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But you should remember that most tower speakers are less than 10 inches wide. Also, they could very easily made them wider and they didn´t, so is the driver small because they are not wide, or the other way around (they are not wide because the driver is small)? What came first?
@@mindtraveller100 Ne I think it`s more complicated than that. A small driver on an wide speaker has a different sound emitting characteristic than on a narrow speaker. It seams they had a certain sound concept and look in mind. Probably they checked first now narrow they can make it without running into too big trouble with the side firing speakers. And planed on from there. Eventual took the front speaker that fitted the width best, DSP took care of the rest.
A few things: They are closed, i.e. no port. The gap is for cooling. Kef is a British brand. All drivers in each speaker are phase corrected to appear from the same virtual point in space. Combined with wide and even dispersion, they create extremely good imaging in my opinion. Although I am biased as I own a pair. Good engineering and a lot of R&D. The room correction it quite rudimental, at least the current version, and does not use the microphone. Just shelf EQ options, more or less.
I have had the privilege of visiting kef hq, trust me when I say this, it's awesome, I am a fef fan and have been for years, the detail in the sound is amazing, I just dug a set of 3005s out and set them up on my sons desk running through a arcam a18, he is now hooked and wants a set of r100s, kef have never made a bad speaker, I have had r300/r500 and more but Mrs says no lol, currently running r200c /r100 and monitor audio atmos, sounds amazing, I may be looking at a pair of these as my final set, oh I have noticed that the kef does wake up my tinnitus, this is the reason for the monitor audio, BUT the detail and clarity is unreal, the 3001s what ever they are , my son was shocked, when I told him that they were 13 years old and been used for many set ups he was amazed that they were not in use. KEF my friends never stop. My old K2 sub is still spot on 10/10
I’ve owned those for a couple months now. They’re pretty incredible. They replaced a McIntosh MA8900 with Klipsch Forte IV’s which were fantastic as well. But these!! They freak my brain out every listening session. They’re powerful yet refined. Surprisingly great at low level listening. And the holographic, disappearing, deep and wide soundstage is truly something you need to experience firsthand. I’m in love. I did add two SVS SB-1000’s to round out the low end but they are not necessary. Oh and the DSP app is needed to get the best out of these for each individual room, speaker placement, taste, etc. But once dialed in - crazy good. Oh and the remote suuuucks.
@trey81373 can you tell me where you put those two extra subwoofers? I'm planning to buy these ls60s with two subs. For now, I'm thinking of putting both subs on both the left and right edge of my sofa.
@@QJHKI Sure. Fortunately I have enough space in my room to but them each to the outside of each speaker. So I have my LS60’s about 8 ft apart and then the subs are along the same wall about 3 ft to the outside of each speaker and about another 3 ft from the corners. Works great in my room.
@trey81373I'm thinking of replacing my current system for these. I currently have a Mcintosh ma7200/kef R3 meta/kc62/. I will keep the kc62 for the ls60s. Do you think I will be happy?
All the drivers are in phase just like Blades no dsp tricks. Smaller midrange and tweeter drivers have better of axis response. Combine this with an extremely narrow front baffle and you get a very large soundstage. You may have heard the Blades in less than ideal circumstances.
DSP is definitely used inside the product for phase correction in bass, eq, protection, etc. I meant there are no DSP “enhancements” that make the soundstage the way it is. It is due to the speaker’s design itself.
Your comments about speaker position and toe seem to work for the KEF R900 as well. I put mine straight and 8" more forward and realized I've been running a "overly warm (muddy) bubble" this whole time (that I was trying to tame with dsp). Seriously leveled up the sound to the point where I was stuck in the chair in disbelief. What was odd was I heard more clarity and treble after pointing them straight, one would think you would get even more directly pointed at you but at least with the R900, not the case. Thanks Zeos!
The LS60s are powered by 3 amps in each speaker. The 4 woofers are powered by two motors, each motor powering one woofer on each side, essentially cancelling all back waves. Very cleverly done. Imaging is as good as it is due to each speakers ability to present the sound from a single apparent source. With timing alignment making everything reach the listeners ears at the same time, it get's almost all advantages of a single driver speaker while keeping all advantages of multi driver speakers. You really need to use far more money than the KEF LS60s cost to get something similar with a passive system.
If you look at the Spinorama of the LS60 you'll notice that the early reflections are as linear as the on axis response. Therefore any room reflections will have the same timbre as the direct sound which will lead to a good in room response even in an acoustically terrible room
@@AbsoluteFidelitythe 10k dip only appears if you are directly on axis (to the millimetre). It disappears in the listening window and early reflections. I didn’t hear it when I had the opportunity to listen to them.
@@sifi36 If you go by KEF's white paper, yeah it doesnt show in the LW and ER. Most people wont really noticed it either, its at a frequency where there are not much information. Still waiting for full spins to see if that dip is present in the PIR.
Ive heard the LS60 in 3 different rooms, they totally disappear and as much as you try to look at it to locate where the sound is actually coming from, its just impossible. When there are vocals, youll be searching high and low for the center channel, like 3 center channels. Instrument separation is the best Ive heard, imaging is so precise you can point out everything in the soundstage. In those 3 rooms Ive heard them, 2 were with no toe in and 1 was with minimal toe in, like 10 degrees, they all just pulled a David Copperfield on me. A little treble boost from the app helps tremendously too. Coaxial speakers are not supposed to be listened to on axis.
The reason why you say it disappears is the fact that it has the 2 kc62 force canceling drivers inside for the subwoofers in each box, and the subs give it that 3 dimensional sound. There really isn't any fancy tech or trickery inside of those speakers. My point is not worth it. People, you would do a lot better by setting up your own system. If you're going to spend 7k on this, put it elsewhere. I could put a system together for you at 7k that would blow this out of the water
@@markmcfeaters9116 Thats gotta be the biggest pile of horse shit Ive ever heard, speakers dont disappear more easily when they have force canceling woofers. It is all about the coupling of the mids and tweeters, how well they are integrated. You have no damn clue yet you are barking saying it is not worth the money.
