Loudspeakers

The L100 Classic three-way retains the iconic look of the L100, but receives a timely update

New to the UK, this powered speaker from Canada offers great potential as a hi-fi starter system

Blade Runner KEF’s Blade celebrates 50 years of loudspeaker innovation with the most dramatic leap forward in decades, says Paul Messenger KEF has been virtually synonymous with loudspeaker innovation for five decades. Although in recent years the company’s main preoccupation seems to have been with multichannelhome cinema, through an impressive succession of clever designs, but the Blade looks likely to put KEF back on the stereo hi-fi top table. Conceived by Mark Dodd and executed with considerable assistance from Jack Oclee-Brown, a Project Blade ‘technology demonstrator’ first appeared two years ago. There was talk of it going into production, but nothing had been decided and its elaborate and costly enclosure – a carbon fibre,balsa wood sandwich – meant that the price was likely to be something like twice our review speaker’s £20,000 price.

KEF has taken its LS50 Wireless active speaker and made it smaller, cuter and more affordable

Prepare to be wowed by a transmission line floorstander with serious pedigree

KLH’s floorstander is an awful lot of speaker for the money, but does it have the sound to match its size?

The powered speaker market – where a stereo amplifier is built into one of the loudspeakers – has become an increasingly popular area with those seeking desktop music systems. US brand Klipsch is embracing the versatile sector, and the R-41PM is a small powered design that’s closely related to its R-41M passive loudspeaker.