Love the tri-laminate tweeters and rosewood color

Plastic trim on front of speakers

These speakers are a great value on the used market. To get the best sound, you have to utilize upgraded speaker wires (or Romex solid copper electrical wire), and pay attention to how they are located in the room. Without proper positioning and good wires, they will just sound average. With good wires, you will hear amazing detail, decent imaging and a good soundstage. Again, this is all about value at this point. These are twenty year old speakers, and for $50 - $200 bucks, you cant necessarily expect them to sound like some of the modern high-end audiophile gear.

I bought these new for $600 a pair . As planned I always used these with a big sub , I could have bought something smaller and put them on a stand to get the correct heigth but stands look dumb plus my kids would pull them over , plus these handle TONS of power , I use a electronic crossover and roll these in whre my sub ends (80 hz) .
These sound incredable that tri-lam tweeter is smooth but defined the mids are great the speaker does a great job from 100 hz and up , they are well built very solid , even people that dont care about audio are very impressed by the clean warm sound .
I now use them in a small room w/out a sub for movies they sound great I always wonder if I should have bought the next model .
Only complaint was the plastic frame around the grill came loose but when the grill is on its vibration free the labels fell off at the time of purchase I needed magnetic sheilded speakers and these were not but at polk the parts to fix all was $20 total w/free shipping .

These speaker produce very good highs and mids.

It can reproduce pretty low frequencies, but it is not clean bass.

System:
Harmon Kardon AVR25 mkII
Polk CS250s Center
Polk LS50 Fronts
Polk RT5 rears

These are very good speakers for general music reproduction. They are the smallest of the LS line, I believe(LS50, LS70, LS90). They were really good for the time, although you could get something better for the money now. If you can picked them up for a couple of hundred bucks used, that'd be a great deal. I often see the LS70s for very reasonable prices and I wouldn't hesitate to snatch those up if I didn't already have these speakers. I plan to get a nice sub to compliment them in home theater applications.

The main drawback of these speakers is the lack of bass power and relative inefficiency. Couple them with a great subwoofer and a nice receiver and your good to go.

Similar Products Used:

Infinity, Boston Acoustics

Capable of decent SPLs.

Just about everything else.

When I first purchased these, I was mighty happy. They were a big step up from the smaller Polk S series I had been using. I was also just out of high school and just entering into home audio and video. After a few more months of use, I was less and less happy with them with every use.

This is just not a good speaker. My wife also had a pair of them, before we were married, and sold them.

They do not image, do not reproduce inner detail, and are just plain bland. They aren't the worst I have heard, but certainly weren't worth their list price, or even the $600 I paid for them on close out. I also couldn't hear any difference between the drivers in these, Polks "upgraded" drivers, and their cheaper ones.

My biggest disappointment with them came after the first time I heard Paradigm stuff. That was when I really decided to dump them. I sold them to a friend who uses them with a Yamaha DSP-A1, set to small, and they sound much better now that they are being used as a mini-monitor. But why buy a good sized floor stander to use it as a mini-monitor?

If you see these on the used market, avoid them. Even Polks newer models, which I'm not overly impressed with, sound much much better than these ever will. I recommend looking north of the border at some Paradigm monitor series, or the new PSB Image series. Both will give much better sound at the same or lower prices. You will also be able to deal with much better stores.

Similar Products Used:

Paradigm Studio 20, older NHT mini tower, old Polk S4 and S6.

Very clean sound from these "little guys".

The biggest draw back..the bass is somewhat "soft".

The LS50's look good..sounds good..hold up well..and perform better than most speakers in this price range...
I have owned these LS50's for over 5 years...they have performed very well..no problems what-so-ever. The biggest plus I have found..very clean highs and midrange..I am
running them with a Denon PMA 860 int/amp...they sound crisp and clean!

I listen to Janis/Jimi/Rolling Stones but I also listen to a lot of Cajun music and a ton of Cuban suff..it all come through very clean!

So..they look good...they sound good...and they won't break your pocket book...its a real deal.

Similar Products Used:

Electrovoice series B...very nice speaker
JBL......very tin sounding
Pioneer...very flat sound

Dynamics, Detail

Tonal accuracy

Although I haven't owned a pair of LS-50s I have had the chance to listen to a friend's extensively. Here are my thoughts. These Polks are good at detail, dynamics, and,when properly set up, they soundstage reasonably well. They only major problem I noticed was the fact that they sounded as if you were listening to speakers with a big paper towel roll attached to them. They had the same tonal character as someone speaking through that type of paper roll. I didn't really mind it too much but it was immediately noticeable. Some people actually prefer a slightly boxy sound. To each his own, I say. It really comes down to what you happen to be looking for:
Natural tonal accuracy? Expansive airy soundstage? Look elsewhere.
If, on the other hand you listen to a lot of Rock and Roll, these may just be your ticket, because they can Rock your world! They are very entertaining for that type of music.

Great detail and accuracy. Good tonal qualities.

Bass is a little weak and the inability to handle real high power output.

I purchased these speakers in 1993. I have been greatly pleased by them ever since. They have a wonderful tone producing great accuracy when it comes to voices,
strings, and any of the lighter sounds. They are also very accurate in reproducing those sounds. If they have a weak point it is the inability to handle really strong bass output.
You can still shake the house if you wish but the music can tend to get fuzzy at the outer edges. However they aren't in production anymore so you can probably get them
very inexpensively now and they are certainly worth the money.
I have listened to some more modern speakers recently. The best I have listened to were Paradigm Monito 9s and B&W DM 605 Series 2. While the B&W speakers were more accurate,
I didn't like their tonal quality and the Paradigms just didn't compare.
I reccomend you listen to them and purchase them if you can.

a little bright, but i think that is the center channel. Cs-100

I got these for $250 on Ebay and that includes the center channel. Out of the box they sound great, I have not had a chance to play with the position ot the hookup. So far so good. Compared to anything in the price thes are great, they are smooth and tight, but seem to be lacking on the low end, but my powered sub fills the void. They bring DVDs to life. I am very happy, they blow away the 301s and the SF-1s.

Similar Products Used:

Klipsch Sf-1, bose 301, JBL.

This is an amazingly well-balanced loudspeaker. I will never buy another pairof loudspeakers-ever. It has a magical sound. You will lose yourself in
detail and imaging. As most floorstanding speakers are, they are even better
with a quality Polk subwoofer.