The woofers are not doing 75% of the work. That 4" mid range driver is. Yes, that's right, that thing. The 8 woofers are only playing sub 340Hz. So that 4" driver plays everything between 340Hz and 3.1kHz. And that thing on the back isn't a port. Well sort of, it's the vent port for the amps. The speakers themselves are not ported.
It’s likely been noted already but there is NO auto room correction via an iPhone. (As mentioned here - 34:35 ) Just the Kef Connect app with the manual DSP settings. But it is quite flexible and works great.
You should call them "powered speakers", because the price at least doubles when the entire stereo system (preamp, power amps, DSP, DAC....) comes with the speakers. The LS60s have 3 separate power amps for bass, mid bass and vocals. The tiny 4" driver on the front has a 100watt amp driving it. I don't think you have to worry about blowing it. The bass drivers have a 500watt amp and I'm sure Kef has everything gain matched according to the power demands of each drivers.
MDF cabinet.. :) It's fun to see how easy active speakers make the whole hobby with all the digital magic :) I am not there yet.. still wanna play around with speakers, amps and so on to find my Nirvana :)
KEF and Triangle both are some of my favorite New Age speakers ' Indigo blue R3meta on their way I can't wait ! Its going to be a three some lol Kef vs Triangle vs Dynaudio !! Coming Soon ' Thanks Zeos ' Appricate your hardwork and dedication '
KEF is British. The imaging/soundstage is supported by the narrow cabinets reducing diffraction and the uni-q driver. A minor toe-in 10 degrees or so makes them the best.
Acoustics in a high room can suck if you have lots of hard surfaces. In our house, I diy-ed an accoustic panel by hanging a stack of five "blankets for moving furniture" on one wall. To make it pretty, we printed a giant canvas at a local printer and hanged it in front of the blankets. The reverb time dropped from multiple seconds to maybe a second. Not perfect, but way better! It just dampens the back and forth bouncing of sound in the room. Having small kids, this has improved our daily life by tons and it cost a fraction of the commercial acoustic panels. The canvas print was an investment but it does make it look cool and gives you personalization options.
That's a really good point about 'The Shape of Sound'. I didn't see the original vid, but dam that is so true. Imaging and presentation is when the magic happens.
It’s the coaxial and single apparent source techniques that make the speaker allocation disappear. The ls50w2 actually also have the speakers disappear effect. Aren’t woofers omnidirectional so they don’t fire to left or right but everywhere. The ribbled sides of the woofers makes them stronger to “go in and out”. Sorry for my terrible English. To me they sound best with streaming Qobuz in the kef connect app. And u should really(!) connect them wired with the cat cable they sound better.
@@natskarot all coaxial are necessarily in phase. They are usually coherent in time domain , but the KEF Reference 3s with very similar coax drivers have the midrange and tweeter electrically wired out of phase with each other. They are not phase coherent.
No. The wide vertical sweet spot is NOT because of the side firing driver. It's because of the coaxial mid tweeter on the front. Because of that driver the vertical directivity is exactly the same as the horizontal directivity. It's the same on my LS 50's and my LS 50 Metas, and it's the same on every KEF because they all have the same tweeter/mid configuration.
You could treat the great room into becoming a greater room. Certainly might cost a pretty penny and doing it in an aesthetic way would be a challenge.
They should have been positioned much further away from the back wall in the great room. At least 1o feet. Also, the room correction software would have helped a lot. And as also mentioned some solid room work would make the biggest difference.
When you made the remark at 0:30, I immediately thought of the Ohms. I was going to ask you if you had the time to compare the LS60s to your Ohms in the Great Room, but i guess you answered that at 40:03? Or would you mind commenting further on LS60s vs Ohms, especially if you did ever put them both in your Great Room?
I know you left this comment a while ago but since I own a pair of LS60's and Ohm Walsh Tall 2000's, I thought I would chime in. They sound absolutely nothing alike. I can only speak for my own listening space, but for me the Ohm's seem to throw sound in a huge arc up and over between the speakers, kinda creating the effect of the whole wall between them is making sound. The Kefs, on the other hand, are more like you are in a room and there are just sounds coming from that direction, each from a different point in space, but as far as you are concerned there are no speakers present. Little abstract, but I hope that explains enough.
At the very least, I recommend to put even a small carpet (maybe 8'x10') in front of the speakers in the listening area. It would at least absorb the original/biggest sound reflections at the beginning, making smaller ones pass beyond the carpet, which would clean up the sound all over the house. You'll thank me later ;)
If z did his research, he would know the magic of kef speakers is the uni q driver and many generations going way back. That would be why positionally they don't have to be aimed at the listener because of their designed wide dispertion pattern. I'm assuming you have done other reviews of kefs in the past like the la 50, is 50 meta or the is 50 powered bookshelves? Not a secret as kef has been research and revising this same coaxial driver many years. This is what they are known for .
The cabinets on the LS60 is MDF not aluminum or magnesium. They are not made of metal they only weigh 60lbs each if they were aluminum they would weigh over 100lbs each. The side firing woofers play the same thing and use their force canceling technology that is found in the blades too. I am interested in hearing these i will need to visit a local dealer. You also need to take into account that at $7k you get a total system and do not need to buy a separate amp or a dac unless you want to. Please do a bit of research before you do these reviews.
I corrected the materials mid review. The upstairs part I had to do before getting them downstairs so I was just speaking from a plebs perspective. Having a local dealer with these will be a plus.
@@ZReviews I will go give them a listen. I am not in the market for speakers at this price range currently. They would be for a smaller office system in the future.
