KEF Reference 5 VS Blade 2 vs Muon

[Pdxwayne]

I have the R7 and also listened the reference 3.

Nice. So no difference at all to you?

 

[BrokenEnglishGuy]

Nice. So no difference at all to you?

First of all the bigget difference its the bass, deeper and cleaner, the rest small upgrades in a already good Design, you can improve with dsp the fr for have something like Reference.
Reference needs larger room vs R series.
Both are the same Design, to me sounds very similar only small difference in the FR. Now I dont believe a stores gonna tell you " the r series sounds close to reference and doesnt worth the extra money", of course the reference gonna have a better placement.

 

[Pdxwayne]

First of all the bigget difference its the bass, deeper and cleaner, the rest small upgrades in a already good Design, you can improve with dsp the fr for have something like Reference.
Reference needs larger room vs R series.
Both are the same Design, to me sounds very similar only small difference in the FR. Now I dont believe a stores gonna tell you " the r series sounds close to reference and doesnt worth the extra money", of course the reference gonna have a better placement.

I read somewhere that bass is 20% of listeners' preference. So better bass clarity was likely one reason I prefer the Reference series.

Thinking back to my auditions in dealer's room, indeed the Reference series were paired with their best chain of streamer, DAC, preamp, amp, etc. R series, as I recall, not using the best chain. Maybe that was another one of the reasons of the difference heard.

 

[BrokenEnglishGuy]

I read somewhere that bass is 20% of listeners' preference. So better bass clarity was likely one reason I prefer the Reference series.

Thinking back to my auditions in dealer's room, indeed the Reference series were paired with their best chain of streamer, DAC, preamp, amp, etc. R series, as I recall, not using the best chain. Maybe that was another one of the reasons of the difference heard.

Yeah the reference have better bass.. But the ref3 is a 50kg speaker and R7 32kg..
Reference have a wonderful bass but the room is the problem, its much easier to set a R7 in your personal listening room. Personally I use 2 foam plugs " O" form in the port because the bass is too clean and deeper in my space, the goal is integrate the personal space with the speaker.. Stores are very different than the common places where costumers gonna put his speaker...
For example I need to use foam plugs so if you asked if I wanna upgrade for get more bass.. That uograde gonna be kind of a meh... For paying 3x 4x times the prices of my R7

If kef make a mini blade meta material that gonna be a upgrade, refence to me are needed if you have a nice big place, if not... Better the R.
A guy here said that anything above ref1 activa te room modes, yeah the ref3 make a lot of tactile bass.. Its a problem.

 

[Pdxwayne]

Yeah the reference have better bass.. But the ref3 is a 50kg speaker and R7 32kg..
Reference have a wonderful bass but the room is the problem, its much easier to set a R7 in your personal listening room. Personally I use 2 foam plugs " O" form in the port because the bass is too clean and deeper in my space, the goal is integrate the personal space with the speaker.. Stores are very different than the common places where costumers gonna put his speaker...
For example I need to use foam plugs so if you asked if I wanna upgrade for get more bass.. That uograde gonna be kind of a meh... For paying 3x 4x times the prices of my R7

If kef make a mini blade meta material that gonna be a upgrade, refence to me are needed if you have a nice big place, if not... Better the R.
A guy here said that anything above ref1 activa te room modes, yeah the ref3 make a lot of tactile bass.. Its a problem.

I think I said that that anything above ref1 activates room modes of my dealer's room.
; )

Anyway, even for a large space for home (like 5000+ cubic ft), I still get room modes. I have found that for my bookshelf and floor standers, stuff the ports sound cleaner in my room.

So, even if I only just have REF 1, I would still seal the back ports. Not everyone is lucky as steve59 to have a nice listening room with speakers placement flexibility.
; )

 

[BrokenEnglishGuy]

I think I said that that anything above ref1 activates room modes of my dealer's room.
; )

Anyway, even for a large space for home (like 5000+ cubic ft), I still get room modes. I have found that for my bookshelf and floor standers, stuff the ports sound cleaner in my room.

