Do you hear that? – A Logitech Z906 Sound System Review

Here we go again with another sound system review, but as with every review there’s something special about this one.

Movie theaters in recent years have begun to see a dip in visitors, mainly due to the fact that on demand and quality paid TV shows are becoming mainstream.

With a click of a button on nearly any smart device, you can have a movie ready to go right in your own living room with the comfort of your own couch. Then when the movie’s all over, you are already home.

So why go to the movie theaters any more you may ask. Well there is something about movie theater popcorn, a large projector, and superior sound that can really engage you into the movie.

While 4K TVs and TVs ranging at 80 inches are still out of most people’s spending limits, getting premium sound isn’t something that only the theaters have.

From sound bars to headsets, sound systems have dramatically decreased in prices lately, to a point where many consumers can now afford quality systems. This is exactly what we are about to experience here.

Well known in the desktop sound industry, Logitech is a staple for sound systems designed for PC users. For both business and home users, Logitech is a go-to company when looking for speakers. Previously, customers were limited to small, yet powerful, desktop speakers. While this worked out great only sitting two feet away from them, they weren’t that powerful for a living room or office.

Cue the Logitech Z906, a sound system that is designed and made for loud movie theater surround sound. With large THX built speaker drivers and containing Dolby Digital or DTS decoding, is the Logitech Z906 the best sounding home theater speaker system out there?

Welcome to my review of the Logitech Z906 Sound System. Throughout this in-depth review, I will be discussing the following topics about the unit: the installation, design, functionality, and my final thoughts. A huge thank you to Logitech for providing me with this product.

Installation

The Logitech Z906 system is shipped in quite a large shipping box. With the 10+ pound box arriving at my location shortly after being shipped, I was excited to get this unit all configured and setup.

Before installation, I had to, of course, choose a location for my new sound system. At first, I considered placing the unit on my desk which in return would provide me with quite literally the ultimate desk sound system.

After diving into the product box I quickly discovered that this is much more than just a desk speaker system. Logitech advertises this product being used in a home theater system and I’d have to agree with them.

In my fairly large home office, I chose this room to be the new home for my speaker system. Previously, the sound system in my office was an older unit that contained full room surround, but the speakers were placed on the ground. The rear facing sound wasn’t very noticeable or present during some games.

This time around, I wanted to add some class and style, especially since the design of this product is superb. My thought of this setup was to wall mount the speakers and run premium audio cable for a perfect sound system.

The Z906 speakers come with the ability to be wall mounted using a single bolt. Unfortunately, Logitech fails to offer any wall mounting solution, both in the box and on their website. Fortunately, I found a great guide at License to Quill that worked out the troubling details.

As pointed out in the guide, the author bought some third-party TechSol Essential TSS1-W (I bought mine in black) speaker mounts that have turn and pivot maneuvers. Then the author of the article goes on to say he needed ten ¼-20 x ½ inch bolts. After picking up my mounting tools, plus some Amazon 200 feet 16-gauge speaker wire I was ready for installation.

Installation time for the entire endeavor took a little over two hours. As shown in the photos of this review, I mounted the rear speakers about six feet up in the air. Then with my custom mounts, I pivoted them down and towards the center of the room just slightly.

The front facing speakers were placed about five and a half feet up which is perfectly level with the TV. These two front facing speakers are kept at the mount’s default position. Also in the front are the center speaker and subwoofer. For the front-center speaker, this was placed in the top most cubby hole of the credenza.Then for the subwoofer, I placed this on the right so that the large bass speaker was pointing away from the credenza.

For aesthetic appearances, I added in the plastic sticky wall cable concealers that hide any speaker wire.

The final part of the installation is getting your equipment connected to the sub-woofer. This entire system is controlled using a Logitech control pod which allows you to change inputs, volume, and control what speaker is being used. However, the inputs for your devices are connected to the subwoofer and not connected to the control pod.

Design

Aesthetically, Logitech did an excellent job. Logitech knows that they aren’t Bose or Harman Kardon, and they don’t try to show off as if they are.

Out of the four main speakers, excluding the center, they all follow the same design. This makes the speakers universal, meaning they can be placed in any location and are not designated as a left/right front/back model.

The speakers are matte black housed in a plastic shell that uses a metal speaker grill to keep objects out of the driver. To showcase a more industrial design, the speaker’s screws holding it together are exposed on the front faces. Most people overlook them, but they at least take away from the otherwise blank face.

For the center speaker, it follows the same design as the others, but instead is rotated 90 degrees as it’s ideal position is sitting flat as shown in the photos.

