Tested: Creative’s Pebble Nova is not a budget, but it is a great versatile speaker for all your media

Best prices today: Creative Pebble Nova

The Loudspeaker setup from Creative consists of speakers with a very fine sound quality that represent a good price -quality ratio. In the past we have assessed options such as the Pebble and Pebble Pro and have positive things to say about them.

For $ 279.99, the Creative Pebble Nova is a substantially more expensive speaker than its stablemates, but the sound is by far the most excellent of the models we have tried. It is also the largest and requires a considerable amount of setup, but these are little things that it is worth tolerate with such a superior sound.

Read on for more information and then view our roundup of the best budget computer speakers for comparison.

Creative Pebble Nova: Design and Build

The Creative Pebble Nova is supplied in a 2.0 speaker configuration. Every speaker has a very round design compared to other creative speakers such as the Pebble Pro. The speakers have a very sci-fi look for them, and look like lawn bombs in size and shape, but with a Deathstar feeling.

Each speaker contains a Dual-Driver Array at the front consisting of a 1-inch tweeter and a 3-inch full driver in coaxial setup. They hang up at 45 degrees to deliver the sound to your ears. At the back of the speaker you will find a bas driver who is not as switched as the two front drivers.

With a diameter of 5.5 inches, I noticed that every speaker takes up a lot of space, so you need a considerable amount of space around you on your desk to place them. The speakers are raised in metal stands, so you don’t want to bump them, or you might have to deal with them. On the positive side, the stands do not require screws and simply pay attention to the base of each satellite.

Dominic Bayley / Foundry

The fact that the speakers are elevated is undoubtedly a good thing. It means that I have not received a desk vibrations, which can hinder the clarity of the sound. The construction is also very solid, the speakers consist of hard plastic and the stands are metal, so you don’t have to worry about fracture.

The Pebble Nova has a ring of RGB lighting at the bottom, but this is not as prominent as in some speakers in bookshelf style. I would have liked to see another RGB ring higher on the speaker body.

Creative Pebble Nova: Connectivity and control elements

The Pebble Nova, as a premium option, comes with three ways to connect to your chosen device. One is via a 3.5 mm AUX input, although this option cannot adjust the music via the creative app such as the other two methods: a Bluetooth 5.3 connection, or via USB-C to USB-C.

Creative offers you two 5-foot USB-C cables (one for electricity and the other for sound) and a 4-foot 3.5 mm audio cable for making these connections.

The top of the master speaker houses the controls. They consist of buttons for power, volume, source and lighting mode. These are very easy to use. However, I would also like to have seen a remote control as another option for checking, given the price of the speakers.

Dominic Bayley / Foundry

Under the master speaker is a separate USB-C port for the 65W PD charger. Unlike other pebble speakers, you cannot feed the NOVA pebble via the USB-C port of your laptop, so you have to be close to an AC-stop contact when setting.

On the side of the main satellite there is an inlet with a removable plug that contains two extra 3.5 mm audio connections for you to connect a headset or a microphone.

Creative Pebble Nova: Sound

The NOVA produces a warm well -balanced sound without clear errors.

To test the speakers, I played “Happy” by Pharrell William, followed by “good vibrations” by the Beach Boys, and “All about that bass” by Meghan Trainor. I then played the film score of Lord of the rings To see how well the speakers can play multimedia.

To summarize my thoughts, I found the Treble and the midtones flew over the bass well in ‘Happy’, so that the instruments sounded clear and defined and not mixed as I hear in cheaper units. The speakers had a very good amplitude, I only had to set them up very lightly to get a strong volume.

In “Good Vibrations” there was enough room for the vocals to shine over the guitar. The midtones had a huge range in the Lord of the rings Soundtrack, the soundscape really dominates with warm velvety overtones with a lot of depth.

Dominic Bayley / Foundry

Playing “All about that bass” proved that there was also enough bass to be heard. It was delivered with an authority that was very impressive. It never sounded muddy. I could turn the volume very high and could not hear any form of distortion, which means that I could fill the room with sound without influencing the audio.

All in all, I was very impressed by the very clear, lively sound of these speakers and with their versatility. These are certainly speakers who apply to desktop computing as well as they do to watch a movie on TV or play on your PS4 or Xbox consoles.

Creative Pebble Nova: Software

Two separate apps treat the audio for the Pebble Nova. The iOS and Android app is fairly limited in the type of available options. You can only exchange channels, adjust the lighting and adjust the EQ.

The creative app deals with things from your PC. This allows you to adjust both the EQ and RGB lighting, but you can also have access to acoustic engine, surround and Crystal Voice+ to improve audiocarity and tonal reach and adjust the sound for a compelling surround sound experience.

An interesting thing that you can do in the Pebble Nova is to change the direction of the left and right audio channels. It means that you can place the master speaker on each side, without the audio being influenced. This is very useful if you have cabling problems or want to create a cleaner desk environment.

Conclusion

In summary, the Pebble Nova excels like a PC speaker system, but also as a speaker for Multimedia. It consistently produces a clear, lively sound, especially in the midtones.

It is also quite large and costs a considerable amount more than other options in the Creative line. But for those who want the versatility of a bookshelf speaker who can do it all, that is par for the course.