KEF Q100 Speaker Review

[thewas]

You are a young man, you should not live in the past!

Check how it is done these days with modern designs, same width, same drivers

Wish I was still young , here is though a slightly different approach of a modern design

(Source: https://www.genelec.com/-/caption-this-competition-8010-versus-1236)

 

[QMuse]

Wish I was still young , here is though a slightly different approach of a modern design

View attachment 53986
(Source: https://www.genelec.com/-/caption-this-competition-8010-versus-1236)

LOL

It would be interesting to see how their DI's compare.

 

[Doodski]

What makes a loudspeaker 'forgiving' of poor recordings? Some inherent positive manipulation, perhaps? View attachment 53936

I would tend to think that better loudspeakers are more forgiving of better recordings.

I gotta chime in on this one. My big Altec horns with KEF 107.2 tweeters and woofers in a large transmission line cabinet where very forgiving of most everything. The only CD I had issues with was Ahmad Jamal Digital Works because they recorded it reallly bright sounding and after awhile it gets on one's nerves.

 

[Frank Dernie]

Wish I was still young , here is though a slightly different approach of a modern design

View attachment 53986
(Source: https://www.genelec.com/-/caption-this-competition-8010-versus-1236)

When I looked at getting Genelecs those monsters are the ones they recommended for my listening distance !

 

[thewas]

LOL

It would be interesting to see how their DI's compare.

Here you go

 

[QMuse]

Here you go

View attachment 53987View attachment 53988

Ahh, you're cheating - you picked up an example that proves your point!

Anyway, who's wife would allow such ugly black boxes to enter the living room?!? But those nice KEF Reference speakers- that's another story..

 

[Frank Dernie]

Here you go

View attachment 53987View attachment 53988

The 8010 is nowhere close to being able to get loud enough in my room at 5m.
I listened to a pair at the HiFiWigwam show last year against small B&W blutooth speakers. Everybody preferred the B&Ws.
The 1236 is a bit big but I was sorely tempted.

 

[richard12511]

Impressive scores on the R3, I see

Most people discuss the scores-with-subwoofer, but none of your listening tests have been that way...

There's no speaker that I would ever run full range without subs, so I tend to ignore the full range score and only look at the with sub score.

Count me in the group that wants with subwoofer listening impressions. Might be more complicated, though, and amir has been busy pumping out these reviews.

 

[maty]

Erin (hardisj) in his old site medleysmusings.com [closed], wrote:

Kef R300 Midrange Drive Unit Testing

[ Parting Thoughts

The benefit of having a coincident design is excellent. I’ve toyed with a few here and there, though, I felt the companies’ never quite got it right. So, when I first started testing the Kef drive units I didn’t expect much, to be honest. However, the previous Kef Uni-Q units I’ve tested (HTS3001SE & Q100) have proven to be very well designed. My results for the R300 drive unit show the same standard of performance. I took the time to listen to these along with the Q100 speakers I have and must say that I am now sold on Kef’s coincident driver engineering. I was extremely impressed by these (two) drive units’ performance in my listening tests. People tend to get caught up in subjective ‘analysis’ whereas I fall in to a very objective analyzer category. I tend to ignore subjective reviews in whole and often advise others to use them lightly, unless there is objective data to correlate. This is why it’s rare I comment on the sound of a speaker/driver.

But, I can unequivocally say, after about 3 weeks of listening to these R-series mids and the Q100 speakers – against my coveted DIY speakers and countless other drive units – these truly are the best drive units I’ve laid ears on. And, for the price, the Q100 speaker is what I would consider an excellent value for the critical listener on a real-world budget. In fact, I intended to sell my Q100′s after testing the drive units but I have since decided to use the Q100′s as portable reference system... ]

 

[Ron Texas]

There's no speaker that I would ever run full range without subs, so I tend to ignore the full range score and only look at the with sub score.

Count me in the group that wants with subwoofer listening impressions. Might be more complicated, though, and amir has been busy pumping out these reviews.