The sad part is that these speakers could have lasted a lifetime, if the amps/brains were seperate and could be upgraded OR they also had passive speaker wire inputs. These may well be paper weights in 5-10 years...
taking the cost at 7700 with tax and taking your 10 years as an example. That is 120 months, so $7700/120 months puts it at 65 bucks a month roughly, given 30 days a month, 65/30 puts you at 2 bucks a day. So 2 bucks a day for 10 years, you would enjoy a highly integrated system which will be come nice decorations after 10 years. Now lets talk about how much money have we lost from buying and selling audio equipment, specialized snake oil cables, and special non-vibrating isolation feet to chase that wonderful well integrated sound? I would argue the former is a better way than the latter.
@@Christhebearable I’m quite fine with that, I have heard these nice speakers and planning on getting rid of my gear, recoup my money and spend a measly 7k. For what you get out of this solution, can’t really beat it. And yes I understand the other side, I was once there ;-)
KEF .. KEF is a proud pioneer of excellence in sound. Since 1961, from our UK home, we have created remarkable award-winning speakers. From our ground-breaking Uni-Q technology to our bar-setting LS60 Wireless, KEF exists to fill rooms with music as it was made to be heard, to move souls with truly authentic soundscapes. Now, we're bringing more people with us on our journey to discover the power of great sound.
Pretty sure it's just simple acoustics. Because the side drivers are plane woofers & they don't use dsp. The whole great imaging is amplified due to combination of coax & thin front baffle.
sidefiring drivers often dont do much above 150 hz, theres also not very much room left if you divide the space between. they either work in pairs or from the same channel, could also be those wierd dual cone drivers that share the same motor system.
Great Review! I am currently hesitating buying LS60s or A700... Big Dilema. Which one of the two would be recommended at low volume? Would the A700 bring a little Fatigue ( as they "F... our faces")? Any plan to try Dynaudio Focus 50?
$7,000 isn’t cheap but given the quality of the speakers, the amplification, the number of inputs and having heard them on a number of occasions I completely agree that they are worth it.
Here's the thing though. Obviously with just the matl's involved, they're not worth that. Its the recipe that works and if they sell a few thousand pairs at 7k, they could have sold 100's of thousands at 3k. Its their call and the audiofile (I spelled it that was because its grating) community is super odd, KEF is odd amongst the odd, so whatever. Their speakers won't be heard by as many people as they could have been. That doesn't sound like a smart or good company. They don't want to make money and they don't want more customers to buy their products. They're like playing a game of keep-away. Good luck.
@@Cinnabuns2009 They have offerings down to $300 FYI. What you're getting in that configuration is arguably killer value compared to separate components, let alone the design itself which is something always worked in as a pillar of price calculation. Get with it now
These look like they were made for rooms like the great room. People that can afford $7,000 speakers for their penthouse that's all tile and glass, reverb and echoes. High WAF and not obtrusive, absolute killer combination for a "modern home".
Pretty cool that you can hear the imaging through your mic setup for the GoPro. Is there an external mic setup or is all just the GoPro? It's impressive either way. Coaxials are my absolute favorite.
I have to say that every KEF active product I tested was very picky with wifi … and support for 1st gen product is non existent 2 years after initial release …
Holyshit what o big space in the house. Perfect for big speakers. If you fix the bad acoustics. How can you rewiw speaker if you dont know anything about them, or how speaker works 😮
Can you please make a review of the fluance signature towers to compare with speakers many times their price. I have been amazed by them and would like to see a comparison to see if I am missing much or if what I have is close. i have been watching and appreciating your reviews since around when you made the fluance signature bookshelves. I have used the bookshelves for the past 7 years and was absolutely shocked by the difference between them and the towers, they are not in the same class and would like to see you compare them to the buchard towers, ls60’s, and b&w 704 s3’s
Looks like you are checking under the rugs for twinkies. Can you sugest some sub amp modules, just make a simple pyramid with an 8 down firing - cut the top off and add foam. It will do better than whats been offered for much less. Don't mean to be harsh, but amp modules are abundant and make for a taylored sound stage. Base detail is friggin astounding when tuned right.
From watching your video i'm getting the idea they are not for every music genre. Can you get them to slam more through the app? They do have some kind of tone control i believe. And can they be used in a surround setup? PS: Steinway Lyngdorf has done this with the dsp thing 15 years ago but at a huge price.
No sweetspot is because of concentric design and bass drivers being above and below the tweeter. Design makes sense because of amazing directivity of the speakers. Same as expensive genelecs
Its not 7000 vs 7000 if you need to add a source and amplification - its more 7000 vs 20,000 - also get yourself two of the KC62 subs - makes all the difference - one per channel the 60's can add them in monaural - its what i did
All that is = 2 much larger housings of the LS50 wireless 2 with 2 built in kc62 force canceling subwoofers. Thats it besides the same basic tech inside. I have the LS50 wireless 2 with 2 kef kc62 subs they are great for space saving. Thats all its good for. For my Home entertainment its totally different with way better speakers and better Amps, and processor with way better subwoofers. Blows any of the kef out of the water
I also didn’t like the blades. But then I heard them at a Best Buy with big boy amps on them, and that changed it. The blades need power. A lot of power. They pinned a 600 watt mono block McIntosh amp with hyponocurrency, amazing. The ls60 are incredible and quite a bargain
If i had a bigger room i probly would've gotten these. Ended up getting the LS50 Wireless II's last year. They sound pretty amazing, shit ton of power too. lol Also yeah these come with the same remote. The app shows you the volume, also has a bunch of other features. Worked great for calibrating them to my room. Sucks that you couldn't get it to work, but atleast for me once paired i've never had to use google home.
Not necessarily less money when you consider the quality and power of amplification needed to get those to sing. As well as all other components to stream, DAC, etc.
