also, there is no way a speaker the size of these can give the kind of frequency response any level of audiophile would be happy with.

So, who should try out this speaker? If you have standard tinny sounding laptop speakers (the almost nonexistent kind), these will be a big improvement. Also you will like the fact that it is USB powered so no batteries, no cords are needed.

However, having said that, I really think the bottom line is, to get truly better sound, you need to use a powered speaker. I think some of the JBL’s may be the way to go.

For cost of these guys, unless you catch them on sale, my advice is to keep looking. We had to return ours. (Thanks to Amazon a really fair & generous return policy).

Definite improvement over stock, and extremely portable
My boyfriend bought me this speaker. It is plug-and-play. On my computer, often movies are not loud enough for some reason and with this speaker it’s as loud as we could possibly want. Also I can blast my music throughout the house from my laptop - before I could not because it sounded horrible at high volumes.

I’m not much of a sound expert, but I think it sounds pretty good.

Flexible, Mobile & Fierceful
Love this laptop speakers!! My laptop speakers suck so much that this little guy just gives me the wonderful sound my laptop deserves!! I highly recommend it!!