Big Sound In Small Package

The Sound Bite is a 2.1 system, which means a left and right set of general speakers and one subwoofer. The entire device is smaller than a McDonald's Big Mac, but hardly as appetizing. It has an inexpensive look to it that makes me concerned about how it would stand up to the portability it's supposed to be designed for.

The full-range speakers are hidden beneath a flip-up hinge that allows about 130 degrees of motion from closed to fully open. This gives you some control over directing the sound. These speakers need protection in travel, hence the fold-down hinge. The woofer is protected by a metal grill.

You use the Sound Bite by plugging it in via powered USB. Some laptops and USB hubs have difficulties handling high-power devices such as this, so it's best to always plug it directly into a computer with applications closed and files saved. The USB cable wraps and snaps underneath the speakers for transportation.

The included documentation—somewhat poorly translated—says that it no additional drivers for Mac OS 9, Mac OS X, Windows 2000, and Windows XP. This is true. But the sound coming out of the speakers benefits enormously from equalization, and the defaults provided in an add-on application available only under Windows is barely up to the task.

The USB 3D Audio Configuration program from C-Media has plenty of options for controlling the shape and direction of sound, but with a 2.1 device, it's rather a lot of overkill.

Without using its EQ features, the sound is rather flat and unbalanced. Switch from Default to one of the built-in settings like Treble, RAP (all capitals—what does it stand for?), or Classic, and prepare to be underwhelmed. None of the preset EQs appears to be tuned to work with this specific device.

Having spent a few summers years ago working in outdoor theater tuning one-third octave equalizers, I can work with the 10-band, tiny, hard-to-use controls in the C-Media software. With some effort, I managed to make Sarah McLachlan sound like Sarah McLachlan. Those same settings worked generally well for a variety of other music, like Glenn Gould, Talking Heads, and James Brown, surprisingly enough.

It's also impossible to know whether the EQ is pre-Sound Bite or within Sound Bite (whether it's changing hardware filters in the device or using software to shape the sound before it's shipped out over the USB bus).

I tried using iTunes both under Windows and Mac OS X, as the free software includes its own 10-band EQ, and the results were far, far better. Oddly, the same music under Mac OS X sounded terrific, while it was still a little tinny and had audibly worse characteristics under Windows XP. Strange, because the audio should be fully controlled from the device, but the OS must have some input into the shape of the sound before it hits the Sound Bite's processors.

My Power Mac G4 crashed when plugging the Sound Bite in, but I only note this as a point of interest because this same machine is susceptible to crashing whenever USB audio is added or removed. (It's the only time this machine ever crashes, in fact.) Other Mac OS X systems running the same release of Panther had no difficulties or system problems.

It's very easy to max the sound out, especially in the lower ranges. The 32, 64, 125, and 250 hertz ranges are particularly susceptible to fuzz and scratch at just higher than reasonable settings. But proper EQ solves that without sacrificing bass. The Sound Bite can produce very nice sound at good volumes.

Now, am I really criticizing a 2.5 watt, $30, fully portable, generally good-sounding speaker kit for lacking more features? No. But because the unit can be externally equalized means that Tritton needed to focus more on having a very good neutral setting that produced sound for a device that bills itself as driver-free.

If you need portable audio, Sound Bite is a terrific, low-cost and portable solution. But be prepared to tweak and tinker for satisfactory results.