Customer Reviews:
 Mediocre sound and DRAINS iPod battery November 11, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
My wife and I purchased one of these units to replace an old sound system. We figured that, with the iPod dock, we could put all our CDs on the iPod and then have access to all of them without swapping discs all the time. The sound was ok - nothing great, but probably commensurate with the price. As the previous reviewer noted, the touch pad on the front of the device is hit-or-miss - using the remote is much easier. The big problem, however, is that when placed in standby mode, not only does the iPod fail to charge but its battery is actively *drained* because the screen keeps coming on every minute or so while it is docked. When I talked to LG they (eventually) responded that this was the designed behavior for the unit. Apparently the statement on the front of the box saying you can dock and charge your iPod does not apply to standby mode. The result is that you need to remember to undock your iPod *every* time you stop listening or the battery gets completely drained within hours.
 Probably the best compact stereo for the money September 21, 2008
3 out of 3 found this review helpful
I was on a mission: find a modest, space-conscious stereo system for my living room that included an iPod port, AM/FM radio, and CD player, could be wired through a subwoofer, and be relatively cheap without looking, feeling, or sounding cheap.br /br /Onkyo has a decent compact shelf system that starts at $300, but that was a little pricey for me, particularly when it doesn't even include an iPod port, much less iPod remote control. Other makers like Sony, Philips, and JVC have similar setups, tailored for iPods, for $100 or less, but everything I found in my browsing was either ugly, shoddy-seeming, seriously underpowered, or all of the above.br /br /Enter this system from LG, the Korean electronics maker formerly known as Goldstar. Like all current LG products it has a sleek, stylish, distinctive look. The two remote speakers are reassuringly heavy and rather futuristic-looking (the recessed disks on the front, contrary to appearance, are not some strange new type of woofer, but only decoration; the actual woofers are hidden behind grilles on the outer sides, hence the "3-way" speakers). The remote is compact but has the range of any standard stereo remote (the drawback of the tiny remotes that usually come with iPod products is that you have to get right up next to the unit for the signal to reach). The sound, for a relatively inexpensive bookshelf system, is really impressive (in part thanks to the exposed tweeters). I wired the speakers through a Polk PSW10 100-watt subwoofer (currently available for 50% off from Amazon, incidentally), and the combination sounds as spectacular as anything I could have hoped for.br /br /As much as I like it, there are a few minor drawbacks. The main control panel, the "eclipse lighting touch," is theoretically an upgrade on the famous iPod clickwheel but seems to have only gotten halfway through development: it's never consistent with how or even if it will respond to touch--so don't lose the remote because it's the only real way you can interact with the stereo. Your iPod will lose its place when you plug it in and/or turn the unit off and on, which can get annoying if you're in the middle of a big playlist. If you input commands directly into the iPod while it's plugged it, it will often stop responding to the remote until you unplug and then replug it back in (and you'll probably want to use the clickwheel for scrolling through a large playlist, as scrolling via the remote is slower than molasses). And if you leave the iPod plugged in while the stereo is off, for some reason the backlight will continually activate, which will eventually drain the iPod's battery.br /br /But these problems are small, and overall I highly recommend this as a compact stereo with great sound.
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