The Logitech Speaker System Z313 is designed to provide high quality audio to devices that are otherwise not equipped to deliver it themselves. It’s intended for your PC, but it can also complement your iPod or any other device that has a standard headphone jack output.

You’ll be surprised at the full, room-filling sound you’ll get from the three speakers in unison – I know I was. Despite their tinny appearance, the two satellite speakers are fairly punchy when backed by the system’s subwoofer. However, even though the default mix is pretty good, you have no option on the device itself to modify the bass in comparison to the treble or vice versa. The Z313’s remote contains only an overall volume dial, an on/off switch and a headphone input. This is a little frustrating since the mix levels may differ even within the same media. For instance, the bass may become overpowering while, say, watching a movie (as it did in my testing) but turning down the overall volume may then render speech almost inaudible. So tweaking the finer mix details will have to be done using the volume options of the device in question, which is hardly convenient in most cases. The ability to do this on the fly would have been appreciated. That said, the default mix gets it right a good 90% of the time.

With two speakers feeding into a subwoofer, which itself has a power cable and remote cable protruding from it, the Z313 presents a relative mess of cables. You’ll have to be rather careful about your placement and positioning of the setup to avoid cable clutter, although you should be fine with most desktop PC setups. The Z313 system also sports an attractive black design that should complement most systems.

PROS: Surprisingly full sound. Simple to set up. Affordable.

CONS: Lacks convenient on-device mix controls. Remote is hardwired to the subwoofer. Prepare for a bit of cable clutter.

VERDICT: It’s hard to be too critical of the Z313 system, which packs a lot of punch at a very reasonable price point. In fact, you’d be hard pressed to find better value when it comes to decent PC speakers.