toshar
New to this forum
A thread for some information and pictures of Logitech Z-5500 5.1 Audio System.
How It Started - One fine day in the month of June, I was randomly surfing internet when I found an interested thread on sell & buy section on x forum. The guy was selling many electronic items from his storage both working and non working for very cheap price pointing Covid Time Clean Up and had mentioned non functional Logitech Z5500 speakers for just rupees 500.
The Story Behind - Back in 2007, I saw this Audio System for the first time in Cost to Cost, neheru place shop playing Chand Sifarish song - very load and clear, full of tabla hollow bass and I liked it very much. Dad asked me to imagine this in our living room. Costing 19.9k, I denied to have it saying its overkill for our place and for our new 26" LCD TV and we bought the other very best Altec Lansing MX5021 THX 100RMS 2.1 system for 6.5K that we actually liked. Its 25w RMS x 2 satellite was more then enough loud whereas 6" Ported Sub was tight and not boomy. But it lasted for 7 months and got malfunctioned at high volumes. Upon complaining I was asked to pick any other speaker. I thought to pick bigger and louder Z-5500 but it was still overkill for us with its price and performance so the shopkeeper suggested me to have Edifier DA5000 Pro 5.1 and I bought it paying 2K more thinking a 5.1 would sound better. But it didn't. DA5000 is way better in build quality weighing over 23 Kgs but always felt under-powered while required equalizer to output desires sound. Well, Its still performing good and currently using it as primary home theater. TV optical > converter > Edifier DA5000.
With the time, Z5500 vanished from the market and got replaced by smaller Logitech Z906 which was never liked by majority of people as it felt inferior to Z5500 which I never bought.
Execution - Enough thoughts of past with speakers, I was really thinking about picking it up and getting it restored to its full glory. I contacted the guy on the forum and asked him to give more photos and explanation about the speakers which he did and invited me to pickup the 15 year old unit directly from his place away at 30kms from my place. The Audio system I found in person was not in worst condition (considering its age) to be honest and includes all the components that came with it in its retail package - A good thing. All the items were loose and thrown away as it is in dickey which took all the place, The 10" Active Sub was as big as my car's 12" Sealed Sub.
Repairs/Restore - While driving back to home, I was making plans in mind that I will analyse the system first carefully picking up defects and not rushing things up. Meanwhile I bought couple of Booze bottles considering June summers from an empty crowd shop - a rare sight in lockdown.
Without tampering the System or any of its component, I looked for it on internet for complete information. There were many repair videos for this particular audio system on youtube so I was assured that I will repair it anyhow. Comparing it to new package, I have got all the components except user manual and documents.
On paper Specifications were interesting - Has 5 satellites speakers consisting 3" drivers at 64w RMS at 8 Ohms, Active Ported Sub with 10" 185w RMS 8 Ohm driver, Separate control pod with LCD Screen with Two Digital Input ( Optical + Coax), 4 Analog Inputs and 1 headphone output. It also has Dolby DTS, Prologic, THX, etc and 1 IR remote with full functionality.
Defects - Dents on corners of Sub Box, Dirty panels, scratches here and there. Rat Eaten power lead, Completely broken satellite drivers, spider webs inside sub, dirty remote broken power button - Something all audio system go through with time. Whatever it was, was now where looking like 15 years old. I cleaned everything with a cloth rag and checked circuits and continuity of wires with digital multimeter, wrote everything on paper about what is needed, watched youtube videos, bought couple of capacitors and fuse and soldered them on Amp board replacing old ones and Bammn.. it started working. Day went well.
Now I attached the Subwoofer and its controlled pod to my PC for further testing and dissembled the satellites and drivers as they needed serious repairing. Satellite housings were soaked for a day in Fena Detergent, cleaned and air dried. All the gooey dust they had on their face got dissolved in the water and no further efforts were needed to clean them. All the panels were shinning like new, without a single scratch and required no touch up paint. Previous owner have kept everything well. Thanks to him.