While these speakers are Logitech branded, they are actually made by THX. Embossed onto the front is the THX logo which I find gives a premium appearance to the speaker. Most people are familiar with THX movie sound systems and this system brings that to your home.

As I mentioned earlier, inputs are connected to the subwoofer. Connectivity is via the expected standard inputs including two digital optical inputs, one digital coaxial, RCA, and 3.5mm. As with your devices, the Logitech speakers also connect to the subwoofer.

Next, there is the Logitech control pod. This control pod uses orange LEDs, a pleasant touch over the typical red LEDs that most other companies use. In the center is the large, smooth rotating, volume wheel that uses single orange LEDs to symbolize volume power.

To the far left are your input controls as well as the presets indicator. Then on the far right is the speaker configuration setup and the IR receiver for the included remote. Speaking of which, the remote included in this product is almost seen as a joke. While I understand that a remote for a speaker system can’t be too invigorating, it doesn’t have to be boring either. You get basic controls as with the control pod, but it feels cheap and is a little disappointing for a product that costs this much. Luckily, being a Logitech product it quickly paired to my Harmony remote.

Functionality

Before getting into the testing and sound reproduction of the Z906, we first need to cover two of the system’s main selling points.

As I mentioned earlier, these speakers are THX branded units which ensure you are getting well-crafted and great sounding drivers, but that’s not all. Logitech also includes two different decoders for convenience. You can choose between Dolby Digital or DTS decoding.

Normally we see Dolby Digital or DTS, but never before have I seen both at the same time. This offers a wide range of compatibility with your devices as these are the two major decoder brands in the music industry. If that didn’t sound cool enough already, the Logitech control pod can even detect which is best for your device, ensuring that you get the best sounds, always.

Moving on to the second major point, we have the Z906’s total wattage. This system can blast 500 watts through its speakers. Mind you the subwoofer does take up 165 watts of that and each speaker is only 67 watts, but there is a serious sound wave being blasted around the room. I ran my standard speaker test with the Z906 only after playing low volume music through the unit for at least three hours.

My first experience with the Z906 was through the 3.5mm jack connected to my Samsung Galaxy Note 4. I played a mixture of high bit rate audio and YouTube sound tracks to see if I could tell any differences.

I noticed quickly on the control pod that it adjusted the speaker format to Dolby Digital and was blasting sound through all of the speakers, as expected. The sound filled the room and sounded about the same, no matter what I played through my phone. As I regularly listen to rock and roll, it’s what I decided to test with yet again. My AC/DC and Ozzy soundtracks were outstanding and having the 5.1 surround sound really helped focus the vocals up front, with the guitars and drums in the rear. It was like being at the concert.

Next, I moved onto my Xbox One which was connected through an optical cable. Straightaway I encountered a problem with the Dolby Digital and DTS decoders. No matter what I set my Xbox to within the settings menu, the Logitech Control Pod did not auto detect which decoder I wanted to use. Regardless, I moved on and continued to use the sound system anyway, especially since sound was being pushed through all of the speakers. Do note that apps on the Xbox, like YouTube, were not pushing full surround, but this is an Xbox software issue.

I choose to test the Z906 in a game that would utilize all of these speakers and what better than Forza 6 where engine noise, tire squeal, and cars battling it out are coming at you from every different direction. As with most things in this review, I was impressed. It was a new and exciting experience that actually helped while gaming. You could hear cars next to you, hear the tires driving on the grass, a pick up on faint details from the rear.

The new Halo Wars 2 demo was also exciting to play. I could hear the drop ships fly in behind me and then land with the sound moving from one part of the room to another. It was as if I was in a virtual reality environment, standing right in the middle of the game.

Of course with THX speakers and two decoders, lows, mids, and highs were all within my acceptable range of listening and I had no complaints about them.

My Final Thoughts

While I deeply enjoyed all of this rock and roll music and race car simulation sounds, it comes at a hefty price. Priced at $399.99 ($345.98 on Amazon) (Two-year warranty), this is a serious investment for most people.

To answer my opening question of this review, I think this system makes an outstanding home theater surround sound system. Although you may be able to do slightly better, like a 7.1 setup, chances are you’ll be paying a lot more, for very little gain.

I enjoyed the Logitech Z906 to the point where I can readily recommend it to anybody who wants a serious, well-designed, living room or office speaker system. Having little fault and utilizing some of the best in sound manufacturing like the THX speakers and Dolby digital or DTS decoding it’s a speaker system that is hard to beat, even if it does cost a little more than a sound bar.

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