Compared this puppy with Bose at Fry's Electronics. No doubt, it puts Bose's speakers to shame. Sure, Bose's three way speakers got power, but the bass is overkill for the ear; it makes the music sound muffled. Infinity's SM185 is clear, no noise, and at the price of $300 a pair, I had to get this deal. Hands down.

clarity, dynamic range,

may need sub woofer for low bass

After listening to the sm-85's I thought they were an assult on the ears, very hard sounding. Now I have the sm-185's and what a improvement, now the highs are extended and crisp yet easy to listen to I love these speakers and they will be my new main speakers replaceing my 14 year old Polks.

Similar Products Used:

JBL studio series, Polk monitor 5b, cerwin Vega

Clarity, good range

I bought these as rear surrounds from harmanaudiooutlet.com for $160.00 after returning a pair of Polk RS-1 speakers (the Polks sounded flat, tinny and my wife hated the look of them).

I was so impressed with the range of the Infinity speakers that I use them as a second pair of main stereo speakers, pairing with a older set of JBL 2600 bookshelfs (they are clearly better than the JBLs, but they mate nicely). Highly recommended, especially for the price.

Exquisite Detail, Clean Bass

None

I had listned to the RS 2000.3 from Infinity; however they were missing some bass. After reading the reviews here I thought I would try to snag a pair at eBay. For $134 US dollars they were a steal. The construction is excellent, it is a very solid feeling speaker. The 8" woofers provide clean bass. The grills are a little chincy; but I paid for the bright infinity sound courtesy of the fastglass tweeter. They fit will in my home theatre. I am running them with the JVC 888VBK DTS recvr with 120 watts per ch, have the Infinity CC1 center channer and plan to purchase the David DBox 300 watt sub (this sub has great reviews on this site) and will finish the rear sound off with Infinity Quadrapole speakers. These speakers are get 5 stars for quality, value, and most importantly SOUND.

Similar Products Used:

Bose 201 Series IV, older Infinity speaker

Strong Highs

Bass Booms a bit if placed on floor or unconventional stands

Bought these speakers for UBID at a pretty good price. I'm a student, so I was looking for something that would give me bang for my buck....these definitely do the trick.

Great highs, good lows, and a very solid midrange.
I have diverse music tastes, and these speakers have been able to handle them all with flying colors.

Using them along with harmon kardon AVR20 II...
good combo

Similar Products Used:

lots of infinity!

makes a great surround speaker.

Slightly to large, for the speakers enclosed.

I was really impressed when I first pluged in the SM 185's, and I still am. They make a wonderful surround speaker for a home A/V system. Also, they are great for front speakers when you have only a small room to work with. Over all I really like the system. For a 2 way system, it is designed very well.

I read some positive reviews before i bought these speakers. So i went to the store to have a listen and at first they really sounded good. Very bright and louder than some other speakers i have listened in the store. They were really screaming for attention and since i like to listen to mainly rock music, they were the speakers for me.
At the time i didnt quite realise the mistake i have made. I only listened for about half an hour at the store but at home i sometimes listen for a couple of hours every day. And after a week or so i really got bored with these speakers and they became annoying. The speakers sound very harsh and sharp especially in the midrange area. The sensitivity of the speakers is 98dB/m and this only makes the whole problem worse. If i turn the volume way up...its like a boeing 747 taking off.
Since lot of people are talking of burn-in time i kept the speakers for a couple of months, but this didnt help. And since i dont want to get deaf i decided to sell these speakers.
My main advice to all is not to buy Infinity speakers no matter how expensive they are. I had the chance to listen to the Infinity Overture Series and even these sound as harsh and sharp as the SM-185. Only difference is that the Overture Series produce a bit more detail and accuracy in their sound.
So it is more important to listen to the quality of the speakers even if they dont produce as much sound like some other speakers do. Because these type of speakers only try to mask their weaknesses with lots of soundstage and noise.
Be ware...only buy these kind of speakers if u have some kind of party outdoors...not for indoor listening.

great trebble. after some positioning the bass is great too.

speaker hight changes the sound drastically.

I got these speakers 3 months ago, for 209$. at the store they were on floor stands, and the first thing I noticed was the complete lack of bass. treble was great, but there wasn't any bass!
we asked the store-d00d to turn up the bass. that seemed to make the difference, and they sounded extremely smooth.
after taking them home, I hooked them up to my pioneer VSX-D509S, and once again heard no bass (even at the highest setting).
later on I had wall-mounted stands made for 'em, and hung them above ear hight at the corners of the room.
the diffrence was amazing.
I actually had to lower the bass. that however caused a problem.
in songs with well defined bass (a great example would be Cypress Hill - cock the hammer) the bass overshadows almost everything else...
still, lowering the bass level usually does it.
overall they're great speakers (especially for 2 ways).
I have no idea what the dood means about their "harsh sound".
I usually listen for several hours, at a time, and have never noticed anything like that.
I'd highly recommend them to budget-tight people (like myself).

Similar Products Used:

non owned. I thought of JBL S38s which were out of my budget, and didn't sound better...

Solid, Loud

Weak midrange, high treble when turned up. Bass could be deeper

I drove these with a 100Wx2 Technics something or other - I can't remember. The crappy receiver may have had as much to do with the sound problems as the speakers themselves.

These speakers are all right for the price. I owned them for 4 years. These days you can do much better for the price. If I had to do it all over again, I would have chosen bookshelf speakers with better detail and less clunk.

In fact I am doing it all over again. I'm going with some PSB Image 2B bookshelves at the moment, retailing for $400. I live in a small apartment now and my Infinitys were way too loud for my room when I had them high school. So I don't need big speakers, just good ones. PSB is what the dudes recommended on the audiophile newsgroups. I'll post my review in about a week when I get them.