While the Apple system is pitched at the high end where audio quality is king and price is less of an object, this Altec Lansing IM5 is very much aimed at the mid ground, not cheap and nasty but a good sound at a good price. The IM5 is also a travel speaker system unlike the Apple offering which would give you a hernia if you tried to carry it too far, so we'll have to be careful to measure the Altec system against its peers in this review.

Slide the IM5 speaker system from its packaging and you are confronted by a familiar grill and colour scheme which matches the other speakers in the range, at first glance there is no dock for the iPod, but press the silver button and a spring loaded mechanism makes the iPod dock appear. A little strange to tuck the grill away but it felt reasonably secure and the overall build quality on the inMotion IM5 is good and should stand a few knocks.

The IM5 is a fairly simple device it has just a few buttons located on the units upper edge, these control power and volume, they are backlit in a pale blue when the unit is on making is easy enough to drive in the dark / semi dark. It accepts all iPod's that have base docking connectors, so this sees all models from the iPod Nano upwards being supported, sadly there is no remote control but then with a travel system its not strictly necessary.

Measuring 213mm x 96mm x 54mm it's not the smallest travel unit and that raised our hopes of a big sound, but on paper the 4 x 1.1 inch drivers giving a combined 4 watt RMS output isn't exactly nightclub standard more Jacobs club!  Slide your iPod into the dock and you can then power and sync your Mp3 player using a port on the rear of the IM5 which can use the standard iPod cable to connect to a PC, if you do not have a PC then the iPod will run from its internal battery. A worrying note is that if you power down the IM5 the iPod sat in the dock remains powered and so its very easy to flatten your iPod without realising what you have done.

So with our 4G iPod sat in place and some Dido ready to play its crunch time for the Altec Lansing IM5. First up it sounded pretty good, as expected its no room filler and you need to be no more than about 6 feet away to really hear the output well. There is bass although not buckets of it and up to moderate volume levels the Im5 performs well with a clear sound and a hint of bass that will satisfy most iPod users. However a switch of genre to Moby and an increase of the volume level to 50% saw the arrival of a resonating case which was now all over the bassline and made for some quite uncomfortable listening. We were unable to get the unit over 75% volume and still be able to listen without cringing.

It's no real surprise that a portable system at the mid price point lacks the bass reproduction of the iPod HiFi or the Bose SoundDock, but the shock was that below half volume the bass distorts. Clearly the MaxxBass trademark technology from Altec Lansing does little to help the 4 small drivers produce a quality warm bassline without shaking the case to bits.

It is almost as if Altec Lansing knew this to be a problem in that they have already made a subwoofer which can be added to the Inmotion IM5, the BB2001 provides another helping of bass from its front facing 4" driver.

The audio performance was a real shame as its design really does work as a portable system, power can be provided via the supplied mains adaptor or via 4 x AA batteries, we managed to get some 20 hours from a full set which is pretty good going. Plus the whole thing folds up nicely into the provided pouch and even the slightly weighty 570 grams didn't put us off moving it about.

For those with the latest Video iPod's the IM5 comes equipped with a video out so you can watch those downloaded music videos on a TV or even a slideshow you have prepared and there is even an aux input should you want to use something other than an iPod or one of the shuffle models without a dock.

All this for £99, not bad but all the toys in the world can't get us past the fact that it distorts like a Dalek on heat if you push the volume over 50%, so we would suggest that you do not go for the IM5 if you like bass rich music. The Logic3 iStation still provides better bass handling at a much lower price 19 months after we first reviewed it!

Plus if you really want the best sound then Altec Lansing can provide it with the all singing IM7

Published - 09/04/2006

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