So, even if I only just have REF 1, I would still seal the back ports. Not everyone is lucky as steve59 to have a nice listening room with speakers placement flexibility.
; )

But i have a question, if your dealers make sure that you are going to listening the R7 instead of a bad room with a speaker inside, why your dealer doesnt have a proper acoustic treatment? Now if you said that, means to me that your dealer didnt even have a room correction EQ..
How can you judge speakers in that way?

 

[steve59]

So, even if I only just have REF 1, I would still seal the back ports. Not everyone is lucky as steve59 to have a nice listening room with speakers placement flexibility.
; )

I can imagine having a few ASR's over for a listen now,

The best bass in my room came from a pair was the persona 7f, but the mids needed a warmer amp than my hegel. The blades came up at nearly the same price as I got for the 7f and they were on my bucket list and though I was negotiating for a pair of legacy aeris I couldn't pass up a chance to try the blades. The banks are paying .5% in a money market acct so if I can get a used pair of dream speakers at a good discount I go for it.

 

[Pdxwayne]

But i have a question, if your dealers make sure that you are going to listening the R7 instead of a bad room with a speaker inside, why your dealer doesnt have a proper acoustic treatment? Now if you said that, means to me that your dealer didnt even have a room correction EQ..
How can you judge speakers in that way?

Why would such dealer add eq to chain? Have you seen any independent dealers use eq when demo expensive speakers?

 

[BrokenEnglishGuy]

Why would such dealer add eq to chain? Have you seen any independent dealers use eq when demo expensive speakers?

So no EQ and no room treatment and did you expected a nice sounding..



I haven't seen any independent dealer doing EQ to their speaker, dealers prefer to offer his special cable instead of attack the problem with EQ in their rooms, lol.

 

[Pdxwayne]

So no EQ and no room treatment and did you expected a nice sounding..



I haven't seen any independent dealer doing EQ to their speaker, dealers prefer to offer his special cable instead of attack the problem with EQ in their rooms, lol.

Wow, so no eq and room treatments and you can't tell one speakers from another?

 

[Ron Texas]

The other thing those cars have in common with the Muon/Blade apart from price, is that practically everyone who buys them will never use them in a way that reveals their specialness.

Horsefeathers! Just look at how many exotics get wrecked. The photos show up on Autospies and the insurance rates are insane. I have a Camaro SS and I'm not going to admit to any crimes here, but it kicks ass.

 

[BrokenEnglishGuy]

Wow, so no eq and room treatments and you can't tell one speakers from another?

Where i said that?
I said only that you only came to that store for hearing a bad room with 0 proper integration. Even amir had a problem in his room and got bad sounding because of that problem in his room. That review Kef R3 was one of the first.

Many people in their home are gonna do some EQ or room treatment, stores was never a good place for judge speaker, at least for me.


Is never a surprise that someone improve a lot his sound using EQ or room treatment. Only for listening badly room's in stores don't gonna show you the entire history about a loudspeaker, specially because if the store have the reference and R they never gonna put the same chain in both towers.


Even amir didn't know they got a problem in his room but the KLIPPEL NFS is much better than a human listening a speaker, the klippel doesn't showed any weird thing that amir was listening because the speaker was never the problem, but the room.

 

[Pdxwayne]

Where i said that?
I said only that you only came to that store for hearing a bad room with 0 proper integration. Even amir had a problem in his room and got bad sounding because of that problem in his room. That review Kef R3 was one of the first.

Many people in their home are gonna do some EQ or room treatment, stores was never a good place for judge speaker, at least for me.


Is never a surprise that someone improve a lot his sound using EQ or room treatment. Only for listening badly room's in stores don't gonna show you the entire history about a loudspeaker, specially because if the store have the reference and R they never gonna put the same chain in both towers.


