The Fostex PMO.4 Studio Monitors--Great Sound for a Dorm Room

The Fostex PMO.4 studio monitor speakers, while making iffy studio monitors, make an amazing dorm sound system. The two three-inch speakers, each enclosed in a six-inch box produce very clear and realistic sound, and are loud enough for most anyone's needs. While they are designed as studio monitors, and thus do not crank out disproportionate amounts of bass, they make lovely clean and loud sound. If you really do want lots of bass from them, however, all you need to do is crank up the low end EQ on the music source. Although they are not on par with the really good studio monitors, most of which run in the $500 price range, they make a lovely sound system, and are far superior to any computer speaker set up that I have heard.

These speakers are sold separately rather than as a pair. You can, however, two of them for $150, and with a little work, get them hooked up. Assuming you are planning to hook them up to an mp3 player or a computer, you will need a Y cable, with a mini ¼" plug on one end, and RCA plugs on the other two. You will also need a male-female RCA cable, to extend the Y adapter to allow proper separation between the two speakers. These two cables should set you back no more than $10, and are available both online and in stores like RadioShack. The optimal set up for these speakers, according both to the manual and my own experience, it so put them about 60 degrees apart, and around six feet from the listener. They should directly at head level, and should be pointed in the right direction. Set up that way, they will give you an amazing sense of space, but set up any other way, they will sound kind of weird. I have them set up one on either end of my desk, and from my bed, which is about six feet away, the sound is amazing. It makes a great movie-watching setup.

Although studio monitors are available offering 75 watts each, ("you can play small clubs with these," the lady on the phone told me, when I asked her what they were good for) the 15 watts these provide is quite a sufficient amount of sound for a dorm room. When I crank these up, everyone in the building knows about it. It is a suitable amount of power for most monitoring applications, too. Although there are better monitors on the market, for occasional use these will work quite will, burying you in a world of very realistic sound.

All in all, these are great speakers, and just about one of the best sound systems available to hook up to your computer.