Speakers
Creative updated many of its speaker sets this year and released a few new ones, too. The Gigaworks T3 with the Slam! woofer uses passive drivers to deliver a far more warmer sound. The bass driver was reworked to force the bass tones and kicks out the side of the device instead of just the front, creating a more noticable bass presence. It will be available for $249 in February.
The Gigaworks HD50 is the most popular 2.0 speaker set. It has extra space in its chassis for the on-board bass channel. It will be available for $199 in Q1. Several other sets were on display, too, including the T40 Series II, which was bumped from 28 W to 32 W, the T20 Series II, the Inspire T3200 with wired PMP dock, and Inspire T6200, a 5.1 system with interlocking satellites in the event of insufficient space for the rear satellites.
Little known to most users, the iPod Nano has a radio. It simply must be enabled by connecting a receiver module such as the one within Creative’s new Travelsound iPod dock. The dock will sell for $99.
The 2.0 N400 USB notebook speakers will cost $69 and come with a case.
Headsets
My Creative representative said that, surprisingly, MMORPGs such as World of Warcraft are driving the sales of high-quality headsets. Users must not only hear the game, but have a microphone in order to communicate with other players. To that end, Creative introduced the Aurvana headset last year, and the USB-powered HS-1100 with a silencer and X-Fi built into it. I tried out the headset with a short run around the Goblin city in WoW and could not hear anything going on around me—Creative’s is one of the loudest boothes, too! I couldn’t even hear my rep when he was standing and talking next to me. Quite impressive!