Even amir didn't know they got a problem in his room but the KLIPPEL NFS is much better than a human listening a speaker, the klippel doesn't showed any weird thing that amir was listening because the speaker was never the problem, but the room.

I am assuming he listened to Revel M16 in exact same location in the room when he did listening comparison? The Revel has a back port too. That means same room issue applies to Ravel. Why he significantly prefers the Ravel when same room issue is there?

Also, even after he fixed the room issue, he said the sound of R3 was "very good". He didn't say it was as good as Ravel....

What did that tell you? For me, it means that one can still sense major differences between speakers even with room issues and without eq.

 

[SS55]

Not that I can afford any one of them but does anyone know the difference in performance between these monsters? Any reliable graphs from anywhere comparing all of them? Really interested in what KEF can really do with their real high end stuff.

I have not heard the Muon, so can’t comment on how good or bad they are. From what I know the Muon is a engineering exercise/flex from KEF. You can say it’s the Bugatti Chiron of the speaker world while the Blade 2 is the Bentley Continental.

As a owner of Blade 2 I have had people tell me there are better speakers out there and there were some who were impressed by it’s sound. So if you ask people which of the three is better it’s going to be all over the place based on their experience and expectations. As always there is no perfect speaker, no perfect room and no perfect audio recording.

 

[atsmusic]

I read somewhere that bass is 20% of listeners' preference. So better bass clarity was likely one reason I prefer the Reference series.

Thinking back to my auditions in dealer's room, indeed the Reference series were paired with their best chain of streamer, DAC, preamp, amp, etc. R series, as I recall, not using the best chain. Maybe that was another one of the reasons of the difference heard.

I think what you are referring to is actually 30%

 

[Doodski]

I have not heard the Muon, so can’t comment on how good or bad they are. From what I know the Muon is a engineering exercise/flex from KEF. You can say it’s the Bugatti Chiron of the speaker world while the Blade 2 is the Bentley Continental.

As a owner of Blade 2 I have had people tell me there are better speakers out there and there were some who were impressed by it’s sound. So if you ask people which of the three is better it’s going to be all over the place based on their experience and expectations. As always there is no perfect speaker, no perfect room and no perfect audio recording.

I retailed the full line of KEF for 9 years and then provided KEF warranty service for some years and have had very good success representing the brand. For a brand to exist in a retailer's space competing with many different makes and hundreds of models in stock and to have the success that KEF did means that it is a good product for both the customer and the retailer. I owned different KEF models that I paid for out of hand. For me to pay for speakers for some years was unheard of because I won so many in sales contests or I was gifted KEF constructor parts and Reference Series parts and I assembled speakers. So for me to buy KEFs means that I liked them. I've owned the 2 way C25(A design intended to be placed right against the wall), the C55 Uni-Q, 104.2 Reference Series, a pair of large transmission line design 3 way that I was going to take to a 4 way but never got around to that and even a set of KEF earbuds for the cel tel. The KEF transmission line tri-amp'd speakers where the most fun and the most involving speaker system that I've owned. What I found about KEF is that they are not initially as impressive as some other brands of speakers in the sound room but for long duration listening they are very good. I sold customers on the excellent KEF warranty of the time, the very good support from the KEF rep, the very good construction, the design and manufacturing capability of KEF and the integrity of the company to provide future long term customer support. KEF seems to still have the same engineering prowess and technical drive, the good intention and goals to provide the best it can for the expense of each model and to be a serious contender in the marketplace. I never had a dissatisfied KEF buyer and the KEF warranty service business was a pleasant experience too from both the customers and from KEF. In brief KEF was a easy company to do business with. I think that anybody short changing and underestimating KEF is biased. I want to listen to the Blade Series although they are not stocked by any retailer in a city of ~1 million people where I live. How times have changed.

 

[bo_knows]

I retailed the full line of KEF for 9 years and then provided KEF warranty service for some years and have had very good success representing the brand. For a brand to exist in a retailer's space competing with many different makes and hundreds of models in stock and to have the success that KEF did means that it is a good product for both the customer and the retailer. I owned different KEF models that I paid for out of hand. For me to pay for speakers for some years was unheard of because I won so many in sales contests or I was gifted KEF constructor parts and Reference Series parts and I assembled speakers. So for me to buy KEFs means that I liked them. I've owned the 2 way C25(A design intended to be placed right against the wall), the C55 Uni-Q, 104.2 Reference Series, a pair of large transmission line design 3 way that I was going to take to a 4 way but never got around to that and even a set of KEF earbuds for the cel tel. The KEF transmission line tri-amp'd speakers where the most fun and the most involving speaker system that I've owned. What I found about KEF is that they are not initially as impressive as some other brands of speakers in the sound room but for long duration listening they are very good. I sold customers on the excellent KEF warranty of the time, the very good support from the KEF rep, the very good construction, the design and manufacturing capability of KEF and the integrity of the company to provide future long term customer support. KEF seems to still have the same engineering prowess and technical drive, the good intention and goals to provide the best it can for the expense of each model and to be a serious contender in the marketplace. I never had a dissatisfied KEF buyer and the KEF warranty service business was a pleasant experience too from both the customers and from KEF. In brief KEF was a easy company to do business with. I think that anybody short changing and underestimating KEF is biased. I want to listen to the Blade Series although they are not stocked by any retailer in a city of ~1 million people where I live. How times have changed.

I feel for you. I just need to drive 6 miles to BestBuy in Frisco TX and I can listen to the big Blades and Ref 5 on display.
Magnolia's main speakers are B&W. I'm sure they will have D4 on display soon if not already. At a shorter distance, I can go to Nebraska furniture and listen to Revel Salon2 and Paradigm persona 5H. It's all fun and games until you need to write the check.

 

[blueone]

I have not heard the Muon, so can’t comment on how good or bad they are. From what I know the Muon is a engineering exercise/flex from KEF. You can say it’s the Bugatti Chiron of the speaker world while the Blade 2 is the Bentley Continental.

As a owner of Blade 2 I have had people tell me there are better speakers out there and there were some who were impressed by it’s sound. So if you ask people which of the three is better it’s going to be all over the place based on their experience and expectations. As always there is no perfect speaker, no perfect room and no perfect audio recording.

I've never even seen a Muon, but I have heard the Blade (not the Blade 2) at a dealer and, oddly, a Porsche event. Apparently Porsche and KEF have some sort of lifestyle co-marketing agreement. Anyway, I was interested in the Blade originally because it is a point source, and I wondered how it would sound compared to my Salon2s. I like the Salon2s, a lot, but I'm always looking for something better (and an excuse to move the Salon2s into our HT system, ahem).

For most classical music, which has relatively limited spectrum below 32Hz, it was difficult for me to develop a preference for the KEF or the Revel. I never felt any sense of loss with the Blades. Overall, I thought the Blade was very, very good. The Blade was one of the few speakers I've ever heard that made cymbals sound as real as the Salon2. If there was sub-30Hz bass involved though, the Salon2 had an advantage that was apparent even on some well-recorded solo piano music. So I was impressed by the Blades, and thought that adding a couple of subs with the right system tuning would probably make the Salon2 and the Blade a real toss-up. Anyone who tells you they've heard better than the Blade 2 is either reacting to the bass response, or perhaps just trying to be difficult.

 

[MarkWinston]

I feel for you. I just need to drive 6 miles to BestBuy in Frisco TX and I can listen to the big Blades and Ref 5 on display.
Magnolia's main speakers are B&W. I'm sure they will have D4 on display soon if not already. At a shorter distance, I can go to Nebraska furniture and listen to Revel Salon2 and Paradigm persona 5H. It's all fun and games until you need to write the check.

They have Blades and References in Best Buy??? God damn, Im living in the wrong part of the world.

 

[preload]

Muon's xover.View attachment 153853

Iron core inductors and Radio Shack-esque resistors. Muons are $300 speakers, right?