I bought my son a "lifestyle" Sony speaker similar to these things on this post this past Christmas for his dorm room. As compared to what I had when I was a kid his age in the 1980's, these little speaker "pills" are incredible. While nowhere near our audiophile standards, my son's Sony is loud and reasonably accurate in audio reproduction for a $250 toy speaker.
He had a $150 Altec Lansing speaker that was stolen prior to the Sony that I gifted him. That $150 Altec simply cranked and had a ton of bass for what it was. I'm pretty skeptical on these cheap toys, but these aren't bad if you need portable audio that is not for critical listening.