Review: Monitor Audio i-deck By Dave Carter
The lowdown With Christmas virtually upon us it's safe to assume that the iPod will once again be selling like, well, iPods at Christmas. However, it's also safe to say that a helluva lot of us are already fully 'podded up so we'll be looking elsewhere to make our festive purchase. Fortunately the apple never falls too far from the tree (geddit?) so the perfect choice is an iPod accessory and we're not talking a silly little rubber case here either, we're talking about a proper bona-fide AAA speaker system. Allow me to introduce the Monitor Audio i-deck, a solution to enjoy your iPod whilst in-the-spot as opposed to on-the-go.

What's good? Monitor Audio have a fearsome reputation in the Hi-fi industry so they're not about to blow it on a below par speaker set. Sound wise, they certainly don't. Inside the massive box that the i-deck comes in you'll find the amplifier, two speakers, a number of different fittings so as all generations of the iPod can fit snugly into the dock, a connector to plug in an auxiliary device and a HUGE AC adapter. The i-deck is extremely easy to use - you simply plug your iPod directly into the dock situated on the amp of the system and voila; it's ready to use. The included remote is used to control the volume and can also skip tracks, though to change albums, playlists, genres etc. you'll actually have to use the clickwheel of the iPod itself. Nicely your iPod will also be charged as it plays music.

The most important thing for the i-deck to do is to sound good and sound good it certainly does. In fact it sounds great. We tested all kinds of music on it; rock and roll, club classics, blues, folk, soul/funk and jazz, the results were consistently impressive. The bass was warm and never fuzzy, the mids sharp and well defined and the treble crisp. Despite their relatively small size the music produced was rich, full and deeply rewarding. The quality of the speakers is such that it is advisable to encode your music in a higher bitrate than the standard 128kbps as there is quite a noticeable difference between that and, say, 256kbps.

What's bad? Despite the great sound there are a few issues that let the i-deck down. For starters the design looks far too much like a set of cheap computer speakers than a contemporary sleek companion to the style icon that is the iPod. Perhaps a case of horses for courses but certainly all of the horses (erm, people) we know didn't like the design. The lack of controls on the i-deck unit itself is somewhat of a let down as is the omission of a basic equalizer to vary the tone of the music. Granted there are multiple EQ settings on the iPod itself but it would be far more convient to have them on the i-deck unit. The model we tested also didn't support the iPod nano though this has apparently been rectified in more recently produced models.

Do you need it? The Monitor Audio i-deck is an excellent piece of kit for the iPod and is without doubt one of the very finest of the high end speaker sets available. In this context it comes thoroughly recommended as one of the best ways to enjoy your iPod at home. However, costing £250 the i-deck is certainly not cheap and if you already have a Hi-fi you could save roughly 99% of that outlay by simply buying a phono to 3.5mm cable. Nevertheless if you are planning to buy a speaker system for your iPod then the i-deck is right up there with the best in terms of sound quality but ultimately the high price and lack of features stop it from scoring higher on our scale.

Overview

Useful Links: Speakers, www.i-deck.com, Zoodex Features: Frequency response: 75Hz- 25KHz (-3dB) Speaker sensitivity: 87dB (1W@1m on axis) Maximum SPL: 102 dBA Output power: 18W/ ch @ 0.05% THD (both channels driven) Auxiliary input impedance : > 10k Ohms Auxiliary input sensitivity: 600mV Signal to noise ratio S/N: 90dB (W/ A-weight) A.C input: 110V~ / 230V~ Adaptor output: 13V~ / 3A Verdict: