KEF Blade 2 Meta review by Erin's Audio Corner

[Ciobi69]

To my untrained eyes, how is this better than ls60 wireless, outside of it can play noticeably louder without distortion and it looks "fancier/more luxury"?

Its a different beast.ls60 are very good but limited in spl and other things

 

[Ron Texas]

To my untrained eyes, how is this better than ls60 wireless, outside of it can play noticeably louder without distortion and it looks "fancier/more luxury"?

Se ee post #168

 

[slaweks]

You won't, but I'm letting you know why you don't hear hissing, because the hissing has been filtered out, not because the amp is impeccably low in noise.

Right, actually, that was a very useful information. Thank you.

 

[Mnyb]

For a truckload of money the Blade ought to be a lot better.

Should I start a go fund me for the Blade 2 Meta?

Meanwhile I’ll enjoy my output limited ls60 with kc92 ping me when you get the blades

 

[mj30250]

What! No cable lifters. Total fail!

Evidently no bi-wiring, either. What a waste!

 

[slaweks]

Exactly what I meant, it's purely anecdotal and subjective, doesn't mean it's not hissing


what about it? that's my thread, just read it to the end

Hi. I did read it to the end, but my conclusion was that the squeaky wheel gets (occasionally, when lucky) the grease. The speaker has not been recalled, and generally it is hissing as before.

​

 

[dfuller]

To my untrained eyes, how is this better than ls60 wireless, outside of it can play noticeably louder without distortion and it looks "fancier/more luxury"?

Unlike the LS60 it lacks any meaningful short-term compression, and its beamwidth is controlled to a much lower frequency (looks like it becomes directional in the ~300hz area where the LS60 is more like an octave higher), which should mean less transition region room interaction.

 

[Ciobi69]

Can someone do the eq on the spinorama app with the frequencies to be corrected. The classic spinorama eq

 

[goat76]

On the other hand, if a track is mixed and mastered with some crappy monitor speakers, I would really have to like the track musically to buy it.

The most important thing is that the mixing or the mastering engineer knows and feels comfortable with their choice of speakers. I'm pretty sure a lot of the audio productions you consider to be some of the most great-sounding ones are done using speakers you would've called "crappy". It's more about how skillful the engineers are at mixing and mastering and has very little to do with their choice of speakers.

 

[holdingpants01]

Hi. I did read it to the end, but my conclusion was that the squeaky wheel gets (occasionally, when lucky) the grease. The speaker has not been recalled, and generally it is hissing as before.

​

if that's your conclusion then you have comprehension issues and I cannot help you

 

[ban25]

That was my wife's decision since none of the options I offered could "disappear."

Ordered. I auditioned them at my preferred local dealer after lunch. Very impressive with the bass response in particular. Should have them in about a week.

 

[cavedriver]

Now this is almost driving towards the extreme where the "speaker" gets hidden in something else. My project list still has plans for trying to bury tactile transducers into framed art to hide surround speakers in the room.

If you "hide" the edges of a panel by putting a picture frame in front of it I guess you could make a transducer-driven design work. But have you actually heard one of these things? I've seen some of the videos with measurements on youtube and they look like quite the mess but I don't remember what their directivity is like. I assume it's quite wide.

 

[CleanSound]

Ordered. I auditioned them at my preferred local dealer after lunch. Very impressive with the bass response in particular. Should have them in about a week.

I prey you did not pay full MSRP for it.

 

[ban25]

I prey you did not pay full MSRP for it.

Got some discount out of it plus the option to buy my old towers. Next step to consider will be amplification. I am trying to decide between McIntosh and NAD Masters Series. We will see.

 

[stren]

Nice and clever of KEF to give Amir and Erin a pair to test.
Amir and Erin are becoming an authority on the reviewers field.

Is Amir getting the blade as well or do you mean the R11M? Eitherway it's great to see them be more active on here and support both sites. Also gives a lot of credence to their own data.

 

[DMill]

I’m quitting this site. This goddamn thing is keeping me from Bora Bora.

 

[Sokel]

I’m quitting this site. This goddamn thing is keeping me from Bora Bora.

I was watching a docu about a turtle that does more than 3 rounds around the world during it's lifetime.
We people deserve at least one,better quit

 

[alont]

Got some discount out of it plus the option to buy my old towers. Next step to consider will be amplification. I am trying to decide between McIntosh and NAD Masters Series. We will see.

Congrats! Also don't forget to get some proper room correction implemented if you haven't already.

Dirac Live ART with Storm Audio or Trinnov + Waveforming if you want the very best to match your new SOTA speakers

 

[al2002]

I find narrow directivity speakers can sound ‘congested’ and lacking in ‘air’, in Stereo especially on naturally recorded large scale works. If the Blades had wider dispersion, say +/- 60 degrees, I’d consider them, but for now I’ll stay with the Salon2. In multichannel music playback, narrow directivity speakers can be more tolerable.

DRC will not affect directivity.

 

[ban25]

Congrats! Also don't forget to get some proper room correction implemented if you haven't already.

Dirac Live ART with Storm Audio or Trinnov + Waveforming if you want the very best to match your new SOTA speakers

Thanks! I'm currently running Dirac + DLBC, will be adding ART for sure as soon as it's available for Integra or Marantz.