1.2.2014

I bought these from another supplier (Ecodigital), because the white version, which I wanted, was out of stock here at that time.It's best that I explain at once that I am a composer (classical) and recordist of natural soundscapes, so the term 'audiophile' does not describe me precisely enough; I'm used to listening into the nature of sounds in a very analytical way as well as aesthetically, and wanting them reproduced accurately rather than necessarily pleasingly.I wanted the A2+ speakers to replace my old Creative I-Trigue computer speakers. Really I wanted the Audioengine A5+ model, but simply hadn't got the space for those on my computer desk.Actually I got off to a bad start with this model.The first pair that I received were remarkably lacking in bass (which is widely claimed to be 'deep, rich and tightly focused' in this model, but certainly wasn't like that at all for me), and were brash and aggressive in their upper range - this sounding like much more than their just needing breaking in. They sounded like the rather boxy and aggressive sound, lacking in real bass, that I associate with the majority of modern TVs. Very disappointing and indeed baffling after all the hype and glowing reviews for this model!I contacted Ecodigital about this, and they immediately said this had to be a fault, and actually wanted me to return the pair (I was impressed!). At my request they very willingly extended the period in which I'd be entitled to a full refund upon return, as I wanted to check out the odd other alternatives before choosing finally whether to accept a refund or a replacement pair. In the event I didn't find anything else that looked like being what I wanted, so, rather dubiously, I chose for a replacement, and this was actioned at once, so that the following day the new unit was delivered and the original one collected.I was mighty glad in the event not to have been put off by that first pair. The replacement was immediately better. Its bass still wasn't what I would call 'deep and rich', but at least it was miles better than from the original pair, and still pretty good for speakers of this diminutive size. Also the upper range sounded only a little aggressive initially, and that wore off very quickly over just a little test playing, so that then the overall sound was remarkably clear, neutral and 'natural' compared with most 'hi-fi' speakers that I've heard. By that time I'd also had a reply from Audioengine Support, as I had contacted them as well as Ecodigital, and they told me that the breaking-in period was important and would make a big difference, and about 40-50 hours of reasonably hard work for the speakers was required for that, so my initial impressions would not mean very much.I note what another reviewer says about getting more bass using the USB connection. Unfortunately I could not do that, and had to use the line out jack socket from my computer, because I often use headphones for critical listening while editing my recordings, and plugging in my headphones mutes the line out connection but not the USB one.I made an early significant improvement in the sound by purchasing a pair of the Audioengine DS1 wedge stands for speakers the size of the A2 models, and also by having a new plinth made for my computer monitor, to raise it a little more and present absolutely minimal desktop footprint. I was then able to bring the speakers forward so that their fronts were directly under the monitor and they had less (but still far from no) obstruction to their radiated soundwaves. The wedge stands were very effective in reducing sound transmission to the desk, but they did not altogether eliminate that, so that in very loud passages (e.g. the Tuba Mirum in Berlioz' Requiem) I could feel with a hand that my desk was vibrating somewhat, including down the legs, with the potential to disturb my neighbour downstairs despite a concrete floor with soundproofing below the concrete.There was no way I would have more or less continuously played music and my own natural soundscape recordings at quite a loud volume while I was wanting to get on with work at the computer, so necessarily the breaking-in has had to be a slow process, with only periodic bits of playing things that sufficiently challenged the speakers. Nonetheless, the change so far has been considerable - particularly as regards the bass. It's still true that for genuine full range listening a subwoofer would be required (the manufacturers' claims that a subwoofer isn't required seem to me a bit nonsensical or dishonest unless they specify for what category of users a subwoofer wouldn't be required!). Yes, the speaker cones do vibrate at very low frequencies, but they are too small to project much volume once you get below about 60Hz, which latter is the figure given for the bottom of this model's official frequency range. However, even the small amount of very low frequencies coming through was very soon giving much more feeling of depth to the sound, and overall the sound was soon awesomely clear and lifelike, and indeed, 'big'-sounding for such little speakers. My musical tests have all been with classical music, and have been extremely impressive, with Havergal Brian's Gothic Symphony, Berlioz Requiem (in St Paul's Cathedral), Vaughan Williams Sea Symphony, Xenakis Nomos Gamma (with much heavy drumming and an enormous tapestry of fine details) and Messiaen's organ work Messe de la Pentecôte all coming out a treat. In all these works, not only were the very loud sections clear and distortion free, but the quieter parts were beautifully clear and neutral sounding, and at no time apart from the very beginning have I experienced over-brightness - just a beautifully precise clarity of sound, as though I were really listening to the original performances.However, although for the most part the speakers' sound seemed very neutral, there was and is a fly in the