I think some of the big floor standing speakers can be equalized to where they are OK without a sub, but there is a loss of headroom. Triton's have built in sub's. When it comes to the smaller speakers the difference is dramatic, as I have found with JBL 305P's, LS50's and the Pioneer BS22. Frankly, I have to discount some of our host's recommendations although I don't doubt the quality of his measurements.

 

[Dzhaughn]

A foam port plug is part of these speakers. The manual says that you will get flat response down to 2Hz if you install it. (Well, it doesn't literally say that, since it literally has no words on the question, but see the second panel from the top of of page 9.)

https://www.manualslib.com/manual/871154/Kef-Q100.html?page=9#manual

Omitting the plug could well be why you measured such impressive bass response. Hmmmm.

But seriously, I am not sure what to make of these measurements with the speaker not set up as spec'd. Would one test the Revel M16 with something stuffed in the port in the back? Maybe, but one wouldn't call the result "A review of the Revel M16."

 

[amirm]

If he is listening loudly in a large room with only one speaker driven to high volumes I would be surprised if 100watts is always enough.

You must have misread my post. The amplifier I am using has 1,000 (one thousand) watts into 4 ohm. It weighs 120+ pounds. It can blow speakers this small to pieces if I let it. It powers every speaker the same way in the same location and has no problem with any of them.

 

[Dzhaughn]

"I think the famous reputation Q100 has more to do with its great looks than sound."

Well, I bought them because of the glowing review in Wirecutter. And because it was small, white, and $300 for the pair, new.

 

[Jon AA]

They did sound very nice though but "realistic" is going too far since it was not an accurate transcription of my recording.
The stereo image was fantastically deep so I loved them, but it is not real, it is created by the acoustics of the room and how the speaker bounces sound around it, so is an added artefact.

Thank you. I've argued back and forth with people (maggi fans, etc) in the past that while the "holographic imaging" and "soundstaging" produced by these speakers may sound fantastic to them, that doesn't mean it's real. That doesn't mean the imaging they're hearing is actually contained in the recording. The speakers are "spacially coloring" the sound.

Of course they won't believe it. They'll believe to their dying day that these speakers let them "hear into the recording" deeper and better than "normal" speakers ever can.

 

[Jon AA]

https://www.manualslib.com/manual/871154/Kef-Q100.html?page=9#manual

The manual doesn't really say anything, but has lots of cool diagrams.

Of particular note for all those saying these speakers are designed to be listened to off-axis, the manual surely seems to show them toeing the left and right speakers in, pointing right at the listening position.

 

[amirm]

R3 review is out: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/kef-r3-speaker-review.12021/

 

[JohnBooty]

I don't agree. This score is not a private affair of @MZKM but his immplemetation of Olive's scoring method

You misunderstand my point.

I didn't say it was MZKM's proprietary scoring method.

I said people were mistakenly thinking that the scores were Amir's work, or otherwise had his direct blessing. It would be beneficial for MZKM to clarify that when he posts the scores imho.

 

[QMuse]

You misunderstand my point.

I didn't say it was MZKM's proprietary scoring method.

I said people were mistakenly thinking that the scores were Amir's work, or otherwise had his direct blessing. It would be beneficial for MZKM to clarify that when he posts the scores imho.

It has been clarified several times, there is even a dedicated thread about it. It is obviously easier for some folks to make false assumptions than to read carefully.

@MZKM is of curse doing it in agreement with Amir.

 

[thewas]

@MZKM is of curse doing it in agreement with Amir.

A Freudian slip?

 

[JohnBooty]

I don't have any skin in the game here; I understand the scoring methodology, its history, and it's (non-)relationship to ASR.

It has been clarified several times, there is even a dedicated thread about it. It is obviously easier for some folks to make false assumptions than to read carefully.

@MZKM is of curse doing it in agreement with Amir.

Just to clarify: your position is that everybody should search through scads of forum threads for the necessary context and supplemental information, rather than MZKM simply adding a brief note of clarification to his posted scores?

That is a extremely odd position to take, and we'll need to simply agree to disagree.

Well, that's fine. It was only a suggestion.