I'm seriously thinking of replacing my antique powered speakers for my desktop since the power switch failed on the powered one, luckily jammed ON and I don't want to fiddle with it in case it jams OFF!
I like the looks of a "speaker bar, and one would suit our desktop / monitor arrangement on the top of a computer cart -- not using the computer slot since that puts the power switch on the PC down at floor level (old CoolerMaster case).
Amazon have this:
Connectland 17 inch 2.0 Channel USB Powered Stereo Sound Bar for Desktop, Laptop Black Wood Finish CL-SPK20149
which seems right in many ways including price and Amazon available but I've no idea how useful the 2.5W power rating would be given that my existing powered speaker says it is 115W, no that we ever use full volume.
However the speaker bar would only be about 2ft away from the PC user and with little background noise.
I haven't really looked at compact individual speakers that might be more powerful but would still fit in the space under the 23in HP 2311x monitor.
Help please!
Got the Connectland pair of speakers today from Amazon. All neatly packed in a tiny glossy box.
Unpacked them and found out how when you put them together to make a speaker bar there's a magnet inside to hold them into the bar format!
They are neat and unobtrusive and fit very nicely under the monitor, angled up slightly by the individual end brackets.
Carefully read the instruction sheet that tells you all you have to do to get them operational.
Sorted out the cables -- USB for power and 3.5mm jack correctly colored lime green for sound and liberated a USB2 socket to plug it in.
All connected up so I found a news video and ran it .... no sound
Read the instructions again, tried a different sound source and remembered all the troubleshooting instructions on the website, which boiled down to check that everything is plugged in and try a different computer. Checked and fiddled with the volume control; still no sound.
Set up the powered USB3 hub I'd also bought, connected the power bricklet to it and plugged the speaker USB cable into it ..... still no sound.
Pulled the bar apart to listen really closely to the powered unit and see if I could hear even a murmur ......
....and on the back is a black on black power slider power switch that is mentioned nowhere with the embossed ON and OFF positions black on black!
The speakers now work fine at about half volume for Dottie seated at the computer and I could follow the speech video we were using as a test even when I was just outside the room.
I've also disconnected the power brick from the USB3 hub with no ill-effect so now extra power is needed.
So all's well that ends well but you can be sure that Connectland and Amazon will hear from me ......
Thanks for all the help.
Thanks Jim -- that's reassuring.
I've now ordered this Connectland combinable pair .... plus a bunch of other stuff of course, like a SIIG 2 port USB3 PCI card since I've only USB2 on my desktop and I'm short of them and a simple powered 4 port USB3 hub to go with it.
I should have ordered an external USB3 hard drive to back up to but ...... later since I've space on a new internal SATA drive that does not carry the active OS which recently went onto a SSD.
My Asus monitor has 2 1-watt built in speakers and is plenty loud at 1/3 volume and full will blast me out of the room.
Jim 
Here's some more background to the above:
I would like to get something on order this weekend ..... oh and they would really only be used for speech like live webcams or videos on news pages.
I found this in an article when I googled to see what I might find on how much wattage do I need?
How Do Watts Translate Into Decibels?
Watts Decibels
2 93
4 96
8 99
[ .... ]
I remember from olden times that 3dB doubles or halves the power as one can see.
and elsewhere
To give an idea of what these levels sound like, take these numbers into consideration:
- 10 dB: normal human breathing
- 60 dB: normal human conversation
- 110 dB: power saw, car horn, shouting in ear
which would indicate that even 2 watts is well above normal speaking loudness ....
TIA