ointment, for I am noticing a resonance in the upper bass or lower midrange, depending on where one considers the demarcation to be. This made particularly drums of a certain pitch range too prominent and rather fatiguing to listen to if they were being used a lot in a particular work. In organ music, passages that used that 'resonance' frequency band tended to sound too penetrating and have, for example, any fluty sounds rather drowned out. Also, rumbles of thunder tended to suffer from this (some more than others), and sound too penetrating, with an unnatural rather vague 'note' to the sound. For the same reason, some sea and wind sound is rather blighted by this resonance, and my 41-minute spectacular close-up recording of the Shag Rock blowhole (near Perranporth, Cornwall), sounds really unpleasant, each intense heavy 'whoooomph' having a nasty penetrating quality that isn't in the recording at all (as heard on my Castle Harlech floor-stander speakers and my Sony MDR-V6 headphones, and of course by my own ears during the recording session).I have now conducted some tests using sinewave recordings, at -6dB amplitude, which is quite loud. Remarkably, I could just hear 30Hz. Indeed, I could just hear a trace even of 25Hz, though I can only just hear that frequency anyway at that playback level, and it would pass unnoticed in actual 'real' recordings. 35Hz was a little more distinct, and 40Hz much more so. It was when I ran a downloaded sinewave sweep from 20 to 200Hz that I found where the unwanted resonance was. There were actually two peaks, one around 150Hz and another around 175Hz, and quite marked. That represented the pitch region of about D3 to F3. However, I have no way of telling to what extent this is an issue of the speakers or simply of their decidedly non-ideal placement among all my computer stuff, so other users may or may not experience that, or indeed may get other resonances, which again would not necessarily reflect upon the speakers themselves.I did get harmonic distortion giving spurious gentle higher tones when playing most of the very low frequency tones, BUT I found that some of this was showing up on the Musical Spectrum display in my music player, Foobar2000, which meant that it was coming from my computer system, not the speakers, so it looks as though overall any harmonic distortion produced actually by the speakers or their amp was, at most, much less than what I actually heard.At the time of writing this I am still hearing improvements in the volume of very low frequencies - the bass increasingly justifying the description of 'deep and rich' despite all the initial appearances. Sorabji's gargantuan First Organ Symphony now sounds quite apocalyptic at times, and even in its very quiet passages I can actually just hear frequencies around 30Hz, very frequently (sic) - the sound having quite breathtaking depth and 'welly' no matter whether quiet or loud. However, all that is for me sitting at the computer. When I get back from the computer, into the room at large, much less is heard of all those very low frequencies, though I can just hear them. So, I would say that these speakers are a long way from filling a room with what I would describe as a genuine 'deep rich' bass. I'll not be ditching my (non-computer-connected) Castle Harlech floor-standers anytime soon in favour of anything smaller!In summary, then, despite the fact that I wouldn't describe these speakers quite as 'full range', at least for anything other than close-range listening, and I'm currently giving them the benefit of the doubt about that rather troublesome resonance that I'm getting, I award them 5 out of 5, taking into account their phenomenal overall sound quality for their small size and especially as used as computer speakers. But if you want to properly hear the 'earthquake' frequencies in the bass (and I'm referring to achieving a fully natural sound and not to the exaggerated bass that many pop / rock music devotees love), then you would still need to add a subwoofer.Update, July 2015:Quite soon after writing and more or less forgetting about this review I improved the A2+ sound by using the Audioengine D1 DAC and S8 subwoofer, and actually did a reasonable job of using graphic EQ to take out those upper bass peaks and make the lower midrange / upper bass quite reasonably neutral. After trying various EQ utilities I settled on Equalizer APO parametric equalizer, using the PEQGUI utility as a very serviceable front end for it, and that has done a very satisfactory job of applying the EQ to sound coming from anything in the computer, rather than just working with specific music players / editors as almost all others do.However, that was not the end of the story, because the A2+ speakers had whetted my appetite for more of a genuine 'monitor quality' sound from my hi-fi system than I was getting from my old Castle Harlech floor-standing speakers. After a long and very expensive saga with trial and rejection of Audioengine A5+, Aktimate Mini and then Aktimate Blue, I finally gave up in exasperation with regard to active speakers for my main room 'hi-fi' and settled for B&W 685 S2 with Cyrus 8 DAC amplifier, with a DSPeaker Anti-Mode 2.0 Dual Core unit to fairly precisely EQ out all the room / speaker resonances affecting the speaker sound, together with a pair of BK XLS200-DF subwoofers, carefully adjusted before the Anti-Mode calibration. With that (relatively) monitor-quality setup and a wide stereo separation I get a much more three-dimensional, detailed and indeed more accurate soundstage, which makes the Audioengine A2+ sound small and altogether a bit crude, even though still very impressive for their diminutive size. Generally now when I'm editing new recordings of natural soundscapes that I've made I much prefer to have the sound routed from my computer to the hi-fi setup to get that bigger and much more lifelike soundstage.

