Bookshelf Speaker Reviews

Performance
Features
Build Quality
Value

AT A GLANCE
Plus
Clean-sounding dialogue
Silky detail
Big, open presentation
Minus
Limited deep bass (without sub)

THE VERDICT
Elac’s new Uni-Fi Reference series can hang with many far larger and pricier loudspeakers. Just add a subwoofer or two to this system for movies, and you’ll be good to go.

German speaker company Elac has had quite a run over the past few years, with designer Andrew Jones turning out new models on an annual basis after setting the audio world on its ears in 2016 with the Elac Debut. Following the Debut's launch, the company came out with the pricier Uni-Fi. A three-way bookshelf design, the Uni-Fi incorporated a coincident midrange-woofer that positions the tweeter at the apex of the midrange cone where the dust cap usually sits.

Performance
Features
Build Quality
Value

AT A GLANCE
Plus
Excellent, full-bodied sound
Cosmetically appealing design
Sturdy build
Remote control with tone controls (!)

Minus
No multiroom Wi-Fi streaming

THE VERDICT
Fluance’s Ai41 is one of the best looking and sounding Bluetooth speakers in its price class.

You can tell immediately whether a speaker is good the moment it starts playing, so I knew right away the Ai41 was good but didn’t fully appreciate how good until I had lived with it for a couple of weeks.

Performance
Build Quality
Ergonomics
Value

AT A GLANCE
Plus
Serious all-in-one streaming solution
Remarkable tonal and dynamic range
Excellent ergonomics and app
Roon Ready Certified
Minus
High volume level slightly reduces resolution

THE VERDICT
KEF's wireless speaker package is an ergonomic marvel that delivers true audiophile performance—especially when paired with the company's complementary KC62 subwoofer.

We live now in wireless world, and the major loudspeaker makers have been quick to embrace it with serious-performance, near-full-range designs. But each seems to have a different idea of what a "wireless speaker" should entail. Some simply connect to an existing component stack via a supplied small wireless transmitter. Others incorporate the whole smart-speaker thang, with full multiroom audio system and Alexa-Google-Siri voice control integration.

Performance
Features
Ergonomics
Value

AT A GLANCE
Plus
Superbly accurate tonal balance
Remarkable bass extension
Highly adaptable onboard EQ options
Onboard auto room correction
Minus
Finite output may not suit far-field listening
No auto on/off
No built-in sub integration option

THE VERDICT
IK Multimedia’s powered monitor is a great desktop audio option, and it also delivers sufficient output for far-field listening in small-size rooms.

With few of us straying far from home these days, or from our computer with its constant stream of information, entertainment, hope, and fear, desktop audio is having a moment.

For this reason, many are discovering a need for some- thing better than the crappy 2.1-channel "computer speaker" systems we bought back in the early 'aughts. What we need is an ultra-compact active monitor—like IK Multimedia's iLoud MTM.

Performance
Build Quality
Value

AT A GLANCE
Plus
Good bass extension
Excellent midrange balance and accuracy
Pluggable port yields flexible placement and performance
Impressive fit and finish
Minus
Slightly bright sound with some recordings

THE VERDICT
This anniversary edition Bowers & Wilkins compact bookshelf combines good looks with intelligently balanced sound.

There are quite literally hundreds of small, two-way loudspeakers you can buy priced from under $100 to well north of $10,000 per pair. To this throng British stalwart Bowers & Wilkins now adds the 607 S2 Anniversary Edition (the anniversary commemorated is the company's launch of its first 600 Series designs 25 years ago). Whether or not the world desperately needs another small two-way may be up for debate, but B&W's authority to add one is not: the ranks of fine small speakers marching forth from the south coast of the UK over the past half-century has been illustrious.

Speakers
Performance
Build Quality
Value

Subwoofer
Performance
Build Quality
Features
Value

AT A GLANCE
Plus
Superb overall performance
Impeccable fit and finish
Relatively compact
Minus
Pricey

THE VERDICT
It may be pricey, but this PerformaBe system offers sublime performance with both music and movies.

I've reviewed many Revel surround speaker packages over time, but it's been six years since my last Revel review, a system centered on the Performa F208 tower speaker. At around 13 grand, that system could still be considered an affordable option compared with a full surround package built around the company's flagship Ultima range. Now, with its PerformaBe line, Revel has a mid-price speaker offering to help bridge the gap.

Performance
Build Quality
Value

AT A GLANCE
Plus
Highly accurate sound
Impressive stereo image breadth
Solid center-channel reproduction
Well-controlled and moderately extended low end
Minus
Towers are sensitive to placement

THE VERDICT
A handsome system that sounds very good with just about everything, and with enough bass extension to satisfy most needs.

Tall, slim speakers are certainly in fashion, and it's hard to imagine many slimmer than Definitive Technology's new Demand Series D15 towers. Despite housing three 5.25-inch drivers (two carbon fiber woofers and a polypropylene midrange), a 1-inch aluminum dome tweeter, and not one but two 8-inch side-firing passive radiators, the D15 measures just 6.5 inches wide and thus indeed requires its bolt-on aluminum bottom plinth to achieve stability.