[quote zachdog]No. The hifi is all marketing hype and not worth half the cost.
The HiFi has been well reviewed and the opinions are very positive:
" Hi-Fi does sound, well, like a high-fidelity unit. The sound can fill a room or even overfill it, if you crank up the volume sufficiently. It is rich, the bass is deep and the treble trills quite nicely"
http://washingtontimes.com/technology/20...-6260r.htm
"I did, however, compare the iPod Hi-Fi with a Bose SoundDock music system ($299), which delivered what I considered until now the best sound of any of the iPod-centric, semi-portable speaker docks on the market. Apple's iPod Hi-Fi is worth the extra $50, no question. It richly fills the gap between earbuds and high-end stereo systems."
http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/f.../index.htm
" On all tracks, the bass was tight and punchy with virtually no muddiness. Mids are prominent but not overwhelming, and highs are very crisp. Detail and articulation are very good, and the stereo imaging is impressive...The Hi-Fi definitely deserves its name...
"I cranked up the volume a few notches below maximum and I could feel the wind coming out of the two bass ports from several feet away—not to mention the remarkably low-distortion aural assault on my ears. In fact, since it had no problem filling up our 20-by-20-foot audio lab with clear, crisp sound, I took it into one of our carpeted "Town Center" meeting rooms, which can seat a couple hundred people and has acoustical tile on the walls and ceiling. I put Stevie Wonder's Sir Duke on, cranked the volume all the way, and realized that this thing is capable of powering a serious party in just about any size room without appreciable distortion...
"I wholeheartedly recommend this speaker if you're looking for an extremely powerful single-cabinet speaker that's portable (runs on batteries as well as AC), because this is about as good as it gets."
http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1895,1933838,00.asp
" it has a rich, warm sound that doesn't grate or offend like many lesser iPod speakers. The second is that despite its relatively small size, the Hi-Fi has actual bass....the Hi-Fi can play loud. Incredibly loud, in fact, given the size of the system. Apple's Borchers told me that when running off AC power, the Hi-Fi is capable of 108dB SPL (measured from 1 metre away) without distorting; off battery, the level is 102dB: still very loud. I was able to turn the Hi-Fi up to levels that were too loud to listen to comfortably (or safely) and the system didn't even flinch. Put these things together and you get a system that easily fills even larger rooms with surprising sound levels -- and sounds good doing it...
"...the iPod Hi-Fi is good enough that it can reveal the differences between good and bad recordings, and between low-bit-rate and higher-quality music files"
http://playlistmag.com/reviews/2006/03/i.../index.php
"make no mistake: This device produces glorious sound"
http://www.northjersey.com/page.php?qstr...FlZUVFeXk3
"And volume there is plenty of -- more than enough to fill an entire party room with rich, non-distorted, ear-thumping, foot-tapping quality stereo music"
http://macmikenews.com/apple/apples-hi-f...s-my-world
Not bad for speakers that can be battery-powered...
BTW, the iPod Hi-Fi can accept a signal from any source (not just an iPod) via analog line-level signal or S/PDIF digital optical audio connection.