I wish I could get onboard with the LS60s but after seeing how quickly KEF cut off the gen1 LS50 wireless gen1 support with no upgrade path and the amount I see come up on marketplace with dead amp modules. It’s a hard pass having such an integrated speaker unfortunately… They need a massive warranty and support to backup the price tag…
@@whatcouldgowrong7914 Yeah, the way they handled their wireless speakers kind of put me off KEF. There was an LSX sale at a shop so I looked them up, even some of the reviews mentioned connection problems, but the comments had even more complaints about the app, the connection, the customer service. Used sites also often have a bunch of them, some of them not connecting, not resetting or just a red light blinking. I think originally they were sold for around 1100-1200 USD, at that price I would expect them to work properly and the company to handle complaints.
Zeos, the reason that the app stopped working for you will be because you lost gps location which is required for remote control of some network devices using google home. It is by far the most annoying thing about these speakers, the remote is a close second...
I want them, but for $7k, I can sell my car, pair it with those funds, and have another nice ride for 10 years. With a radio included :) Nice review, tho. I drooooled, so here's an upthumb for "but a boy can dream".
@Bergo8888 Right now I could pick up a brand new set of Focal Aria 948 for $3499. A new Music Fidelity 2 channel Amp 2X230 for $1999. A new Yamaha A6A Reciever to be used as a Processor $1400. Would that be good enough?
I could go over a little with a New Marantz SR8015 reciever for the processor for $1999. I have set up budget audio equipment. I found great deals on some awesome equipment
Sorry but no. At least for me. I mean in what respect is that better.?Ls60 has so much power on tap its not even close. Of course power is not everything but individual power for each driver is pretty neat. But I am gonna be fair and say I haven’t heard your system but have heard Kef and sounded like it should be more expensive. Have you?
@Bergo8888 You're funny, you don't know Audio!! I know exactly what the LS60 is and how they sound. Musical Fidelity with the Focal Aria 948. That setup is a lot better than those kef,s ls60 and a lot less money. When you compare speakers and amp to sound quality.
"Blades sound thin and lifeless"???????? That's just a profoundly unserious comment. The fact it's coming from a speaker reviewer (and one i like) makes it even more puzzling. If you're ever in Dublin, New York or London we can give you a demo. Steve (sbitav ltd).
Random ass question tha popped in my head like 20 min ago; how loud do you have your audio stuff on when burning them in, and would playing it louder make a difference
Ahhh yes ive been waiting for this feview since noticing them off to tye side in a previous video. I guess i'd prefer the smooth sound of these than "fucking my own face" with the buchardts! 😂 That cracked me up. Kef has alot more money to spend more time "engineering" the sound than buchardt. No competition except for sheer spl from the Buchardts I would imagine. May be wrong but id bet on the Kefs.
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KEF is from the UK, it stands for Kent Engineering and Foundry.
Ah then it makes sense that they seek refuge in New Jersey
@@ZReviews to be fair, we did the same thing 247 years ago today
they're not from Sheffield or Birmingham
It’s near Dover
But mostly made in China these days as they’re owned by a Chinese company…
With a 6" wide baffle, anything below 760Hz will radiate in an omnidirectional pattern so no use in putting a larger driver on front.
Science
Also Opposite science MoFi SourcePoint 10 need to be reviewed.
How's that calculated?
But you should remember that most tower speakers are less than 10 inches wide. Also, they could very easily made them wider and they didn´t, so is the driver small because they are not wide, or the other way around (they are not wide because the driver is small)? What came first?
@@mindtraveller100 Ne I think it`s more complicated than that. A small driver on an wide speaker has a different sound emitting characteristic than on a narrow speaker. It seams they had a certain sound concept and look in mind. Probably they checked first now narrow they can make it without running into too big trouble with the side firing speakers. And planed on from there. Eventual took the front speaker that fitted the width best, DSP took care of the rest.
A few things: They are closed, i.e. no port. The gap is for cooling. Kef is a British brand. All drivers in each speaker are phase corrected to appear from the same virtual point in space. Combined with wide and even dispersion, they create extremely good imaging in my opinion. Although I am biased as I own a pair. Good engineering and a lot of R&D. The room correction it quite rudimental, at least the current version, and does not use the microphone. Just shelf EQ options, more or less.
KEFs are not always time and phase coherent. These new ones may be different, but their 800 series is traditionally not
How do you find them? I've got LS50Ws and look at these like the ultimate upgrade...
AHH well no fingering then then🙄
I have had the privilege of visiting kef hq, trust me when I say this, it's awesome, I am a fef fan and have been for years, the detail in the sound is amazing, I just dug a set of 3005s out and set them up on my sons desk running through a arcam a18, he is now hooked and wants a set of r100s, kef have never made a bad speaker, I have had r300/r500 and more but Mrs says no lol, currently running r200c /r100 and monitor audio atmos, sounds amazing, I may be looking at a pair of these as my final set, oh I have noticed that the kef does wake up my tinnitus, this is the reason for the monitor audio, BUT the detail and clarity is unreal, the 3001s what ever they are , my son was shocked, when I told him that they were 13 years old and been used for many set ups he was amazed that they were not in use. KEF my friends never stop. My old K2 sub is still spot on 10/10
I’ve owned those for a couple months now. They’re pretty incredible. They replaced a McIntosh MA8900 with Klipsch Forte IV’s which were fantastic as well. But these!! They freak my brain out every listening session. They’re powerful yet refined. Surprisingly great at low level listening. And the holographic, disappearing, deep and wide soundstage is truly something you need to experience firsthand. I’m in love.
I did add two SVS SB-1000’s to round out the low end but they are not necessary. Oh and the DSP app is needed to get the best out of these for each individual room, speaker placement, taste, etc. But once dialed in - crazy good.
Oh and the remote suuuucks.
Thanks for Confirming all the things.. And the remote
@@ZReviews for sure. Was fun to hear you go through all similar experiences/emotions I’ve been having. Well done.