22.7.2017

The speakers came all the way from England to Berlin and I've been tracking the package all the way here, so the anticipation was killing me to say the least. Five minutes to set up and having already purchased Edifier R1280Ts and a cheap pair of Bose Companion Series III and sent them both back for different reasons (the Edifiers sounded good but looked cheap, the Bose were just a mess acoustically with crazy muddy bass all over every single thing you played on them) so I'm in a decent position to describe the sound here. For the record I've owned a couple of expensive pairs of Sennheisers, a few nice pairs of bluetooth headphones, I do play the electric guitar as well.I think the Sennheisers were what set me on the path to really appreciating clean,neutral, flat acoustics without all kinds of crazy bass-boosting nonsense - and that was what drew my attention towards the Audioengine A2s. Suffice to say I'm not disappointed. I felt kind of bad or wondered if I was judging the previous speakers I tried too harshly, but these give me the exact sound I want so that's kind of reassuring. Furthermore as someone who had really got used to listening to music solely through headphones, these are an original experience to me - I have to say I like it a lot, even the most expensive headphones just don't give you the same kind of stereo / bass / imaging experience as (these) speakers.The sound itself is hyper accurate, clean, the imaging is beautiful - with the speakers angled correctly you get an incredible sensation of the music almost being played in front of you. I can single out the individual instruments and listen more deeply into the tracks I'm hearing, hearing details I've never heard on songs I've heard hundreds of times. The bass is ultra controlled, snappy, punchy, and just exactly 'where' it needs to be acoustically, it's almost kind of like having a separate subwoofer. I certainly don't feel the need for a sub in this case. Vocals, mids, trebles are even better, they're exceptional. I don't know if there's any genre of music that wouldn't sound great on these, perhaps if you're a hardcore drumnbass kind of guy these won't blow the roof off in terms of the low end, but come on, these are PC multimedia speakers, if you wanted that you wouldn't be looking at these in the first place. Ultimately they just make you want to listen to your whole music collection again.I have the volume set to about 3 o'clock and Windows volume at about 5%... I live in an apartment so I really didn't need some monster speakers like the A5s, and loudness-wise even these speakers have ten times as much power as I could ever need. Perfect for a small party with friends.I haven't purchased the (overpriced, but nice) angled stands you can buy yet but I'll consider it given how good these are. This is the most amount of money I've personally spent on an audio product, from what I've researched and from listening to a mixture of systems I'd hazard a guess that these speakers probably give you 95% of what any set of speakers out there is going to give you for the price - and at probably a tenth of the outlay you could potentially invest in a sound system. What I mean to say I would actually look at it the other way and say this: spending much less than what Audioengine is asking for the A2s just doesn't make sense, unless you really don't care about sound quality you will ultimately end up buying something better at some point anyway, probably these very speakers for that matter.In terms of the media you actually end up playing on them, I would emphasise the fact that with these speakers you're lifting the ceiling in terms of the quality of the physical media i.e bitrate etc that you play on them. What that means is that these speakers love to be fed high quality media, cheap old mp3s might not fare so well on them, but that's not their fault.Also, weirdly one of the bags my speakers came in had a weird black stain on them, looked like spilled ink or something, no idea what it was.No regrets having purchased this, expensive but totally worth it.EDIT: A week after purchasing it I just noticed a tiny scuff mark on the Left speaker. Hopefully it's not going to drive me crazy after spending all this money. Seems there may be some small QA issues going on here. Reduced 1 star.

