Sigh. Today’s a legitimately sad day. I’ve had to say goodbye to my Harman Kardon GLA-55 2.0 PC speakers. I’ve had them for over 15 years of faithful service, but despite trying to have them repaired and my own botched attempts at fixing them, I’ve had to accept that their time has come and they’ve joined the paint tins for the next trip to the dump (for recycling).
I have a new pair on the way, and they won’t sound as good, nor look as iconic, but they will work properly, which is arguably more important. It’s still a sad day though, and worth eulogizing. While technology tends to come and go, we all have that one gadget, peripheral, or component which has a special place in our hearts and for me, my ridiculous Harman Kardon speakers were one of them.
I literally just wrote a piece for PCWorld about why these speakers were so great, too. A fitting send off, but an ironic one. Let’s give them one more.
Love of the ridiculous
The GLA-55s are a unique set of speakers that were gifted to me in the early 2010s by my then boss who had no need for them in his even-more-impressive audiophile setup. They’re huge and heavy and completely ridiculous. They didn’t ever fit into my setup or look right next to my more modern, and less-crystally monitors and other hardware.
But they sounded great and were a brilliant conversation starter. Out of all the strange gadgets, gizmos, and components I’ve had over the last 20 years of writing about PCs and other hardware, my Harman Kardon speakers always drew the most interest from visiting friends and family.
They were as much a work of art as capable PC speakers with strong bass and clear highs. TechPowerUp even called them the coolest speakers ever in its coverage of them way back when.
But after so many years of use they had started to show their age. Scratches in the crystal-like plastic, dents in the soft-surface tweeter from errant kid fingers, and finally, a hole in the rubber surrounding the main drivers.
While manoeuvring them for some shots for the aforementioned article I wrote about their longevity, I brushed my finger against the rubber and it just disintegrated into a sticky, powdery mess. At the lightest of touches I had inadvertently destroyed the airtight chamber around the driver which helped deliver such thumping good sound. In an instant of carelessness I’d ruined this speaker.
But apparently this wasn’t my first time. Looking closer at the other speaker revealed similar stress points on the rubber and in actuality, it had already started to come away from the plastic surround too. Neither speaker was in great shape and some quick Googling suggested that at best, I shouldn’t be using them until they were fixed. If they could be fixed at all.
A glimmer of hope
My first contact with Harman Kardon was a dead end. These speakers had been end of life for years, so no, they couldn’t fix them or provide any repair aid. They did have a third-party company they used for repairs in the UK, though. They might be able to do it, I was told.
But no. The parts to replace this very specific speaker surround no longer existed, so there was no way they could do it either.
Perhaps a third party alternative? I looked, but the drivers on these speakers were a very specific 3.1-inches in diameter. I couldn’t find anything close to the right size… Until I did.
It turns out that a Dutch speaker repair shop had a few foam replacement driver surrounds for my very specific Harman Kardon GLA-55 speakers. What luck! I ordered a pair to be shipped over in due haste and eagerly awaited their arrival two weeks later.
In the meantime I contacted the original repair shop, but balked at the potential bill. It was $150 (equivalent) to even look at the speakers to see if they could or could not repair them. The estimates for the actual repair were several hundred more, plus shipping. While these speakers might have been worth $1,000 when new, but I could get a comparable set of speakers for the same price of a repair.
But I’m an industrious chap. Before I confine these speakers to the trash heap I should take one more shot at it.
Maybe I can fix high-grade electronics myself…
I’ve been taking apart graphics cards, laptops, and other complicated PC hardware for years. Surely with due care I could have a good go at fixing these myself. So I set to work.
I peeled off the underside rubber feet, I removed the screws. I took apart the base housing, and undid the screws on the circuit board and… solder. Unleaded solder at that, so my hobbyist soldering iron couldn’t quite get it hot enough to melt it effectively. I didn’t have a solder wick. I burned myself twice in my inexperience.
Two hours into this mess of melted skin and stubbornly solid solder, I considered my options. I was on the cusp of diving down an (admittedly autistically driven) rabbit hole. There was still a chance I could fix this, but I was about to order a new soldering iron and some other kit to make this one repair easier, that I wasn’t confident of performing effectively.
I touched the rubber on the speaker surround again, as if to confirm how bad it was, and it melted away in my hand in a sticky mess that would have made fitting the foam even after an effective teardown difficult. This wasn’t going to work, was it?
I could spend hours of my time and tens or hundreds more of my dollars to fix these old, busted, dented, beautiful speakers. Or I could go and write an article about it and earn enough to pay for their replacements.
So, here we are.
So long and thanks for all the riffs
Reluctantly, I spent the next 20 minutes tidying up the mess I’d made. The blobs of solder on the table, the seemingly-liquifying bits of speaker rubber on the floor, put the tools into the toolbox, my blistered finger under the tap. I thought about screwing the speakers back together so they could at least take their funeral march to the dump in full form. Like preparing them for an open casket.
But they’re speakers, not a person or pet. I stuck them next to the pile of other junk outside and ordered some perfectly fine Edifier R1280DBs. They’re not super exciting, don’t look weird and wonderful, and probably won’t sound as good as the Harman Kardon’s did back in their heyday. But there is Bluetooth support, and they’ll fit better on my desk, and won’t have a weird popping sound when I’m instead using my wireless headphones.
I will miss the GLA-55s though. They weren’t just a great piece of hardware, but an iconic part of my PC gaming and working setup for over a decade. It honestly feels a bit weird typing away like this without them flanking my monitors.
Something is amiss. I suspect it’ll feel that way for quite some time.