I would like to thanks various forum users for helping me with satellite drivers and providing me needed information. The best replacement drivers were Tang Band W3-593SF 3" 8 ohm Full Range Silver Cones rated only at 12w RMS and costing around 8.5k for 5 units - comparatively costly. There were very few options for 3" 8 ohms speakers as direct replacement, I could have used 4" speakers but ditching the stock housing and using custom wooden boxes wouldn't be a proper restore . Karol Bagh and Chandni Chowk electronic markets were closed at that time. Then I found a local uncle who talks very much but somewhat expert with his speaker repair skills and repaired the drivers with stock looking like cones + 8 ohm voice coils for 600 rupees. The job done on speakers was satisfactory if not perfect. I installed all the drivers back into their housing, assembled everything back and now I have a fully working Big Logitech Z-5500 5.1 Digital Home theater.
Results - The only thing I forgot is to repaint the sub in black paint, will do it someday later. The satellites now outputs higher frequency sounds always requesting Sub for bass to balance but gets the job done, if not THX approved. I keep the sub at 20% only and overall volumes at 30% for most of the time to listen music in a 3 BHK flat. Anything above this is super loud. I am addicted to and have used 12" sealed sub which is way-way-way more responsive and tighter then this one but this thing is hugely ported and loud. It Booms and Booms very loud and shakes everything so we keep it below 30% anyday. We are 4 guys in this flat and enjoys this Audio System while we game, netflix or partying. I spent total sum of Rs. 1900 on it which includes everything for pickup to repairs which is bang bang for bucks. I imagined it to have as a teenager but now I have it and its mine.
Enjoy the Photos
1. The image sent by the previous Owner.
2. At my Place
3. Dirty and broken satellite drivers, Control pod with broken power button.
4. Sub Box with permanent deformation, Driver Cones surround ripped off.
5. Included all the 5 lengthy wires, power cord, 3 x aux cabled. Sub had big heatsink behind that gets hot occasionally.
6. Sub internals and bass port tube. The device was never repaired before, no traces of poor soldering.
7. 10 Inch Sub Driver 8 Ohm. Its surround and cone was still good and soft. In good condition. There are couple of accosting padding inside.
8. None of the driver has any kind of specification mentioned on their back. Just few numbers which I failed to decode. Nothing matched on google.
9. Before Sand Blasting and Chemical Cleaning....
10. Cleaned Housing Panels stacked for drying. No paint is used as they were already scratch less.
How It Started - One fine day in the month of June, I was randomly surfing internet when I found an interested thread on sell & buy section on x forum. The guy was selling many electronic items from his storage both working and non working for very cheap price pointing Covid Time Clean Up and had mentioned non functional Logitech Z5500 speakers for just rupees 500.
The Story Behind - Back in 2007, I saw this Audio System for the first time in Cost to Cost, neheru place shop playing Chand Sifarish song - very load and clear, full of tabla hollow bass and I liked it very much. Dad asked me to imagine this in our living room. Costing 19.9k, I denied to have it saying its overkill for our place and for our new 26" LCD TV and we bought the other very best Altec Lansing MX5021 THX 100RMS 2.1 system for 6.5K that we actually liked. Its 25w RMS x 2 satellite was more then enough loud whereas 6" Ported Sub was tight and not boomy. But it lasted for 7 months and got malfunctioned at high volumes. Upon complaining I was asked to pick any other speaker. I thought to pick bigger and louder Z-5500 but it was still overkill for us with its price and performance so the shopkeeper suggested me to have Edifier DA5000 Pro 5.1 and I bought it paying 2K more thinking a 5.1 would sound better. But it didn't. DA5000 is way better in build quality weighing over 23 Kgs but always felt under-powered while required equalizer to output desires sound. Well, Its still performing good and currently using it as primary home theater. TV optical > converter > Edifier DA5000.
With the time, Z5500 vanished from the market and got replaced by smaller Logitech Z906 which was never liked by majority of people as it felt inferior to Z5500 which I never bought.
Execution - Enough thoughts of past with speakers, I was really thinking about picking it up and getting it restored to its full glory. I contacted the guy on the forum and asked him to give more photos and explanation about the speakers which he did and invited me to pickup the 15 year old unit directly from his place away at 30kms from my place. The Audio system I found in person was not in worst condition (considering its age) to be honest and includes all the components that came with it in its retail package - A good thing. All the items were loose and thrown away as it is in dickey which took all the place, The 10" Active Sub was as big as my car's 12" Sealed Sub.
