[podium73]

Hi,

Can I first of all start off by stating that I am not in any way connected to the company BK Electronics.
I am merely commenting on my recent purchase with an aid to helping others make up their own minds.
I like many others who post/read the reviews on this forum understand how hard it can sometimes be to demo equipment and make a decision.
I hope anyone who is considering a BK XLS200 finds the brief information in this review useful in their search for the best pound for pound sound.

The subwoofer was delivered to me on time by DHL.
The first thing I realised when lifting it indoors was its sheer weight, if you work in an office and they have ever sent you on a manual handling lifting course now is the time to put it to use!

The sub was extremely well packaged; heavy duty cardboard and taped for additional strength at all the edges and joins.

On opening it I found a smaller box inside, surrounded by Styrofoam packing.

I lifted the smaller box out and was again amazed at the weight.

(My previous subs have all been £150 and under, not exactly high end but all I could afford at the time)

At the top opening of the box was:
1 power cable
1 neutral speakon cable
1 phono cable
Floor spikes
Instruction manual
and my receipt (even this was neatly folded in a small plastic pack).
On lifting out the contents and the cardboard insert I was faced with the subwoofer itself.

It was wrapped in polethene and packed with more Styrofoam.
On removing it from the box I was immediately impressed by its quality finish and look.
My own flavour was Semi-gloss silver in the down firing variety.

I cannot emphasis enough the quality of the unit, there is not a single mark or blemish in any regard.
The paint work is absolutely perfect and has an extremely luxurious finish.

With most products these days I feel that they actually have a mass produced feel about them.
Things don’t fit right, bits are missing, instructions in any language but yours, the list goes on.
The quality and finish is not up to the hype of the marketing used to sell you the lifestyle and the product.
Suffice to say living in Britain we now accept that some products will have minor blemishes – due to everyone wanting everything cheaper, quality suffers.


This little sub on the other hand truly has a superior handcrafted feel. The whole unit’s construction is absolutely solid.

It was positioned, connected up and switched on.
All I can say is wow.
I really didn’t think it would make that much of a difference, wrong!
It really did fill out the sound of my other speakers.
These are the canton cd100- front left and right, cd50 –centre and cd10 – rears.

Although I may not have lots of experience with subs, I am very critical and have heard the usual suspects in my price bracket.

This sub goes low (my room is about 4m x 6m) and fast; one of my concerns was that it could not keep up with the aluminium drivers of the cantons.
I’ve tested it with most of the reference material quoted on this forum with both DVDs and music, sounds great.
Even with The Chemical Brothers “Setting Sun” it sounds tight, and believe me that’s going some.
I know people have their own songs to critique their equipment but try this track, on a poorly set up system it sounds a mess – boomy – all over the place.

There is also a track by "the beta band" called "broke"that will melt your sub if your not careful.

I only discovered this sub through reading this forum and subsequent research.
My budget was actually £300- £350.
Though I wanted, and succeeded to spend less than this.

You will not be disappointed in this little sub it is quite a steal at the money.

I will post more as I test it even more thoroughly.

....this is my first long post and any observations or mistakes are purely my own...

Thanks for reading.