The quality of the sound is really good and well-balanced, especially taking into account the price. Very loud as well-I never put it on more than half the volume and it does fantastic job.
The main prob I have come across with is that subwoofer is humming-quietly, but annoyingly. It's OK if you use this system to connect to TV or MP3 player and switch it off when the progran/music is finished. But if you connect it to your pc/laptop and leave the power on to hear the system sounds, etc.,it might drive you nuts.
After surfing the net, I found out, that quite a few Altec Lansing owners report this buzz from the sub, although this model has not been mentioned before. I asked nearly every reviewer of this model on Amazon personally, and ALL of them reported a buzz-some say its quiet, but its still there. Was considering a return, but decided to keep it after this, no point in getting another humming set. After all its still a great sounding system for a bargain price, and you can just switch it off when not in use. Would give it 5 stars without buzz.