Digital Sound System 80 Manufactuerd by Microsoft Retail Price $110 Frequency Response: 40Hz - 20kHz Satellite Power: 16W+16W Subwoofer Power: 44W

Oh God, now they’re here in speaker country. What’s next? Oil rigs? Dairy products? Will Windows 2001 come with poultry integration for the farmers? OK, OK, enough Microsoft-bashing for the day. Let’s get to the (hah!) speakers and try to give it an unbiased review... 

The Digital Sound System 80 was developed in collaboration with Philips, using their patented wOOx subwoofer technology. Since this is a USB speaker system, Microsoft has included quite a few toys to control the speakers. Just like the Altec Lansing ADA 305, these speakers can be used without a sound card if you’re playing audio CDs, because the audio signal is carried out by the USB and processed by the onboard DSP on the subwoofer. Microsoft deserves credit for the sleek, new age design of the Digital Sound System 80: unlike most other speakers, which are box-like and squat, these 4.8x7.1x4.8 inch satellites are curvy and pleasing to the eye. The 7.3x8.9x12.8 inch, 44W RMS subwoofer is fairly conventional-looking, of course. 

These speakers can be used in USB (digital) or analog mode. In USB mode, you don’t need a sound card to play digital audio, though you’ll need one if you’re planning on using it for anything else. The software utilities are available in USB mode, which gives you a ten-band graphic equalizer that comes with the traditional presets. 

When this product debuted, it was priced at around $200- but for some mysterious reason of their own, Microsoft decided to suddenly drop the price to $110. Of course, when this happened, people naturally assumed there was something drastically wrong with the speakers. But that isn’t the case. Microsoft only dropped prices because they wanted the Digital Sound System 80 to give other speaker systems a run for their money. And indeed it does, as we found out when we tested it in comparison with other systems.

Music sounds great. Mid-range frequencies are well-balanced, bass is particularly strong and sound is crisp and clear. That applies to movie dialogue as well. Just like the Labtec and Bose systems, the Digital Sound System 80 offered excellent playback for audio CDs. 
 

But- and the inevitable but strikes again- when we were testing gameplay, most of us agreed that the Labtec provided a richer, room-filling sound than the DSS80. Especially with NFS III and EAX, the DSS80 was not as impressive as the Labtec speakers were on this score.  But all in all, you cannot take away the $110 price tag. Incredible as it may seem, this is the cheapest system in the roundup and still outperforms some $200-300 systems. Without a doubt, you can’t go wrong with this package. For the budget-minded user, Microsoft’s Digital Sound System 80 is ideal.