Repairs/Restore - While driving back to home, I was making plans in mind that I will analyse the system first carefully picking up defects and not rushing things up. Meanwhile I bought couple of Booze bottles considering June summers from an empty crowd shop - a rare sight in lockdown.
Without tampering the System or any of its component, I looked for it on internet for complete information. There were many repair videos for this particular audio system on youtube so I was assured that I will repair it anyhow. Comparing it to new package, I have got all the components except user manual and documents.
On paper Specifications were interesting - Has 5 satellites speakers consisting 3" drivers at 64w RMS at 8 Ohms, Active Ported Sub with 10" 185w RMS 8 Ohm driver, Separate control pod with LCD Screen with Two Digital Input ( Optical + Coax), 4 Analog Inputs and 1 headphone output. It also has Dolby DTS, Prologic, THX, etc and 1 IR remote with full functionality.
Defects - Dents on corners of Sub Box, Dirty panels, scratches here and there. Rat Eaten power lead, Completely broken satellite drivers, spider webs inside sub, dirty remote broken power button - Something all audio system go through with time. Whatever it was, was now where looking like 15 years old. I cleaned everything with a cloth rag and checked circuits and continuity of wires with digital multimeter, wrote everything on paper about what is needed, watched youtube videos, bought couple of capacitors and fuse and soldered them on Amp board replacing old ones and Bammn.. it started working. Day went well.
Now I attached the Subwoofer and its controlled pod to my PC for further testing and dissembled the satellites and drivers as they needed serious repairing. Satellite housings were soaked for a day in Fena Detergent, cleaned and air dried. All the gooey dust they had on their face got dissolved in the water and no further efforts were needed to clean them. All the panels were shinning like new, without a single scratch and required no touch up paint. Previous owner have kept everything well. Thanks to him.
I would like to thanks various forum users for helping me with satellite drivers and providing me needed information. The best replacement drivers were Tang Band W3-593SF 3" 8 ohm Full Range Silver Cones rated only at 12w RMS and costing around 8.5k for 5 units - comparatively costly. There were very few options for 3" 8 ohms speakers as direct replacement, I could have used 4" speakers but ditching the stock housing and using custom wooden boxes wouldn't be a proper restore . Karol Bagh and Chandni Chowk electronic markets were closed at that time. Then I found a local uncle who talks very much but somewhat expert with his speaker repair skills and repaired the drivers with stock looking like cones + 8 ohm voice coils for 600 rupees. The job done on speakers was satisfactory if not perfect. I installed all the drivers back into their housing, assembled everything back and now I have a fully working Big Logitech Z-5500 5.1 Digital Home theater.
Results - The only thing I forgot is to repaint the sub in black paint, will do it someday later. The satellites now outputs higher frequency sounds always requesting Sub for bass to balance but gets the job done, if not THX approved. I keep the sub at 20% only and overall volumes at 30% for most of the time to listen music in a 3 BHK flat. Anything above this is super loud. I am addicted to and have used 12" sealed sub which is way-way-way more responsive and tighter then this one but this thing is hugely ported and loud. It Booms and Booms very loud and shakes everything so we keep it below 30% anyday. We are 4 guys in this flat and enjoys this Audio System while we game, netflix or partying. I spent total sum of Rs. 1900 on it which includes everything for pickup to repairs which is bang bang for bucks. I imagined it to have as a teenager but now I have it and its mine.
Enjoy the Photos
1. The image sent by the previous Owner.
2. At my Place
3. Dirty and broken satellite drivers, Control pod with broken power button.
4. Sub Box with permanent deformation, Driver Cones surround ripped off.
5. Included all the 5 lengthy wires, power cord, 3 x aux cabled. Sub had big heatsink behind that gets hot occasionally.
6. Sub internals and bass port tube. The device was never repaired before, no traces of poor soldering.
7. 10 Inch Sub Driver 8 Ohm. Its surround and cone was still good and soft. In good condition. There are couple of accosting padding inside.
8. None of the driver has any kind of specification mentioned on their back. Just few numbers which I failed to decode. Nothing matched on google.
9. Before Sand Blasting and Chemical Cleaning....
10. Cleaned Housing Panels stacked for drying. No paint is used as they were already scratch less.