@trey81373 can you tell me where you put those two extra subwoofers? I'm planning to buy these ls60s with two subs. For now, I'm thinking of putting both subs on both the left and right edge of my sofa.
@@QJHKI Sure. Fortunately I have enough space in my room to but them each to the outside of each speaker. So I have my LS60’s about 8 ft apart and then the subs are along the same wall about 3 ft to the outside of each speaker and about another 3 ft from the corners. Works great in my room.
@trey81373I'm thinking of replacing my current system for these. I currently have a Mcintosh ma7200/kef R3 meta/kc62/. I will keep the kc62 for the ls60s. Do you think I will be happy?
All the drivers are in phase just like Blades no dsp tricks. Smaller midrange and tweeter drivers have better of axis response. Combine this with an extremely narrow front baffle and you get a very large soundstage. You may have heard the Blades in less than ideal circumstances.
DSP is definitely used inside the product for phase correction in bass, eq, protection, etc. I meant there are no DSP “enhancements” that make the soundstage the way it is. It is due to the speaker’s design itself.
Your comments about speaker position and toe seem to work for the KEF R900 as well. I put mine straight and 8" more forward and realized I've been running a "overly warm (muddy) bubble" this whole time (that I was trying to tame with dsp). Seriously leveled up the sound to the point where I was stuck in the chair in disbelief. What was odd was I heard more clarity and treble after pointing them straight, one would think you would get even more directly pointed at you but at least with the R900, not the case. Thanks Zeos!
The LS60s are powered by 3 amps in each speaker. The 4 woofers are powered by two motors, each motor powering one woofer on each side, essentially cancelling all back waves. Very cleverly done. Imaging is as good as it is due to each speakers ability to present the sound from a single apparent source. With timing alignment making everything reach the listeners ears at the same time, it get's almost all advantages of a single driver speaker while keeping all advantages of multi driver speakers. You really need to use far more money than the KEF LS60s cost to get something similar with a passive system.
If you look at the Spinorama of the LS60 you'll notice that the early reflections are as linear as the on axis response.
Therefore any room reflections will have the same timbre as the direct sound which will lead to a good in room response even in an acoustically terrible room
Didnt like the dip at ~10khz, should have made it flatter with DSP. Perhaps the off axis response makes up for that on axis dip? 🤷♂️
@@AbsoluteFidelitythe 10k dip only appears if you are directly on axis (to the millimetre). It disappears in the listening window and early reflections. I didn’t hear it when I had the opportunity to listen to them.
@@sifi36 If you go by KEF's white paper, yeah it doesnt show in the LW and ER. Most people wont really noticed it either, its at a frequency where there are not much information. Still waiting for full spins to see if that dip is present in the PIR.
I know, these are great speakers. I have them in blue.
Ive heard the LS60 in 3 different rooms, they totally disappear and as much as you try to look at it to locate where the sound is actually coming from, its just impossible. When there are vocals, youll be searching high and low for the center channel, like 3 center channels. Instrument separation is the best Ive heard, imaging is so precise you can point out everything in the soundstage. In those 3 rooms Ive heard them, 2 were with no toe in and 1 was with minimal toe in, like 10 degrees, they all just pulled a David Copperfield on me. A little treble boost from the app helps tremendously too. Coaxial speakers are not supposed to be listened to on axis.
The reason why you say it disappears is the fact that it has the 2 kc62 force canceling drivers inside for the subwoofers in each box, and the subs give it that 3 dimensional sound.
There really isn't any fancy tech or trickery inside of those speakers.
My point is not worth it.
People, you would do a lot better by setting up your own system.
If you're going to spend 7k on this, put it elsewhere.
I could put a system together for you at 7k that would blow this out of the water
@@markmcfeaters9116 Thats gotta be the biggest pile of horse shit Ive ever heard, speakers dont disappear more easily when they have force canceling woofers. It is all about the coupling of the mids and tweeters, how well they are integrated. You have no damn clue yet you are barking saying it is not worth the money.
The woofers are not doing 75% of the work. That 4" mid range driver is. Yes, that's right, that thing. The 8 woofers are only playing sub 340Hz. So that 4" driver plays everything between 340Hz and 3.1kHz. And that thing on the back isn't a port. Well sort of, it's the vent port for the amps. The speakers themselves are not ported.
It’s likely been noted already but there is NO auto room correction via an iPhone. (As mentioned here - 34:35 ) Just the Kef Connect app with the manual DSP settings. But it is quite flexible and works great.
- casually listening to the speaker review
- mum comes in
- 14:58
LOL
You should call them "powered speakers", because the price at least doubles when the entire stereo system (preamp, power amps, DSP, DAC....) comes with the speakers. The LS60s have 3 separate power amps for bass, mid bass and vocals. The tiny 4" driver on the front has a 100watt amp driving it. I don't think you have to worry about blowing it. The bass drivers have a 500watt amp and I'm sure Kef has everything gain matched according to the power demands of each drivers.
MDF cabinet.. :) It's fun to see how easy active speakers make the whole hobby with all the digital magic :) I am not there yet.. still wanna play around with speakers, amps and so on to find my Nirvana :)
KEF and Triangle both are some of my favorite New Age speakers ' Indigo blue R3meta on their way I can't wait ! Its going to be a three some lol Kef vs Triangle vs Dynaudio !! Coming Soon '
Thanks Zeos ' Appricate your hardwork and dedication '
Bro. You need to visit the kef factory and ask them all the questions you want to know
KEF is British. The imaging/soundstage is supported by the narrow cabinets reducing diffraction and the uni-q driver. A minor toe-in 10 degrees or so makes them the best.
