The Jensen Banshee JiSS-330 Docking Speaker Station is a uniquel-looking, excellent sounding, reasonably priced speaker and recharging dock for all iPods with dock connectors (but not iPhone, which is incompatible).

You'll either love or hate its looks:

I have to say it reminds me of one of the female mutants in Total Recall (if you've seen the movie you know which one) or perhaps the one-eyed Leela from the Futurama TV series. In any event, it's definitely got that "other-worldly" look about it.

The spec sheet claims the JiSS-330 provides "revolutionary surround sound with unmatched volume and precision." I beg to differ with the surround sound part -- I never felt I was listening to surround sound. But the rest of it --the "unmatched volume and precision" part -- I have to agree with. You can crank the volume on this puppy all the way to 11 without introducing a speck of distortion. Its ported design (you can see the bass port on the right in the picture above) gives it much better bass response than you'd expect while its three speakers deliver crisp and well defined mids and highs. In a nutshell, it sounds much better than you'd expect from a unit so small.

Speaking of small, I really liked its size -- just 8 inches wide, 4 inches deep, and 4.25 inches tall -- and that it sounded as good as or better than many bigger and more expensive one-piece speaker systems.

Not only does it sound great, it's packed with useful features you probably wouldn't expect from speakers that list for under $100 and sell for even less at most retailers. Among the niceties are:

• 10W Total Output Power
• S-Video and RCA video out jacks for playing iPod video on your TV
• 6-foot S-Video cable included
• 6-foot RCA video cable included
• 1/8-inch line in jack for iPod shuffle, other audio devices, or computers
• 6-foot 1/8-inch to 1/8-inch audio cable included
• wireless remote control

So those are its pluses... now here are some of its minuses:

• While it includes an AC power adapter, it would be nice if it could also operate from batteries (and nicer still if the batteries were rechargeable).
• The remote control has limited functionality (Play/Pause, Volume, Next/Previous, and On/Off).
• The remote control is too big and, at least in my humble opinion, ugly as heck.

The Jensen Banshee JiSS-330 is only available in one color -- black -- and works with all iPod models except the iPhone. It comes with dock adapters for most (but not all) iPod models.

The Bottom Line

If you're looking for a great sounding iPod speaker system with video output for under $80 (street) and you aren't put off by its looks, look no further.