How loud do computer speakers need to be? I considered this question when hooking up the Expressionist UlTRA system from Altec Lansing. After all, my Marshall bass amp sits behind my computer desk, and not even that is 200 watts (although, yes, it should be). When working at my desk, the computer speakers are about two feet from my head. Surely I don’t need 200 watts pumping music and game audio from that short distance…or do I?

The name Hercules comes with certain expectations. Personally, I think of two things: shiny, bare-chested, overdubbed dudes and this giant pinball machine at Cedar Point with a pool ball for a pinball. It’s kind of a negative connotation, now that I consider it, as the Hercules movies were always pretty bad, and the Hercules pinball machine was never really that fun to play. So, was the Hercules XPS 2.1 50 Speaker Kit also a let down? Not really, but it’s not exactly a champion of speaker systems, either.

Full review past the break.

Reviewing speaker systems is a bit tricky for me for two reasons. First, I know little about the science of sound. Numbers and fancy symbols and awkward abbreviations mean as much to me now as they did when I wasn’t paying attention in junior high science class. I’ll display all those numbers and abbreviations later in this review, but it’s up to you to decipher them.

Second, although I can tell you whether something sounds good and why, I can’t tell you how good it sounds compared to the competition. At the electronics stores, I can sample four or five systems next to each other, determine what I like best, and make my purchase. Here, I’ve just got one unit standing alone, doing its thing, and I have to judge it on that alone.

Find out how the Mint 220 Digital Wireless Digital Music System does its thing after the break.