new KEF Q's and REF's

I was at a demo of the new KEF ranges at my hifi dealer last night and bumped into Ron Locke. This was one of the first outings for the new ranges and being a KEF owner (Q35.2)I thought i'd post my thoughts.

The new Q range : Q1, Q3, Q5, Q7, Q9c replace the Q15.2, 35.2, Q55.2, Q65.2 and 95.2c respectively.

The speakers look the business with curved cabinets and all have new metal tweeters. Prices have gone up about £50 over the .2's.

Had a listen to the Q5, (which hadn't had a proper run in period)which sounded pretty good in the mids and high end with the new q driver compared with my 35.2.

Next we had a look at the new reference series which look superb, especially in the black finish. Slim curved cabinets and a titanium hypertweeter sitting on top.

The first floor stander in the ref range (Model 203 : 2, 6 inch bass drivers and a new uni q driver (titanium tweeter)) sounded superb loads of detail and tight low end, shame i dont have £3000 to spend! (plus another grand for the centre speaker!!)

Thanks to Ron I'll probably be on the upgrade path sooner than I would have liked

Cheers
Calum

Hi

I take it you didn't see my article in "post event analysis", but it's over 20 days old now anyway

In short I got in of a demo of the said new series at Live2001, and agree with your comments about the Q5, which sounded very good with its new metal tweeter!

The centre speaker (Q9c??) was nice too, with impressive directional sound.

At that time they weren't exact about when the full range would be out, and prices weren't confirmed then, any ideas on this??

Xeonic,

cpark probably didn't see your post because the "post event analysis forum" was actually for "The Event" held on August Bank Holiday weekend at StereoStereo in Glasgow.

Steve

Xeonic - No I didn't see your "review" in the post event forum. I've read it now though - thanks!

I don't know when the new Q range are available but it must be soon because I have the price list sitting in front of me. As I mentioned, they have taken a £50 price hike over the equivalent Q.2 range.

So, Q1 £250, Q3 £400, Q5 £600, Q7 £800, Q9c £250

I was planning of swapping my Q35.2's to the rear duties and replacing them with some Q5's or Q7's. Unfortunately Ron Locke suggested that my Q95.2C might not be tonally matched with the new Q-range (new Q driver)

Sounds more expensive than planned now, who said upgrading was easy!

Regards
Calum

[Nic Rhodes]

Originally posted by cpark:
<STRONG>I was planning of swapping my Q35.2's to the rear duties and replacing them with some Q5's or Q7's. Unfortunately Ron Locke suggested that my Q95.2C might not be tonally matched with the new Q-range (new Q driver)

Sounds more expensive than planned now, who said upgrading was easy! </STRONG>

This was my biggest fear and the reason I upgraded to the old Ref 4-2 before they went for good. Still temped on some 1-2 for rear music duties.

Thanks for all the info, guys!

The obvious question now is, will there be any major discounts on the "old" range?? As good as the new speakers sounded, I wouldn't say no to, for example, a set of Q55.2 instead of Q3's.

I did notice a slightly higher power handling for the equivalent replacement model, which is more in line with the ever increasing amp power relative to available speakers!!

[Ramius]

Xeonic

My local branch of Superfi (Leeds) had the Qxx.2s on sale.
Q15.2 £150, Q35.2 £250, Q55.2 £400.

A thing to note more than the higher power handling of the new Q series, is that they are 3dB less efficient according to the specs on the Kef site.

Cheers.

Ramius

Cheers m8, I'll check my local SuperFi in Birmingham (who usually have good deals anyway) and see what kind of offers they have!!

Superfi have a deal on their website for the Q95.2C only £99.. + £10 Delivery.
Still looking for a deal on Q15.2s though


Here's a question for you guys...

I thinking of buying one of the new marantz av decoders and see that they have a single output for the center rear.

If I were to buy it, i'd need to buy 3 Q15.2s (to complete my setup).

What I want to know is can you buy odd numbers of speakers as they normally quote prices "per pair" ?

[AOD]

I don't know about "odd" numbers of speakers, but I would have thought you should try and "split" the single centre rear feed so you can drive two rear centre speakers.

Can't recall who mentioned it, but the reason is that if you have a single centre rear speaker directly behind you, the brain plays some acoustic tricks on you and you think the sound is actually coming from in front instead. Twin speakers alleviates this apparently.

Sadly Marantz only give a single pre-out for this channel, which is a bit unfortunate.

I've just ordered the Q95.2c from Superfi (last night in fact)
£109.99 all in (inc del.) To go with my 55.2s.
I'm extremely impressed with the 55.2s although only just getting them (3 weeks ago) I am very annoyed with my local Sevenoaks for not telling me that a new Q series is being released soon, won't go into that as i'm awaiting a reply from KEF on this issue but it looks like they are not going to reply to my email

[Beddie]

I like the sound of a Q95.2C for £100 - any owners out there? If you can let me know what you think of this speaker, and whether it has any obvious problems I'd be grateful.

Originally posted by AOD
I don't know about "odd" numbers of speakers, but I would have thought you should try and "split" the single centre rear feed so you can drive two rear centre speakers.

Can't recall who mentioned it, but the reason is that if you have a single centre rear speaker directly behind you, the brain plays some acoustic tricks on you and you think the sound is actually coming from in front instead. Twin speakers alleviates this apparently.

Sadly Marantz only give a single pre-out for this channel, which is a bit unfortunate.

Yeah, I considered using a pair of Q85.2s connected up in parallel with a 4ohm reistor in series to bring it back up to 8. Not so sure about that though.

I think the SR6200 and definitely the SR7200 [correction - have the same 6 channel setup so it is obviouly intended that you only use one, even on more high end models]. This seems a bit daft as most people say that two speakers give the best results.

Incidentally, the new Sony 6.1 Amp (1071 ?) uses the same setup, so it's not just marantz being a bunch of muppets.