Acoustics in a high room can suck if you have lots of hard surfaces. In our house, I diy-ed an accoustic panel by hanging a stack of five "blankets for moving furniture" on one wall. To make it pretty, we printed a giant canvas at a local printer and hanged it in front of the blankets. The reverb time dropped from multiple seconds to maybe a second. Not perfect, but way better! It just dampens the back and forth bouncing of sound in the room. Having small kids, this has improved our daily life by tons and it cost a fraction of the commercial acoustic panels. The canvas print was an investment but it does make it look cool and gives you personalization options.
That's a really good point about 'The Shape of Sound'. I didn't see the original vid, but dam that is so true. Imaging and presentation is when the magic happens.
It’s the coaxial and single apparent source techniques that make the speaker allocation disappear. The ls50w2 actually also have the speakers disappear effect. Aren’t woofers omnidirectional so they don’t fire to left or right but everywhere. The ribbled sides of the woofers makes them stronger to “go in and out”. Sorry for my terrible English. To me they sound best with streaming Qobuz in the kef connect app. And u should really(!) connect them wired with the cat cable they sound better.
There is unfortunately no microphone room correction and there is no port, it’s the vent for the electronics.
Qobuz absolutely makes a difference - night and day compared to Apple Music.
The coaxial driver minimizes reflections, that's why it sounds good in that room.
Perfectly in phase too, I love coaxials for that reason
@@natskarot all coaxial are necessarily in phase. They are usually coherent in time domain , but the KEF Reference 3s with very similar coax drivers have the midrange and tweeter electrically wired out of phase with each other. They are not phase coherent.
No. The wide vertical sweet spot is NOT because of the side firing driver. It's because of the coaxial mid tweeter on the front. Because of that driver the vertical directivity is exactly the same as the horizontal directivity. It's the same on my LS 50's and my LS 50 Metas, and it's the same on every KEF because they all have the same tweeter/mid configuration.
Definitely not the same both ways given the tall and narrow baffle. But closer than most non-coax configurations would be.
Confirming that the original Blues Brothers film is FANTASTIC. An iconic, highly quotable comedy.
You could treat the great room into becoming a greater room. Certainly might cost a pretty penny and doing it in an aesthetic way would be a challenge.
And and and, forgot to say. Very entertaining review! In a good way
They should have been positioned much further away from the back wall in the great room. At least 1o feet. Also, the room correction software would have helped a lot. And as also mentioned some solid room work would make the biggest difference.
When you made the remark at 0:30, I immediately thought of the Ohms. I was going to ask you if you had the time to compare the LS60s to your Ohms in the Great Room, but i guess you answered that at 40:03? Or would you mind commenting further on LS60s vs Ohms, especially if you did ever put them both in your Great Room?
I know you left this comment a while ago but since I own a pair of LS60's and Ohm Walsh Tall 2000's, I thought I would chime in.
They sound absolutely nothing alike. I can only speak for my own listening space, but for me the Ohm's seem to throw sound in a huge arc up and over between the speakers, kinda creating the effect of the whole wall between them is making sound. The Kefs, on the other hand, are more like you are in a room and there are just sounds coming from that direction, each from a different point in space, but as far as you are concerned there are no speakers present.
Little abstract, but I hope that explains enough.
The best speakers don't sound like speakers. They sound like the orchestra is in the room.
well now you HAVE to test the blades in this biiig open space atleast once...right? :D
no
At the very least, I recommend to put even a small carpet (maybe 8'x10') in front of the speakers in the listening area. It would at least absorb the original/biggest sound reflections at the beginning, making smaller ones pass beyond the carpet, which would clean up the sound all over the house. You'll thank me later ;)
If z did his research, he would know the magic of kef speakers is the uni q driver and many generations going way back. That would be why positionally they don't have to be aimed at the listener because of their designed wide dispertion pattern. I'm assuming you have done other reviews of kefs in the past like the la 50, is 50 meta or the is 50 powered bookshelves? Not a secret as kef has been research and revising this same coaxial driver many years. This is what they are known for .
Z, have you considered reviewing TektonDesign speakers?
From what I've heard, the app is fairly important to getting the most out of them. Sucks that it didn't work for you.
It worked for a while. I still don't have an iphone to do the mock room correction
@@ZReviewskef doesn’t have room correction on any phone if you mean “microphone tuned”. Just normal EQ, would be on Android too.
Wow, going from your old apartment to this place is quite unbelievable! Did you inherit $10 million dollars? LOL
The cabinets on the LS60 is MDF not aluminum or magnesium. They are not made of metal they only weigh 60lbs each if they were aluminum they would weigh over 100lbs each.
The side firing woofers play the same thing and use their force canceling technology that is found in the blades too. I am interested in hearing these i will need to visit a local dealer. You also need to take into account that at $7k you get a total system and do not need to buy a separate amp or a dac unless you want to.
Please do a bit of research before you do these reviews.
I corrected the materials mid review. The upstairs part I had to do before getting them downstairs so I was just speaking from a plebs perspective. Having a local dealer with these will be a plus.
@@ZReviews I will go give them a listen. I am not in the market for speakers at this price range currently. They would be for a smaller office system in the future.
Also love Walsh 5000s & Larsen 9s
Superb designs!
Treat the ceiling, reduce reverb and also put so absorption on the walls and you’ll have an incredible space.
...and carpets. never forget the floor
The sad part is that these speakers could have lasted a lifetime, if the amps/brains were seperate and could be upgraded OR they also had passive speaker wire inputs.
These may well be paper weights in 5-10 years...
They'll make nice speaker stands.
One of the reasons where passive is better and honestly my preference.
taking the cost at 7700 with tax and taking your 10 years as an example. That is 120 months, so $7700/120 months puts it at 65 bucks a month roughly, given 30 days a month, 65/30 puts you at 2 bucks a day. So 2 bucks a day for 10 years, you would enjoy a highly integrated system which will be come nice decorations after 10 years. Now lets talk about how much money have we lost from buying and selling audio equipment, specialized snake oil cables, and special non-vibrating isolation feet to chase that wonderful well integrated sound? I would argue the former is a better way than the latter.