17.4.2014

UPDATE: 13 June 2014As my experience with the speakers was far worst than what most people claimed in other reviews I decided to return them and get a new set.The replacement arrived a few days ago (after a long delay because they were out of stock) and they perform significantly better.Had I received the properly performing speakers in the first place then I would have given them 5 stars. However I will raise my rating from 3 to just 4, since there seems to be some quality control issues, at least in my case.-------------------------------------ORIGINAL REVIEW 17 April 2014-------------------------------------I bought these speakers based on the very good reviews but I have to say I am a bit disappointed.These speakers look really nice and solid,

10.3.2015

Bought these speakers as an upgrade to my current Creative speakers which are now 7 years old. I wanted an amp and shelf speakers but space on my desk was limited. I now have my turntable and PC setup in my spare room. Having the separate RCA and Line Input on the A2+’s was a major advantage for me.Unboxing these speakers is a pleasure. Each speaker has its own bag as does the power pack, power lead and speaker cable. Unlike other reviews I have read of this product, mine was supplied with a UK plug already fitted.Setup the speakers on my desk, connected up the USB cable, power pack and supplied speaker wire. Connected the USB cable from the speakers to my PC.Windows 7 recognised the new device but refused to install the driver. Tried to detect the driver from the windows update site and failed. Searched the web for a driver installation an no driver pack is available. Not even from the AudioEngine website. Upon checking device manager the device was detected as the AudioEngine A2+, under the properties the device said it was working. But looking at the driver it was not signed by Microsoft and had an error saying it could not load the software for install. I tested the USB auto install feature using a Digital camera plugged in to the same port. This installed fine and tried a USB printer on the same cable as the speakers and no issues.After a quick google some suggestions were to remove the USB drivers from the PC, reboot and try again. Others suggested removing DLL’s from the windows folder. The last suggestion was one I was hoping I did not have to do and that was to reinstall windows. Sadly this was my last and final option. Luckily I had a backup of a base Windows 7 image. I restored this and plugged in the speakers. They detected and installed and were set as the default speakers under control panel.I tested the music quality from Spotify using the high quality. The playback was beautiful, very clear and nice tones from the speakers. I did notice the bass was not as punchy as I was expecting but it’s not lacking. I am planning to add a separate subwoofer on the output of these speakers to complete the setup. I tried the input on the RCA from my turntable with built in preamp. Sound was clear and crisp and the cracks and pops from the Vinyl were more noticeable compared to my last pair of speakers.I would recommend these speakers to prospective buyers. However I wanted to make people aware of the installation issues I experienced. Could just be my OS at fault but resulted in a wiping of the OS to get a set of speakers to work. A driver available on the website would be helpful and from an IT point of view would assist with fault finding.

5.8.2019

I bought these because my PC monitor does not have built in speakers and the built in speakers from the Mac mini are absolute garbage. After quite a bit of research I settled on these because they were getting excellent reviews. I sometimes play Xbox and also watch a lot of youtube and Netflix at my desk so I wanted good speakers.I connected the speakers to my Mac mini using USB connection so I can use the Mac's built in DAC and also so I can control the speaker's volume via my keyboard and mouse. This model isn't bluetooth capable but that's fine because I bought it to be use solely as desktop speakers.The sound from the speakers are excellent and what you would expect from speakers this size.

11.1.2015

I needed a new pair of speakers for my office setup and didn't want to break the bank but also wanted something solid and decent. After careful consideration I settled on a pair of the A2+ in white and have to say I'm very impressed.Beautifully packed with all components supplied in their own cloth bags, the design is clean and they're very solidly put together. The supplied cables are of a decent quality & length (for a desk based setup).These speakers are pretty tiny and sit, unobtrusively, on my desk unnoticed by anyone until I start to play some music. Then they transform into room filling little beasts easily loud enough to sit at 30% volume for general day to day listening.

22.2.2021

Got these in black for my home office desk.Using them primarily for music and some video.Connections:They are connected to my Macbook Pro, and I've placed them about 1.7M apart.The left speaker unit connects to the power cable.The 2 units are connected together with the speaker cable provided (speaker cable is 2 metres long).I have connected to my Macbook via the provided 1.5M USB cable, but can be connected via Bluetooth too.There are external outputs that could optionally connect to a subwoofer.Operation:They are turned on/off via the volume knob (on back of unit).I can turn the volume up/down via my keyboard controls (and/or can use the volume knob on the speaker).Sound:Very precise and rich sound.

