People used to get some crappy generic speakers for their computers (or with their computers), mostly because good computer audio was not a common need.
These were not even marketed as "computer speakers" but rather as portable speakers, speakers for walkmans/discmans etc, that's why they were not popular for computer usage. They are far superior to common computer speakers of the time and descent speakers in general for their size and price.

Yes but lots of retro enthusiasts drool over the Roland micro monitors. I can't imagine they are that much better than these to justify the premium on the used marketplace especially for the average user.

sydres wrote on 2024-09-18, 23:58:

Yes but lots of retro enthusiasts drool over the Roland micro monitors. I can't imagine they are that much better than these to justify the premium on the used marketplace especially for the average user.

Comparatively to what the "usual " computer speakers of the day were they are supposed to be pretty good. The iconic looks are what is important here.

One of my first purchases after getting my own pc was getting rid of the awful Packard Bell speakers and replacing them with a set of altec Lansing 2.1. definitely an upgrade but still not high end. But being a poor high school student who wrote his own music they certainly made a difference. I fully understand the iconic look thing, I also understand the nostalgia of low fidelity vintage PC speakers.