Anyone tried or owned the speaker cradle PEGA-SPC100K?

[rleungym]

Hi all,

Is it worth the money. How does it sound? I read the spec and it only has 2.1W output. That is very small. Can anyone tried or owned the speaker cradle comment on the quality of the sound it produces.

Thanks a lot.
Ray

[n2ifp]

Originally posted by rleungym
Hi all,

Is it worth the money. How does it sound? I read the spec and it only has 2.1W output. That is very small. Can anyone tried or owned the speaker cradle comment on the quality of the sound it produces.

Thanks a lot.
Ray

In the past 4 months, I don't remember anyone saying they had it. In one long gone thread, a couple of us joked about it as being the Bose sound system for the Clie. For myself, I didn't think it worth the money for something I probably wouldn't use.

[khyasad]

Yep, I bought one but only as I needed another cradle (one for home, the other for work) and thought, I might as well buy the speaker one, if only to try out the sound quality.

I use the speaker cradle at home and use it mainly as a second cradle.

The first thing that hits you is that it's much bigger than the one that comes with the NX70. It doesn't look as simple and elegant as the original cradle but the stylus holder is the best feature about it (I bought a second stylus for my NX70 and it saves me from taking the stylus out every time I have to put it in a cradle). It's quick to slip in the stylus and take out of the speaker cradle).

I have a Bellagio case for my NX70 and even though it's a tighter fit than the original cradle, it fits and hotsyncs fine.

When inserted into the speaker cradle, it sits more upright which initally bothered me, but over time, actually is better for me due to where it lives on my desk and saves me from leaning over the NX70 to view it (less glare from surrounding lights). However as it's a little more upright, you can't write on the NX70 as easily, but then again, I don't when my NX70 lives in either cradle.

As for the sound volume, well, I have to say I was surprised how loud it was. On the same day it arrived, I had some family staying over for an extended weekend break. Put all their suitcases in my room and that evening, I left the NX70 in the cradle. The next morning, everyone woke up in the surrounding rooms to the alarm I set on my NX70 (which I had forgotten to cancel). It's pretty loud. Not as good as buying dedicated speakers and attaching it to the headphone socket, however it's very convenient if you're at your desk, working on a report and instead of hooking up headphones or connecting it to my sound system. Don't underestimate the flexibility of being able to sit the NX70 into a cradle and get loud sound (instead of the tinny one built-in to the NX70). That, plus you can hotsync and has a really nice (if simple) stylus holder makes for a nice, *very* convenient cradle.

Sound quality, now that's another thing.

I've converted a whole load of movie trailers and also watch some CSI episodes on my NX70. For those purposes (i.e using the movie player), the speaker is very good indeed. You can hear the nunances of speech very well and the bass is not bad at all -- very surprising actually.

However, for music quality, it could be better. It's loud enough, however I do enjoy my music and so I prefer listening to music through decent headphones (like the Bose Triport) or through my sound system. Having said that, my youngest brother happen to walk in and said the music quality was very good, so each to their own.

The cradle also has a second audio input (there is a slide switch to select the clie or the second audio input) and we attached a minidisc player and a CD player. Both sounded pretty good (we used a male-to-male stereo cable with gold-plated connection - standard 3.5mm).

As with most things, do try it out if you can. I didn't, but only because I saw the speaker cradle as nothing more than a second cradle (which I needed) and the speaker as a gimmick. The gimmick turned out to be not bad at all and so it was a good buy in the end.

Hope that helps ...

[khyasad]

PS.

of course, the other *big* advantage is that it's a second charging station too for my Clie ...

I'm never worried about power any more, since I come home and leave it in my speaker cradle which will give it it's life juice.

Might be useful to illustrate how I use the speaker-side these days.

At the end of each day, I would review my voice memos via headphones or even the built-in speaker (well, that's how I use the voice memo function -- I use it constantly). So, lately, I've been finding myself dropping the Clie into the speaker cradle and listening to my voice memos through the speaker, allowing me to recount the important points of the day ... So you could almost think of the speaker cradle as a pseudo-answering machine, playing back the messages left during the course of the day (albeit me recording those messages on the Clie :)

[rleungym]

Originally posted by khyasad
Yep, I bought one but only as I needed another cradle (one for home, the other for work) and thought, I might as well buy the speaker one, if only to try out the sound quality.

I use the speaker cradle at home and use it mainly as a second cradle.

The first thing that hits you is that it's much bigger than the one that comes with the NX70. It doesn't look as simple and elegant as the original cradle but the stylus holder is the best feature about it (I bought a second stylus for my NX70 and it saves me from taking the stylus out every time I have to put it in a cradle). It's quick to slip in the stylus and take out of the speaker cradle).

I have a Bellagio case for my NX70 and even though it's a tighter fit than the original cradle, it fits and hotsyncs fine.

When inserted into the speaker cradle, it sits more upright which initally bothered me, but over time, actually is better for me due to where it lives on my desk and saves me from leaning over the NX70 to view it (less glare from surrounding lights). However as it's a little more upright, you can't write on the NX70 as easily, but then again, I don't when my NX70 lives in either cradle.

As for the sound volume, well, I have to say I was surprised how loud it was. On the same day it arrived, I had some family staying over for an extended weekend break. Put all their suitcases in my room and that evening, I left the NX70 in the cradle. The next morning, everyone woke up in the surrounding rooms to the alarm I set on my NX70 (which I had forgotten to cancel). It's pretty loud. Not as good as buying dedicated speakers and attaching it to the headphone socket, however it's very convenient if you're at your desk, working on a report and instead of hooking up headphones or connecting it to my sound system. Don't underestimate the flexibility of being able to sit the NX70 into a cradle and get loud sound (instead of the tinny one built-in to the NX70). That, plus you can hotsync and has a really nice (if simple) stylus holder makes for a nice, *very* convenient cradle.

