Best Buys – Audio & AV – July 2019

Best Buys Audio & AV 2019-#2

KEF for Christmas: the gloss

white LSX at the Melbourne launch.

1961 1968 1969 1972 2000 2009

K1 SLIMLINE

KEF’s first speaker,
using Cooke’s
vacuum-formed
foil-stiffened
polystyrene cones
along with the
revolutionary
T15 tweeter with
its thin polyester
film Melinex
diaphragm.

CRESTA

KEF’s genre-busting

‘bookshelf’ Cresta

used the same

B110 and T27

drivers adopted

by the BBC in its

legendary LS3/5a

studio monitors.

CONCERTO

Built from 1969

through to 1977,

the Concerto was

a three-way design

again using the

B110 as a

dedicated mid-

range driver to

cover the critical

vocal range.

CODA

KEF’s budget

Coda line could

fill a history book

all by themselves,

their many versions

delivering four

decades of afford-

able hi-fi sound

to music lovers

around the world.

KHT 2005

The arrival of the

‘egg’ design in

KEF’s KHT 2005

sub-speaker

package saw the

Uni-Q concept

find a new place

in home cinema

sound delivery.

MUON

KEF’s 2009

ultimate speaker

design, with only

100 pairs made,

at a price above

a quarter of a

million dollars.

They paved the

way for develop-

ment of ‘Blade’

and ‘Blade 2’.

CUTTING EDGE: KEF’s flagship Blade extended

the Uni-Q concept to a full set of drivers all

delivering from a virtual point source.

73

monitor with a relatively narrow and rounded

baffle translates to extraordinarily exacting focus with

images precisely placed within a wide and extremely

deep soundstage, and a dynamic range that is very

impressive, irrespective of speaker size.”

GOING WIRELESS – LS50W

By 2017, times were a-changing in hi-fi, with

traditional sources being replaced by streaming

from the internet and the smartphone, and

traditional systems being replaced by standalone

wireless speakers. So KEF delivered the LS50

Wireless, one of the first active wireless loudspeak-

ers to deliver hi-fi levels of performance from

such an all-in-one solution. By building inside the

LS50 Wireless twin power amplifiers and a digital

input stage including DACs, the LS50 Wireless

reduced the traditional hi-fi system to just the

speakers. The right-hand speaker had both Wi-Fi

and Bluetooth, able to stream from smart devices

or from computer or NAS drive files across the

network, while the difficult sychronisation of

data to the left speaker was achieved by having an

Ethernet cable linking the two.

It was a huge and immediate success, winning

awards globally including What Hi-Fi?’s

All-in-One System of the Year award for both

2017 and 2018, and an entry into its Hall of

Fame. The current LS50 Wireless packs a full

240W of internal power, and offers analogue,

optical and USB computer inputs in addition

to Wi-Fi and Bluetooth streaming, all under the

control of two KEF apps for iOS and Android.

It was this combination of connectivity with

the sonic strengths of the KEF LS50 design which

the deepest depths of bass, but what it did above

a perceived 50Hz was reported in Australian Hi-Fi

as “well-controlled, detailed and pleasingly visceral....

I needed to remind myself the LS50 is a small

speaker with a 130mm driver with reduced surface

area due to the inclusion of the tweeter assembly

within it, while the use of a Uni-Q driver in a

Raymond Cooke (centre, standing) was still

at Wharfedale under a supposedly-retired

Gilbert Briggs when he became enthused

by the ‘plastic cup’ idea of a speaker driver.

At the time trying out a new profile shape

in paper required six months of expensive

tool-making for moulding and drying. While

others had realised the potential benefits,

Cooke avoided “the fatal mistake of think-

ing that if it feels stiff to the touch under

steady state pressure conditions, then it

will be stiff dynamically — which it usually

isn’t”. With Wharfedale recently taken over

by Rank, and Cooke restless working for

others, he joined with John Balls and Bob

Pearch, who was son of Leonard Pearch

who owned the Kent Engineering and

Foundry in Maidstone, and who offered

the trio an external Nissan hut and use of

the foundry’s tools. Taking the initials from

the foundry, KEF Electronics was officially

registered on 5th September 1961.

DOWN AT THE FOUNDRY