A lengthy review follows so for the TL;DR version:
Great budget speakers for a small living room or bedroom once burned in and are vastly superior to HDTV speakers or a soundbar. Highly recommend if you don't have the money for a $300 range set of speakers or just want to get your toe wet in surround sound setups.
Updated February 25, 2017:
Still a good bargain.
Having since upgraded the living room surround sound speakers, I've moved these to my PC along with a cheap used 5.1 receiver but with a different subwoofer. They work very well in a "near field" environment of desktop and three feet away especially in gaming. More details at the end of the review.
Updated 1/29/2016 Long version:
When it finally became unavoidable that I'd have to retire my lashed up 5.1 system consisting of a Creative Labs Dolby and DTS decoder and Gateway BA-7900 speakers, I had to get some surround speakers fast and cheap. Reviews of the 108427 were good enough, the price was right, Prime shipping was fast, so I pulled the trigger.
First it is important to relay what kind of taste I have in speakers. Long a fan of Boston Acoustics line of musically neutral products, I value detail and fidelity over shaking the foundation of the house. Yamaha and Polk follow, while I despise Bose and Klipsch for distorting audio. More like torturing it, but that's my personal opinion and audio preferences are very personal. Genres of music listened to are rock, classical, jazz, Sinatra, Dino, electronica, soundtracks, outlaw... pretty much everything other than rap and country. Constantly shifting between music types is why I prefer neutral speakers over "warm" sounding ones.
The good news is these cheap Monoprice speakers are very neutral and well detailed for their price point. Better speakers can be had for 2-3 times the price including their own line. After 35 hours of burn in (a must with small speakers), the high frequencies are good, mid-range are good for movies (music is another matter), lows are shockingly good thanks to a subwoofer designed to carry a lot of the load the satellites normally would. If you are going to play a lot of music over these, you will want to either replace the fronts with bookshelf speakers or matrix everything with Dolby ProLogic II or DTS: Neo 6. While not faithful in those modes, they cover up the weaknesses that show in stereo mode.
A drawback is the fussy connectors on the speakers. In fact I was sure one of the satellites was defective out of the box. Further examination revealed that some of the strands in the speaker wire had not made it through the hole in the spring loaded connector. It only took five or six strands splayed out to cause the speaker to hiss. Ten minutes of fiddling and muttering under my breath produced clean sound once all the strands were in.
Connecting the active subwoofer to a receiver that has a single RCA line out does not require an adaptor. Just take the stereo RCA cord included and plug in only the white jack to to the line out and the white line in jack. Works just fine since it is a mono signal in the first places, though I found on my set that more bass was delivered through the white line in than the red. It may be designed that way like more expensive subs.
8/19/2017
I was wrong about the subwoofer only needing one RCA jack to work effectively. Taking a peek into the enclosure, it became obvious from the wiring that the 8" driver is a dual voice coil at 8 ohms each. This means you NEED a mono to stereo adaptor to get the full sound if you go off a receiver's subwoofer out jack. Otherwise the driver only moves half the air it should!
Another review complained the speakers are very directional and I found this to be true. The design of the cabinets is that the drivers sit behind a shallow horn for both the tweeters and midwoofers which limits their off axis performance. While terrible for music, this is an actual plus for movies that have dedicated surround sound mixes or for gaming.
Blu-rays of were used to test different surround mixes: TRON: Legacy was used to test DTS-HD 5.1, The Hunt for Red October for Dolby TrueHD, and The Conversation in DTS-HD 5.1. The first two I played to gauge the effectiveness of surround cues with the last movie used to hear how a dialogue heavy movie would fare. Directional cues are excellent making it a joy to listen to modern movies. The torpedoes in Red October zoomed around nicely with the tweeters really adding to the ambiance inside the submarines. The center seems a trifle weak, but it isn't a dramatic imbalance and can be adjusted at the receiver level. The sub is ridiculously good for a cheap 8", managing to be detailed and still able to make your ribcage vibrate when LFE is used in a scene like the dance club in TRON: Legacy. Just don't expect much lower than 40 Hz
Though small, the Monoprice 108247 speakers need some oomph to push them. They really don't perform until they start getting loud. For reference, the speakers are hooked up to my Sony STR-DN1010 receiver that is rated to 110 watts per channel. Music doesn't fill out until above 40 volume, while movies and TV require at least 35. Yes, they can get loud as long as you have a decent enough receiver to drive them. Remember to calibrate the speakers with your receiver if you can and make sure the crossover is set to 160 Hz.
Part of my putting together the new surround setup involved assistance from two three month old kittens. As a result, I can report that the speakers are fairly tough units able to survive a 3 foot drop with only the grill popping off. Of course, I don't advise trying this at home, kids.
Love the movie performance, but playing music over them left much to be desired. Consequently, a pair of Insignia NS-SP213 bookshelf speakers have replaced the fronts. Currently they are burning in and I forgot to get the banana jacks to turn the setup from 5.1 to 7.1, so I'll update this review later with the results of that.
1/29/2016: While I still haven't gotten the 7.1 up and running, the NS-SP213 speakers up front blended in much better than expected with the 8427 set. Stereo music is very enjoyable now with the subwoofer perfectly overcoming the low end weakness of the new fronts. Though auto calibrated by the Sony receiver again, the center volume had to be manually bumped up a couple of decibels to overcome it being drowned out in the mix. In fact, I'm wondering if the calibration is what made the center seem weaker in the first place.