Sound quality, now that's another thing.

I've converted a whole load of movie trailers and also watch some CSI episodes on my NX70. For those purposes (i.e using the movie player), the speaker is very good indeed. You can hear the nunances of speech very well and the bass is not bad at all -- very surprising actually.

However, for music quality, it could be better. It's loud enough, however I do enjoy my music and so I prefer listening to music through decent headphones (like the Bose Triport) or through my sound system. Having said that, my youngest brother happen to walk in and said the music quality was very good, so each to their own.

The cradle also has a second audio input (there is a slide switch to select the clie or the second audio input) and we attached a minidisc player and a CD player. Both sounded pretty good (we used a male-to-male stereo cable with gold-plated connection - standard 3.5mm).

As with most things, do try it out if you can. I didn't, but only because I saw the speaker cradle as nothing more than a second cradle (which I needed) and the speaker as a gimmick. The gimmick turned out to be not bad at all and so it was a good buy in the end.

Hope that helps ...

khyasad,

Thank You _so much_ for this very detailed review. The big question for me is that:

Well, I need a second cradle. I also want's to play some music when I dock my NX in the cradle. I was thinking of buying just another cradle (normal one) and plug a pair of speaker into the headphone jack. I check the documentation and they explicitly warn us for doing this and said it may damage the NX. Do you know why they are saying this? (I don't know much about stereo....:-)) Is it because if the speakers are too powerful, it will fry the headphone jack by drawing too much from it? Have you tried this before?

Again, thanks a lot for your advice!!
Ray

[zx7rgirl]

Hi rleungym,

I also have this speaker cradle and am very pleased with it. I also have the srs-z1 amp/speakers that sony makes for laptops. Unfortunately with the latter, the power adapter weighs a tonne!
The speaker cradle is not small, but it easy to cart around for the dual purposes it serves.
I would recommend that over a pair of speakers, as they would probably take up more room, even though they seem more compact. Oh - and if you're american, you will get 25% off this speaker cradle at sonystyle - lucky blokes! :)

[khyasad]

I can only guess that the NX70 is a sensitive device, in that I mean it has many sensitive components that could potentially fry if a current overload occurs via any port on Cllie, incl. the headphone jack.

Because the NX70 jas a 3.5mm jack, people assume they can plug any audio input/output cable and it will be fine. But unless you ensure the resistance values are not exceeded (need to check if it's 4 or 8 ohms), then there is a potential for a possible reverse current flow. I'm not really an electronics expert so I bow down to anyone else's judgement on the correctness of that statement, but let's just say that even the smallest difference of "excessive" current/voltage flow *could* cause sensitive elctronics to be permanently damaged.

Perhaps someone with academic as well as professional expertise and experience can correct me (if need be) and provide a much more concrete account on whether plugging in powerful speakers to the NX70 headphone jack will damage the NX70 ...

and Ray, you're most welcome ... In fact, I think that was my first ever review of a product ! :)

[aardvarko]

The stock cradle has a stylus holder, too...

[Importluva]

Hmm this new plugging in speakers thing is news to me, didn't know that you weren't supposed to do this.

However, the iRock (wireless FM transmitter) should be fine to use right? Its powered by just 2 AAA batteries, so I doubt anything would happen. Thanks :)

[captainao]

I've used my iRock without problems

[n2ifp]

Originally posted by khyasad
I can only guess that the NX70 is a sensitive device, in that I mean it has many sensitive components that could potentially fry if a current overload occurs via any port on Cllie, incl. the headphone jack.

Because the NX70 jas a 3.5mm jack, people assume they can plug any audio input/output cable and it will be fine. But unless you ensure the resistance values are not exceeded (need to check if it's 4 or 8 ohms), then there is a potential for a possible reverse current flow. I'm not really an electronics expert so I bow down to anyone else's judgement on the correctness of that statement, but let's just say that even the smallest difference of "excessive" current/voltage flow *could* cause sensitive elctronics to be permanently damaged.

Perhaps someone with academic as well as professional expertise and experience can correct me (if need be) and provide a much more concrete account on whether plugging in powerful speakers to the NX70 headphone jack will damage the NX70 ...

and Ray, you're most welcome ... In fact, I think that was my first ever review of a product ! :)

The resistance you refer to is called impedance. DC resistance is not necessarily the same as AC impedance. The output impeadance of the Clie is not super critical. A mismatch can result in a skewed frequency response if it's too far from the intended design. Most headphones are in the 40-100 ohm range. High output amplifiers need a proper match for good frequency reproduction and low distortion. High distortion can trash both the amp and speakers itself. In a low powered device such as a Clie, that's usually not too much of a concern. Yes, if you hook up a device that has an electrical defect, then yes it could damage it. That can be true for a lot of things. With the right cable, I can hook up my Clie to any sound system without too much difficulty. The whole idea is to be sensible, make sure the external amplifier has enough amplifier gain where you don't have to run the Clie at max volume so it won't have to work as hard. There are some users who have actually used Clies with their automobile sound systems.

[franci miller]

Is anyone using spearker external that they would recomend, prefferably something that sould fit in ones pocket, (the other pocket) so as to balance my already bulky clie pocket. I have been using sony cheapo walkman skr. without a problem, knock wood.
Sincerly, MC Hammer