@@celticspride133 we will have to agree to disagree.
You could just avoid the snake oil...
@@Christhebearable I’m quite fine with that, I have heard these nice speakers and planning on getting rid of my gear, recoup my money and spend a measly 7k. For what you get out of this solution, can’t really beat it. And yes I understand the other side, I was once there ;-)
KEF .. KEF is a proud pioneer of excellence in sound.
Since 1961, from our UK home, we have created remarkable award-winning speakers. From our ground-breaking Uni-Q technology to our bar-setting LS60 Wireless, KEF exists to fill rooms with music as it was made to be heard, to move souls with truly authentic soundscapes. Now, we're bringing more people with us on our journey to discover the power of great sound.
Pretty sure it's just simple acoustics. Because the side drivers are plane woofers & they don't use dsp. The whole great imaging is amplified due to combination of coax & thin front baffle.
sidefiring drivers often dont do much above 150 hz, theres also not very much room left if you divide the space between.
they either work in pairs or from the same channel, could also be those wierd dual cone drivers that share the same motor system.
LoveLoveEffingLove LS 60s!!!
Simply fabulous!
Great Review! I am currently hesitating buying LS60s or A700... Big Dilema. Which one of the two would be recommended at low volume? Would the A700 bring a little Fatigue ( as they "F... our faces")? Any plan to try Dynaudio Focus 50?
$7,000 isn’t cheap but given the quality of the speakers, the amplification, the number of inputs and having heard them on a number of occasions I completely agree that they are worth it.
Here's the thing though. Obviously with just the matl's involved, they're not worth that. Its the recipe that works and if they sell a few thousand pairs at 7k, they could have sold 100's of thousands at 3k. Its their call and the audiofile (I spelled it that was because its grating) community is super odd, KEF is odd amongst the odd, so whatever. Their speakers won't be heard by as many people as they could have been. That doesn't sound like a smart or good company. They don't want to make money and they don't want more customers to buy their products. They're like playing a game of keep-away. Good luck.
@@Cinnabuns2009 They have offerings down to $300 FYI. What you're getting in that configuration is arguably killer value compared to separate components, let alone the design itself which is something always worked in as a pillar of price calculation. Get with it now
hard to buy a speaker pair and amp who match and can peak 500w +
These look like they were made for rooms like the great room. People that can afford $7,000 speakers for their penthouse that's all tile and glass, reverb and echoes. High WAF and not obtrusive, absolute killer combination for a "modern home".
Pretty cool that you can hear the imaging through your mic setup for the GoPro. Is there an external mic setup or is all just the GoPro? It's impressive either way. Coaxials are my absolute favorite.
Just the Hero 10. The speaker reviews on the new DJI Pocket 2 are even better.
Would you Keep the LS60 or the A700 if you had to choose ?
I have to say that every KEF active product I tested was very picky with wifi … and support for 1st gen product is non existent 2 years after initial release …
My dad ran KEF 8"s two way with a dome tweeter into the digital display New Acoustic Dimension NAD. That changed me to go for quality.
What you choosing? This or the buchardt
yes that big room is audio imposible.. you ll have to invest in some treatment
Holyshit what o big space in the house. Perfect for big speakers. If you fix the bad acoustics. How can you rewiw speaker if you dont know anything about them, or how speaker works 😮
Can you please make a review of the fluance signature towers to compare with speakers many times their price. I have been amazed by them and would like to see a comparison to see if I am missing much or if what I have is close. i have been watching and appreciating your reviews since around when you made the fluance signature bookshelves. I have used the bookshelves for the past 7 years and was absolutely shocked by the difference between them and the towers, they are not in the same class and would like to see you compare them to the buchard towers, ls60’s, and b&w 704 s3’s
Looks like you are checking under the rugs for twinkies. Can you sugest some sub amp modules, just make a simple pyramid with an 8 down firing - cut the top off and add foam. It will do better than whats been offered for much less. Don't mean to be harsh, but amp modules are abundant and make for a taylored sound stage. Base detail is friggin astounding when tuned right.
From watching your video i'm getting the idea they are not for every music genre. Can you get them to slam more through the app? They do have some kind of tone control i believe. And can they be used in a surround setup? PS: Steinway Lyngdorf has done this with the dsp thing 15 years ago but at a huge price.
The sound great with every genre I’ve thrown at them. Even hard rock/metal.
No sweetspot is because of concentric design and bass drivers being above and below the tweeter. Design makes sense because of amazing directivity of the speakers. Same as expensive genelecs
Its not 7000 vs 7000 if you need to add a source and amplification - its more 7000 vs 20,000 - also get yourself two of the KC62 subs - makes all the difference - one per channel the 60's can add them in monaural - its what i did
They look amazing and i bet they sound great in person. I wonder how they compare to the R5s with in amp is the same price range.
Thanks Zeos for this review!
maybe the wood is for internal bracing as with the ls50?
How dare they include such a remote at 7K?!
Kef is from UK come on Zeos !!!
All that is =
2 much larger housings of the LS50 wireless 2 with 2 built in kc62 force canceling subwoofers.
Thats it besides the same basic tech inside.
I have the LS50 wireless 2 with 2 kef kc62 subs they are great for space saving. Thats all its good for.
For my Home entertainment its totally different with way better speakers and better Amps, and processor with way better subwoofers.
Blows any of the kef out of the water
They do sound great but just a 2 year warranty from a manufacturer as big as KEF (on all that electrical & amps). And at 7k, total deal breaker here
I also didn’t like the blades. But then I heard them at a Best Buy with big boy amps on them, and that changed it. The blades need power. A lot of power. They pinned a 600 watt mono block McIntosh amp with hyponocurrency, amazing. The ls60 are incredible and quite a bargain
If i had a bigger room i probly would've gotten these.