To anyone interested in playing music over these speakers, I highly recommend adding a pair of bookshelf speakers to the mix.
Also did some testing with and without the metal grills and found little discernible difference with the 80247 satellites, unlike the Insignia pair which need to have the grills off.
February 25, 2017
Two of the satellites and the center now are being used with my PC via an old Sony 5.1 receiver. The directionality mentioned earlier is terrific for playing video games that use proper surround cues -- there's no sneaking up on me now!
The subwoofer is also in service, but in the home gym/hobby room filling in the void for some deep bass deficient stereo speakers. Being able to wire the hot stereo outs to the speakers is a nice plus on such a bargain unit.
I've also taken apart the remaining unused satellites to get a look at construction and was surprised at what I found. Though finding a capacitor bridging the woofer to tweeter wasn't a shock (it prevents lower sound frequencies from frying the tweeter), the polyfill mat to dampen sound was. The back of the plastic cabinet also seems to have been designed with the option to put a full crossover in! Build quality is better than expected for something this low priced leading to some mad scientist experiments on the spares.
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From the manufacturer
Monoprice 10565 Premium 5.1 Channel Home Theater System with Subwoofer
While superb sound quality is the ultimate goal of any home audio system, the realities of budget and even aesthetics often force compromises in sound quality. Well, the time for compromise is over. Now you can have it all - great sound, great looks, small size.
The Monoprice Premium 5.1-Channel Home Theater System surpasses all expectations for sound quality in a small package. The four satellite and the single center speakers each use a 3" polypropylene mid-range driver and a 3/4" aluminum dome tweeter. They can handle up 100 watts of power and have an impedance of 8 ohms.
The satellite and center channel speakers handle frequencies from 110Hz to 20kHz ±3dB, with the crossover between the mid-range and tweeter drivers set to 3.5KHz. The powered subwoofer features an 8" downward firing speaker driven by a 200 watt amplifier. It handles frequencies from 30Hz to 150Hz (-10dB) and uses a variable crossover from 40-150Hz.
Compare with similar items
This Item  Monoprice Premium 5.1 Channel Home Theater System with Subwoofer - 100 Watt Speakers, 200 Watt Subwoofer, Black |  |  |  |  | |
| Price | — | $159.99 | -33% $399.00 List: $599.95 | -11% $196.00 List: $219.99 | $399.99 |
| Delivery | — | Get it as soon as Monday, May 20 | — | Get it as soon as Friday, May 17 | — |
| Customer Ratings | |||||
| Sound quality | |||||
| Value for money | |||||
| Remote Control | |||||
| For beginners | |||||
| Sold By | — | Bobtot | 6ave | Amazon.com | Adorama |
| speaker size | 6.5 inches | 5.25 inches | 4 inches | 36 inches | — |
| power source | — | Corded Electric | Corded Electric | AC | Corded Electric |
| connectivity tech | wireless | Coaxial, Bluetooth, Optical, USB, RCA, HDMI, Auxiliary | HDMI, Ethernet, Coaxial, Optical, USB, Auxiliary, Bluetooth | Auxiliary, HDMI | Wireless |
| speaker type | Subwoofer, Center Channel, Satellite | Subwoofer, Surround Sound | Subwoofer,Bookshelf | Subwoofer | Subwoofer |
| mounting type | Floor Standing | Wall Mount | Tabletop,Wall Mount,Floor Mount | Sound Bar | Floor Standing, Wall Mount |
| weight | 41.63 pounds | 23.25 pounds | 51.8 pounds | 5 pounds | 32 pounds |
| control method | remote | remote | — | voice | remote |
Reviews with images
Some differences from previous version!
This is actually my 3rd set of these speakers I have bought. One set for my wife's office, one set for a bonus room. Both of those were the v2015 sets. They then went out of stock for a LONG time and just recently came back this last month. I promptly ordered a set for my theater as I have been happy with the previous sets. More than happy really. There are some differences however...The drivers are made of a different color material, or maybe an entirely different material. The black laminate was separating from some of the speakers right out of the box. The new logo is... not great at best and because of the changed driver colors, not as pleasing with the grills off. The biggest change which kind of hosed me was the mounting screw on the 2015 version has always been a 1/4" course threaded screw. Before opening this box I went and bought the 6 I needed for use with my mounting brackets. Opening this box, they changed the screw to an M6. Sigh, another trip to the hardware store. Not really a big deal, but there are some popular mounts that have built in 1/4" threaded rods which will now no longer work with these speakers.You can see most of the differences in the versions here: [...]I mean, I'll give them time to break in, which is super important with these speakers. So far so good, the sound is as expected, just the quality of manufacture has certainly suffered. I dont' understand why Monoprice can't throw in a bag of the correct mounting screws, especially now that they are not the standard 1/4".
Top reviews from the United States
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Reviewed in the United States on January 21, 2016
Style: 5.1 ChannelSize: W/8in SubConfiguration: SingleVerified Purchase
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Style: Premium 5.1Size: W/8in SubConfiguration: SingleVerified Purchase
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Style: 5.1 ChannelSize: W/8in SubConfiguration: SingleVerified Purchase
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