Cheap $88 Sony SS-CS5 Speakers - Awesome

Amazon had these on sale for $88 earlier today and I jumped on a pair. I needed a pair of stand mount speakers to use with the Audio Refinement Complete Integrated Amp in my office. Source will be the excellent sounding Raspberry Pi based streamer I recently built up.

So, the Sony speakers I purchased from Amazon on 12/14 have still not arrived and they are showing "possibly lost" in the tracking system. If they don't arrive soon, I've got a line of a couple of really nice used speakers on Craigslist. The Craigslist speakers are more expensive, but they are classic older speakers that I'm sure are much better than these cheap Sonys.

Amazon shipped my Sony's on 12/14 and they were promptly lost by the carrier. Yesterday I requested a replacement order and they are in transit for delivery tomorrow. Should be fun to see what $88 sale speakers sound like. They will be replacing a pair of $39 Radio Shack Presidian speakers that I bought on closeout after reading a similar internet thread years ago. This is for a toy/experimental system in my office.

Mine arrived this evening and I have them up and playing now. Too early for any analysis, other than to say they look WAY better than the $88 sale price would indicate...

I've had the cheap $88 Sonys playing for a few hours this morning. Really, very impressive for the money spent. Listening to Radio Paradise and Spotify via my $100 Raspberry Pi/HiFi Berry DAC, Audio Refinement Complete Integrated amp and the Sony speakers. No, it is not as good as my main rig, and it shouldn't be considering the cost disparity. However, it is enjoyable, especially for background music and music discovery via web-radio and Spotify.

So, when they are on sale for $88 on Amazon, pick up a pair if you have a need/use for them. At the current $168 Amazon price, I would pass and just find a pair of good $200-ish dollar used speakers. You can find a pair of used speakers for $200 that would be a significant upgrade from these Sonys IMHO.

@213runnin  - I agree they are good (and getting better as the break-in longer). My point was for $200-ish you can get some great used speakers. For instance, I've purchased a pair of vintage Infinity Qb speakers for under $200 and there is no comparison. I've also recently seen a pair of used Energy Connoisseur c-4 on a nearby Craigslist for $200. Those speakers are from a completely different planet than the Sonys.

Now, if one needs NEW speakers, and their budget tops out at $170, the Sonys would be on the list, for sure. And they are way more compact than either of the speakers I mentioned, so they will work in locations where the others simply will not fit.

Happy listening...

I'm listening to the cheap Sony speakers today in my office system. The system currently consist of a RPI based music streamer, Audio Refinement Complete integrated amp and the Sony SS-CS5 Speakers. In this system, the cheap Sony speakers sound really very good.

At the moment, I'm streaming the latest album from Daniel Lanois - "Heavy Sun" and it sounds very good.

Great speakers for anyone who has a budget of less than $100 (when on-sale).

@mesch  - Agreed that the Audio Refinement Complete is a pretty solid little amp. Hard for me to disagree with your philosophy as that's exactly what I'm doing right now. The very inexpensive Sony speakers sound pretty darn good driven by this good quality integrated amp and playing streaming audio. Ultimately I will likely buy a "step-up" pair of bookshelf speakers for the office. But for now, the cheap Sony's are meeting my needs for background music and streaming music discovery.

@b_limo  - Thanks for your reply. Just went out to the GR Research site and the upgrade for these speakers is now $345. So, not a chance I'm going to invest that much into an upgrade for these. I could easily buy a much better speaker for that money. For instance, I could buy a pair of Spica TC-50 for less.

For now, they sound good enough for the current use case. If I ever decide to step up my office system, I'll probably buy a pair of small-ish floor standers.