16.12.2014

Blimey! It's difficult to comprehend the quality of the sound that emanates from these tiny speakers. The bass doesn't go really deep, but what could you expect from such small cabinets? The bass is astonishingly punchy and is accurate enough though. There is clarity to the midrange and a nice smooth sparkle at the high frequencies. I use them on a TV together with a DVD player. The input from the TV is via the 3.5mm jack and I use the rca phono input for the DVD player for best quality sound. The only downside of connecting this way, is that when playing a DVD, the sound is transfered through the TV via the HDMI connection, so both the sound from the TV AND that from the DVD (being directly connected to the speakers via rca phono)

17.1.2018

I have bought these to replace an elderly pair of Logitech speakers that would be worth around £25 new. Those were good enough for games, but to my ears completely unacceptable for music.In my sitting room I have an ancient pair of Spendor BC1 speakers with high quality amplification, tuner and CD. That system would cost £5000 to replace with new kit of the same standard.Not to my surprise the quality is intermediate between the two.I tend to listen to classical music at moderate levels - except when playing Wagner! These speakers are definitely good enough for me to listen to when at the computer or sitting elsewhere in the spare bedroom. I have the volume turned down quite low (12 o'clock on the control knob and 25% output from the computer).

7.1.2014

"Be the first to review" I was urged, so here it is,hot off the press. My normal listening is via headphones, but I thought I would like some music to fill the pad while there's nobody around to complain. I was going to buy the A2's, but saw there was an improved model, and so I chose these, despite there being no customer feedback, bit of a risk. They were shipped out quickly from Amazon at little cost to Hungary, quite impressed by that. Also highly impressed by the packaging and accessories, all the wires and connections, rapid set-up. The speakers are very chunky and neat, creating a modest yet commanding presence on your desktop. They are very versatile: you can run them straight from your laptop via USB as they have a built-in DAC,

13.4.2015

Straight off the bat these are NOT high end speakers, nor are they designed to be or claimed to be.These are premium speakers for your desk, and for what they are, they are very very good.these are designed for close range listening and if you're buying them for your tv or any other multimedia purposes where you wont be sitting fairly close to them you will find that while the mids and highs sound fantastic the bass falls away at distance.I read a lot of reviews that said they got better sound out of the usb connection, in my experience I got better sound from 3.5mm jack, this is because my 2014 macbook has a 24bit/96000hz DAC inbuilt as opposed to the 16bit/48000hz of the speakers DAC,

9.6.2017

After some research, we purchased these Audioengine A2+W speakers to replace our broken Corsair SP2500's, that we have had since July 2012. We have been using these A2+W's since April 2017. Note, we aren't audiophiles, but we like to think that we can tell the difference between good & bad sound quality. Here is our experience thus far.Pro's:+Clear, quality, punchy sound in games( RTS/MMO) & music is equally so, picks up all the little backing lyrics/sounds really well.+Nice stylish appearance, with 3 colour options available.+Good quality feel, sturdy, solid weight wooden cabinets.+That something extra packaging, everything comes in microfiber cloth bags.+No sub,

12.5.2018

I had read several reviews of these speakers before their purchase...They sit either side of my computer monitor, they sit on the Oak work top upon Oak mini stands I put together to to get them at the correct height/angle.I'm sitting very close to the speakers <1 metre from either.The sound stage is very impressive. OK no great thumping base, but I could add a sub for that should I want it - which I don't.They can go louder than I find comfortable - (Though I'm right on top of them - Not trying to fill a large room)They were bought to replace my previous set-up because re-arranging my office meant there was no longer room for my old NAD 3020 amp and monitor speakers.

15.5.2017

Ordered these in March. Prompt delivery, well packaged & looked & felt like a quality product & for their size sounded excellent.HOWEVER, the left hand speaker has now developed a fault, it emits a soft quiet buzzing. Worse this is an intermittent fault. Contacted AudioVisual Online & was instructed to return for examination (£20 including insurance). Within ONE day I received an e-mail saying there was nothing wrong with them & to contact AudioVisual Online to arrange o pay for their return. What's the point, they can't be usedHaving re-read several other reviews it is clear that there is a consensus, great speakers if nothing goes wrong with them,

9.8.2018

I work from home and I've been using these on my desk for about 6 weeks now, so they're well and truly broken in and I'm really happy with the sound (and volume) they produce. I have them plugged into the USB port on a MacBook Pro, and they're sitting on Audioengine Ds1 speaker stands.I was pleased to discover that the computer's volume control still works, as I'd previously been using some old Creative desktop speakers plugged into the headphone port on my Dell monitor (which apparently has a built-in DAC) and with this setup I couldn't adjust the volume from the computer. These speakers are pretty small compared to my old ones, and I was a bit skeptical about their power,

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