Logitech Z-5500 Owner's Club.

OmegaRED

I have tried analog splitting in the past and did notice it affected the volume but I read up on it extensively before trying it again and apparently if the cables are not long it should retain the quality of the signal (any difference wouldn't come across on the Z-5500's anyway as it's not studio quality). Yesterday I picked up 3 Y splitters from The Source and hooked it up. I actually had to cut away some of the coating just to make it fit because they aren't meant to be so close together.



I've been gaming since then and tested a bunch of movies over analog with the splitter and also I used my 360 via Toslink comparing the same games on my PC to their console counterparts and I did not notice any drop in sound quality. I would definitely notice it on my headphones since I've been using them far longer than the Z-5500's.

The optical sound is nice over DDL or DTS Connect but at the same time you are letting a 2004 piece of hardware do the digital processing rather than a high end X-Fi which has superior technology; it's better to let the X-fi send an analog signal to the speakers.

Anyway, at present I have my 360 connected to the Z5500 Pod via Toslink and my PC is occupying the analog. I have extra Coaxial and Toslink cables and am considering getting a Toslink to Coaxial converter to run from my soundcard to the Z-5500 Coaxial connection so I would at least have the option of using DDL etc in the future.

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Judas

yeah, i had that same premise with analog and digital to ..

"why would i use something that has rather not bad but still inferrior decoding capabilities do the work instead of something superior" and jumping around every so many months i simply found that digital was not only easier to deal with, it was stable, reliable, and overall seemed to produce better surround sound seperation (when using discrete 5.1 audio) then the cumbersome analog.

Now i'm not basing this off strickly a realtek audio chipset.. i'm talking about using the x-fi fata1ity i had, the samsung 2550 Blu-ray Player and a few number of other devices that provide both an analog and digital surround sound independant channel hookup.

Even compared to the yamaha 11.2 amp. HDMI was superior period... if the z-5500 were to be updated, and had multiple HDMI in capabilities.... these things would be the cats ass.


I really wish logitech would either make ANOTHER 5.1 with updated specs and whatnot. better if they made a 7.1 compliant model.

Something rated in the 1200-1500 watt range and perhaps a little larger driver say 12 inch (even though i find the 10 inch excellent).

The only Critical down side i think there is in logitech design is that each satalite speaker housing isn't 100% solid. At various frequencies, you can get audioable resinence from the speakers housing itself that is very distracting and sounds like terrible distortion. This however only appears to occur with poor quality audio or very specific frequencies though. I know it's the houseing as all you have to do to cure the problem is put preasure on the backside of the speaker and the problem is solved.

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OmegaRED

Also, due to a lack of desk space I had to put the Z-5500 subwoofer right next to my computer case. OH NOES! There's only a few inches of space in between yet it hasn't affected my hard drives. I guess the magnet in the sub isn't that strong after all.

I was cautious at first and put the sub on its own stand but that meant the case had to go under my desk which trapped all the heat from my video cards and cpu making the area under my desk feel like an oven.

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