If your’e comparing these speakers to a conventional HTIB setup, oh man, these things blow typical HTIB satellites out of the water and into outer space. Get them, get them now, replace all 5/7 of your satellites! You’ll be glad you did! Most of my friends fall into this category, and these are perfect entry level speakers for someone who is looking for an inexpensive upgrade to their HTIB. You’ll be blown away by the improvement. There isn’t a whole lot of bass, so make sure you have a sub. Oh, and put these on stands and not in a bookshelf.

If your’e a bit more discerning/slightly larger pocketbook, though, you’ll find their fairly average, and more on the mediocre end of average. I picked up a set of these speakers on clearance as surrounds for my 5.1 system, and they do the job adequately. For a small room or a *very* small surround system, these could be okay as your L/R front speakers but overall they are just too small for my tastes as fronts. The sound is rather neutral, with not a lot of bass extension. A bit ho-hum, but that means they strive for accuracy in reproduction, which is good. The really good thing is the speakers aren’t boomy! A lot of little speakers like this have boom, but the Sony engineers decided to get rid of that, thank you for putting some foam in. They are good entry level speakers, esp. for the price per pair these typically go for.