Ended up getting the LS50 Wireless II's last year.
They sound pretty amazing, shit ton of power too. lol
Also yeah these come with the same remote.
The app shows you the volume, also has a bunch of other features.
Worked great for calibrating them to my room.
Sucks that you couldn't get it to work, but atleast for me once paired i've never had to use google home.
KEF's French, right? .....i laughed out loud when i heard that!
For less money could you give your review of the Magneplan LRS+ which I understand is the USA bargain of the century (not so much in the UK)?
Not necessarily less money when you consider the quality and power of amplification needed to get those to sing. As well as all other components to stream, DAC, etc.
@@trey81373 Sadly you make a good point.
I wish I could get onboard with the LS60s but after seeing how quickly KEF cut off the gen1 LS50 wireless gen1 support with no upgrade path and the amount I see come up on marketplace with dead amp modules. It’s a hard pass having such an integrated speaker unfortunately… They need a massive warranty and support to backup the price tag…
Now we got some scandalous stuff here
@@ZReviews I love KEF dont get me wrong but should be a 5yr warranty on n everything not just the drivers
@@whatcouldgowrong7914 Yeah, the way they handled their wireless speakers kind of put me off KEF. There was an LSX sale at a shop so I looked them up, even some of the reviews mentioned connection problems, but the comments had even more complaints about the app, the connection, the customer service. Used sites also often have a bunch of them, some of them not connecting, not resetting or just a red light blinking. I think originally they were sold for around 1100-1200 USD, at that price I would expect them to work properly and the company to handle complaints.
Two pairs of Ls-50 fizzled out👎
its point source ,wide sweetspot realism ,and UK.
what where the kali audio small speakers you recommended awhile back
i think he hates input selection on circular buttons
32:27 last time I checked Kent was in England.
Uni-Q concentric driver ... That's the magic Imaging ...
You haven't had the MoFi Source Point 8s yet? ..
My god the reflections that room no speaker can tame it
Kef is all about science.
Sure wish you were able to play music samples longer that a couple of seconds.
Ohm Walshes might sound better upstairs, their made for big open spaces IIRC
Downstairs: What do all those multiple speakers resonating at different frequencies do to the overall sound of the ones you are listening to?
Would it be worth replacing my KEF R11’s and Naim Uniti Atom?
Currently they are sold for 5k instead of 7k
Zeos, the reason that the app stopped working for you will be because you lost gps location which is required for remote control of some network devices using google home.
It is by far the most annoying thing about these speakers, the remote is a close second...
Hello:) I have the Buchardt A700 and am thinking about switching to the Kef ls60. Is the change worth it? Kind regards, Sascha
I personally wasn't satisfied, given the price I expected better. I have the KEF R7 meta and these KEF LS60s and the latter sound really bad
Great review
I want them, but for $7k, I can sell my car, pair it with those funds, and have another nice ride for 10 years. With a radio included :) Nice review, tho. I drooooled, so here's an upthumb for "but a boy can dream".
Try omni-directional speakers in that room
I had my ohm walsh 2000 in there. Not enough
Yes try the Ohm Walsh speakers
@@ZReviews Try Duevel one of these days
Unicore dual bass drivers work as one
Doesn't the Walsh Ohm have a similar soundstage ?
Walsh even more but it isn't as precise. I had to add those Aperion super tweeters to get them close
How much the Aperions?
Super Bass 2! Christian McBride ❤
Are these much better than Airpulse a300pro?
No air pulse is a bit better
hahahaha kef its another level !!!!!!!!! a300 pro barelly better than q350 bookshelf@@Necrohermit
What is the song at 24:44? I've heard that song but can't for the life of me remember and I need to add it t my playlist.
Lay, Lady, Lay, Bob Dylan
Yeah... those are great speakers. =)
People i could put a complete system together for you at 7k that would blow this out of the water
What would that be?
@Bergo8888
Right now I could pick up a brand new set of Focal Aria 948 for $3499. A new Music Fidelity 2 channel Amp 2X230 for $1999.
A new Yamaha A6A Reciever to be used as a Processor $1400.
Would that be good enough?
I could go over a little with a New Marantz SR8015 reciever for the processor for $1999.
I have set up budget audio equipment.
I found great deals on some awesome equipment
Sorry but no. At least for me. I mean in what respect is that better.?Ls60 has so much power on tap its not even close. Of course power is not everything but individual power for each driver is pretty neat. But I am gonna be fair and say I haven’t heard your system but have heard Kef and sounded like it should be more expensive. Have you?
@Bergo8888
You're funny, you don't know Audio!!
I know exactly what the LS60 is and how they sound.
Musical Fidelity with the Focal Aria 948.
That setup is a lot better than those kef,s ls60 and a lot less money.
When you compare speakers and amp to sound quality.
"Blades sound thin and lifeless"???????? That's just a profoundly unserious comment.
The fact it's coming from a speaker reviewer (and one i like) makes it even more puzzling.
If you're ever in Dublin, New York or London we can give you a demo.
Steve (sbitav ltd).
Kef LS60 vs Airpulse A300 Pro?
Random ass question tha popped in my head like 20 min ago; how loud do you have your audio stuff on when burning them in, and would playing it louder make a difference
Yes it does. USUALLY a tad above listening level.
@@ZReviews Would playing it very loud cause it to burn in even faster because of the bigger movements needed for such volumes?
Hi what song is playing around 38:34 ..? 😊
23:13 lol it's called a crossover. You should learn how speakers work.
Ahhh yes ive been waiting for this feview since noticing them off to tye side in a previous video. I guess i'd prefer the smooth sound of these than "fucking my own face" with the buchardts! 😂 That cracked me up. Kef has alot more money to spend more time "engineering" the sound than buchardt. No competition except for sheer spl from the Buchardts I would imagine. May be wrong but id bet on the Kefs.
👍 Strategist by Kensuke Ushio