Home > Consumer Reviews > Philips FWC550 Compact Stereo System

I searched and searched for an affordable bookshelf system, comparing features, cost, and most importantly, sound. After listening to many Sony, Aiwa, and Sharp systems, I stumbled upon this unit. At first, I was turned off by the appearance, but once I listened to the unit, I was blown away. This system sounds better than many full-size component systems. The quality of sound is magnificent with virtually every music genre. Thundering bass and crisp, clean highs add to a wonderfully spacious sound, even with the speakers located directly next to the unit. This system produces door-rattling bass whether you are listening to rock, rap or classical music. You have to listen to this system to believe it.

There is a wonderful timer feature that can serve as an alarm clock, allowing you to wake to the radio station, cassette or compact disc of your choice. There is also a sleep timer that will shut the unit off at a designated time so you can drift off to sleep to your favorite compact disc. There are auxiliary inputs so you can plug in a CD-R unit or your DVD player and burn CDs or enjoy rich surround sound for your home theater system.

I enthusiastically recommend this system to anyone looking for high dollar sound from an affordable compact unit.

When my 4 years old Panasonic audio system's CD changer broke a month ago, I planned to get a new audio system. I set my price range to $200, I searched and compared every weekend in the past month in our local electronic/department stores(Best Buy, Circuit City, Sears, Kmart, Malmart, Target, etc) I found 3 system that fit my needs, all at $X: Panasonic SC-AK33, JVC MX-G50, and this Philips FWC550, and believe it or not, Philips FWC500 is the best choice out of these 3.

Let me explain what I don't like about the SC-AK33, the fatal flaw is its 5-CD Changer, if you ever tried it before in stores, you know what I am talking about, it just plain ...! It's slow and makes loud noise, and you can't exchange CD while the CD is playing, if its CD changer is like JVC or Philips, I would probably buy this Panasonic system! Even this system's bi-amp bi-wire with buidt-in super woofer drive configuration can't save this fatal flaw.

I almost bought the JVC MX-G50, but the final look at this system turns my stomech, I mean maybe I am just not ready for that kind of fancy or should I say ugly look. It got bi-amp, bi-wired Hyper woofer drive, so what, the speaker grills are not removable, come on, I like to show off my speaker, what good will it do if the grills are not removeable?

That only leaves me the Philips FWC550, wow, it got a future looks, plus it has a black color, it offers the same audio power as the Panasonic SC-AK33 and JVC MX-G50 at 240 watt, I really don't care if it's bi-amp or bi-wire or not, in fact it is not, well, that's not important, because at 240 watt of muisc power, you really can't tell the system is bi-amped or not.

One thing I want to point out first because I read lot of reviews online and they all gave the wrong size of the woofer in this system: the size of the woofer is 6.5 inch, not 5.25 inch as claimed in those online reviews!

This system got the richest sound effects I've ever seen, it got MAX sound, DSC(digital, rock, pop, new age, classic, electric), VAC(hall, concert, cinema, disco, arcard, cyber), DBB(beat, punch, blast), IS(incredible surround).

The bass this system produced is very loud, dare I say it's louder than Panasonic SC-AK33, and same as JVC MX-G50's, it's just SonicBooms I am hearing... I tried to keep the bass down in case my neighbors complaining... So if you are in the market for a new audio system, this is one to get, and get it before you neighbers do!

After reading the reviews, I decided to investigate the unit further, since I need to replace my aging JVC bedroom unit. I burned a copy of Lee Ritenour's "The Collection" CD (my favorite reference disk) and took it to the electronics store. Lo and Behold! The FWC550 brings out the best from the CD....from the thumping electric bass to the crisp guitar riffs and everything in between. I thought I was hearing the music from FLOOR STANDING speakers! Philips means it when they say 240 Watts! The ulimate sound setting is the combination of DBB-"BLAST" and DSC-"ROCK". Needless to say, I bought a set right away without hesitation. I must say it sounded even better in my room. The only thing missing was Dolby NR for the cassette and direct track access number keys on the remote......This has to be the best buy of the year! Absolutely Stunning!

I got a chance to hear this stereo first hand...and let me just say...it is UNBELIEVABLE!! Especially for the price! I just couldn't believe it! At first I was a little intimidated by the look of this stereo, but after listening to the...sound of some of the other stereos...I gave it a second look. Okay, so it's a little masculine and a little scary at that, but you just can't beat the quality for the money. (Plus you can just separate the speakers from the base and it's not nearly so scary) It has all the toys...surround sound, digital sound, those nifty sound options to make it sound like you're in a stadium or at a concert, etc. And all the buttons are a lot more user-friendly than those on the Sony and Aiwa stereos I was looking at. So if you want the best cd player [for a reasonable price], this is definitely the one for you. And take it from me, it probably sounds a heck of a lot better than most [other] stereos. Enjoy! And happy listening!

I have had this stereo for 3 months now and I am extremely pleased with it. The sound output is magnificent and if you're like me and like to have alot of bass it features a max sound button. If not you can adjust the digital sound control and the virtual ambience control. In the digital sound control you have 6 choices. They are: digital, pop, classic, rock, newage, or electric. In the virtual ambience control the choices are: hall, cinema, arcade, concert, disco, or cyber. You can also hook it up to your game or a computer.
Overall i was extremely impressed with the product and would buy it again. I recommend this stereo to everyone.