a pair of KEF iQ3 bookshelf speakers. I am positively amazed at how well these perform, even in my non-treated room. The level of refinement is shocking at this price level. While the fit and finish is reminiscent of speakers at and slightly above the price, what really counts is the sound.
I never believed that I could find a box speaker that had the midrange immediacy and purity that my maggies had, along with fantastic imaging. Well, I think I can have my cake and eat it as well.
The greatest strength about the iQ3 aside from driver integration is the midrange performance. The mids are rich, full, and warm sounding.The drivers sing as one thanks to the Uni-Q the technology. The tweeter is at the center of the woofer cone. Imaging artifacts from external cabinetry between drivers (as well as simple distance between the drivers) is simply not there.
Driver integration is stellar as well. Due to the non-issues mentioned above, a well designed flare on the woofer, good quality crossover (have not been able to hear it), and quality jumpers on the back help to contribute to driver integration. The jumpers here are not wimpy stamped strips. KEF provides users with quality terminated jumpers, estimated to be about 10-12 gauge.
Highs are very smooth and extended. I normally do not like metal dome tweets, but these behave themselves very well. A trumpet has brilliant shimmer, and bite when called for. The clash and decay of cymbals is present in full form, but does not detract from the overall sonic picture.
Detail retreval is also excellent as well. While listening to Chris Botti's "When I Fall in Love", the recording studio walls are easily heard as reverberations captured on the recording, seemingly appearing on the left and right side. Whether this was actually happening in the studio and recorded or if it was introduced after the fact is not something I know.
This leads me to the issue that this is one very well balanced speaker. Bass, treble, and midrange all blend into one. Nothing is out of proportion to my ear, and very smooth sounding. Midrange is also to the warm side, and I vastly prefer this.
Bass performance, while great, is what you would expect out of a bookshelf. It is still a little fat, but after playing them for 2 days straight they are smoothing out. In a medium sized room, they have enough bass to satisfy. Specs say 45Hz is the -3. Going by the type of music I have put in them, I would estimate my in room response to be in the 30's.
I am powering them with my A-35r, a great combination in my opinion (provided you don't crank it up too loud). The Pioneer has a warm sound, and to my ears is taking an edgy quality off the tweets. I demoed them at first on a Rotel 1052 receiver, and found them to be somewhat bright.
A potential downside is that these speakers are too good for the run of the mill AVR. These like some juice behind them. My A-35r will not drive them to high levels before clipping. While it is certainly good enough for me, it is something that a potential buyer needs to realise.
they do sound ever so slightly boxy, but the more I play them the less of this quality there is. I know it can take quite a while for these speakers to fully break in, so I do not see this as a problem.
FWIW, I did not hear this trait on the floor models.
I have not had a chance to listen to the insignias yet. I want to, to do a comparison to my iQ3. Granted, I don't expect a $70or so pair of speakers to sound as good as a $500 pair.
These are also speakers are also not going to make a bad recording sound worse, but can make a good recording sound heavenly.
Over the past several years, I have aquired about 30 or so CDs that I have downloaded off of iTunes. This is a fraction of my total collection, but it is important that when I want to throw one of these in (or other CDs that stink in the mastering dept) that I am not going to cringe.
While they definatly let you know that you aren't listening to high resolution, your first instinct isn't going to be to cover your ears. Indeed, one of the worst mastered CD's I have is a Sarah Brightman (believe it or not) CD that was only sold at the Harem tour stops. It is a collection of previously unreleased material. Several songs have her voice bordering on shrill with lots of speakers I have listened to it on. The KEF beat out even the MartinLogan Clarity for smoothness and tonality. With the Clarity, I got up and shut it off within 1 minute. With the KEF, I only remarked to the dealer that I had never heard that CD sound so good, as it was one of my poorest mastered.
At this point, I was auditioning with my own equipment at the dealer. I remarked earlier that I feel that the speakers are smoother and warmer on my integrated than with the Rotel unit that was being used.
I heard them both,but they deffinetly dont sound similar,and its not close as you would expect.Danny Richie has made mods for them they actually can sound quite staggering with the mods,I think i may buy a pair of Insignias to mod,Kef is 1 of my favorite speaker companies,and deffinetly 1 of my favorite box speakers their coherancy is off the charts.