MAXIMUMPC april 2007
reviews Tes Ted. Reviewed. veRdic Tized
W
hen we heard about Belkin’s Cable-Free USB Hub, our first thought
was, “Yes! Now we can move our iPod A/V dock next to our TV in the
living room and still sync the player with iTunes on our PC in the den.” Ha!
This device’s range is so poor it barely reaches across the room.
To be fair, Belkin doesn’t make tremendous claims for the device: The
box states that the USB hub has “30 feet of wireless range” and that you can
“transfer files at speeds up to 480Mb/sec.” That obviously won’t fulfill our
multiroom mission, but the device doesn’t deliver on its stated specs, either.
We were lucky to get 10 feet of range, even when—as the manual recom-
mends—we maintained a clear line of sight between the dongle and the hub.
Potential buyers shouldn’t get too excited about getting rid of
cables, either. You’ll need an electrical outlet to plug in the four-port hub
and a free USB port on your PC to plug in the cable for Belkin’s dongle
stand. Plugging the dongle directly into the back of your PC will likely
prevent it from pairing with the hub no matter where you put it. And since
the dongle half of the equation isn’t a Certified Wireless USB device, it
will never be compatible with future devices that do comply with that
standard. Belkin considers the combo a closed point-to-point network.
To test file-transfer speeds, we copied 412MB of random files from
our desktop PC’s hard drive to a freshly formatted 6GB USB hard drive. We
achieved a data-transfer rate of 24.9Mb/sec with the drive plugged directlyinto our PC. When we repeated the test with Belkin’s hub (with the dongle
just a few inches away) the data-transfer rate dropped to 9.4Mb/sec. We
then moved the hub about six feet from the dongle and repeated the test;
this time, the data-transfer speed dropped to a mere 5.3Mb/sec.
Considering you can buy a wired four-port USB hub for around 30
bucks, you’d have to be nuts to
spend $200 for this wireless model.
—Michael BrownBelkin Cable-Free
USB Hub
At what cost wireless?
if Belkin’s cable-Free USB hub is any indication of what we
can expect from other wireless USB products, the technology’s
future is bleak.2
BelkiN CABle-Free USB HUB
$200, http://www.belkin.comW
e’re accustomed to big sound from tiny speakers because we review a
lot of 2.1 configurations that have beefy subwoofers to serve up generous
portions of bass. So we were skeptical of the “audiophile quality” claims TBi
Audio Systems made for its diminutive—and sub-less—Majestic Diamond i
audio monitors. Well, we’re believers now.
it’s not just the size of these speakers that renders them atypical of the
products we usually review; they’re also passive, which means you’ll need an
external amplifier to drive them (TBi provided us with Sonic impact’s remark-
able $40 Portable T-Amp for this review.) The Majestic Diamond i’s aren’t mag-
netically shielded, but they use a low-gauss magnet, and TBi says the speakers
can be placed in close proximity to a CrT. lCD monitors, of course, aren’t
affected by magnetic fields.
listening to Steely Dan’s “My rival” (from Gaucho), we were struck by these
speakers’ ability to deliver silence between the notes in the song’s arrangement.
You don’t hear that in lesser speakers, because they can’t stop resonating between
tightly packed notes. We then turned to the guitar and vocals of “if This is Goodbye”
from the Mark knopfler, emmylou Harris collaboration All the Roadrunning.
The Diamond i’s proved as adept at delivering knopfler’s mellifluous bari-
tone as they were at producing Harris’s alto. listening to “Beyond My Wildest
Dreams,” however, we found ourselves craving just a bit more bottom end, down
where the kick drum lives, and for a taste more in the upper register—we wantedmore of the drummer’s rim shot laying down its half-time rhythm.
if ever there were an audio system that proves what a tragic mistake
it can be to judge the quality of audio components by spec charts, this
combo is it: The speakers are rated to handle just 25 watts rMS, while the
tiny amp is rated at just 15 watts per channel; heck, the amp can run on
eight AA batteries. if you’re looking for a high-end yet transportable audio
setup for your digital media player or notebook PC—and have a
generous budget—you can’t do
much better.
—Michael BrownTBI Audio Systems Majestic
Diamond I Speakers
These pint-size speakers deliver 10-gallon sound
The Majestic Diamond i speakers are outfitted with just three-
inch full-range drivers, but they sound better than much
larger speakers.9
MAje ST iC DiAMoND i SPeAkerS
$400, http://www.tbisound.com5.5"4.6"