Looking at buying a pair of the above speakers, in particular the Paradigm Studio 40's with a Yamaha YST-SW320 sub.
Any comments? I am very impressed with the Paradigms; I have yet to hear the Kef Q7's.
However it has been said to me that the combination of Paradigm Studio 40's with the Yamaha sub is very hard to beat and bang for the buck there is not a speaker system around for $1000 (Oz dollars) extra that will touch it...
Big claim
cheers...John
elitefan
Posted on
John, I love the Paradigm Studio 40 and almost bought them a few months ago but instead went with Monitor Audio Silver2 for my mains and the Silver1 and Silver center. Kept my Def Tech sub and it's a great system in my small living room. I do not understand how you can get the 40's and a sub for $1000 when the 40's list for $900 in black and more in cherry. The Yamaha sub you mentioned must be a cheap, mediocre sub, I guess. If you decide to buy the 40's I would also get a Paradigm sub like the ps-1000 or ps-2000 or even the pdr-10 or 12. I have not had a chance to hear Kef's for several years as no dealers in my area but in the past I thought they were great. They were the first really small speaker I heard that could fill up a good sized room. B&W's are nice also but for a British speaker I prefer the Monitors.
Hawk
Posted on
John:
I have to agree with elitefan--the Yamaha sub is cheap and not worthy of the Studio 40s ( very fine speakers, btw). You can do much better for a very reasonable amount of money. I don't know what you are being charged for the Yamaha sub, so let us know so we can suggest something better for the same amount of money.
I like the Paradigms and I like the B+Ws, but I found the KEF Q7s to be a bit coarse, and not worth what they are asking for them.
Well, I went out and bought the Kef Q7's. Reason(s)? I was not happy with having to put a sub on the Studio 40's, and I had a good hard look at the Studio 80's - a very hard look. Against the B&W's, no contest - the 80's blew them away once I went away from rock (Annie Lennox "Medusa") to St Petersburg Chamber Choir "Credo"). Track number 13, the last track - if you flip-flopped between the speakers you could hear the soundstage double, triple in size. A real eye opener. Very transparent speakers... Beautiful. But they did not fit the budget, and while I could have taken the demo ones off the floor, they were in black and the wife would have had a fit... :-(
So went and auditioned some Kefs vs Tannoys. The Kefs have that "Kef" sound that I have been so used to for the last 25 years (I have some T-lines); the base was well extended and it had good mid and top end. The Tannoys were so close it was a hard call; but I liked the bottom end better.
Are they better than the 80's? Technically not quite. But then perfection is not *all* of what music is about. Instrument players can be of a high technical standard, but lack that "special something" (soul???). That is why jazz can be so good over classical music. It is certainly not perfection, but in terms of soul, emotion, etc, it very often beats classical.