Re-Imagined Watt/Puppy Speaker Returns For Brand'S Half Century
To mark its 50th anniversary, Wilson Audio has resurrected its iconic WATT/Puppy for a ninth iteration - and the first since the dual-enclosure loudspeaker was discontinued in 2011. Called, simply, The WATT/Puppy, it sells for £41,998 in standard WilsonGloss colourways, with custom and premium finish options, plus choice of grille colour, available.
The Largest Of Q Acoustics' 5000 Series Speakers Combines Inspiration From The Concept 50 With Ideas Of Its Own
Armour Home's Q Acoustics has been busy in recent years, refreshing nearly its entire portfolio of passive and active loudspeakers, and expanding existing lines. The Concept 50 and 30 models were launched in 2022 to fill out its top-flight range, which includes the Karl-Heinz Fink-designed Concept 500 flagship , and a more affordable 5000 series appeared just before High End Munich in 2023. This didn't arrive fully complete either - the largest 5050 floorstander we're looking at here only finally debuted in the Spring of 2024.
Ohio-based SVS throws all its speaker know-how into a high-value concave cabinet bristling with custom drivers
Between 2017 and 2022, SVS comprehensively overhauled its range of subwoofers, introducing models from the 80kg PB16-Ultra to the compact 3000 Micro. A quiet spell followed as SVS tackled a new project – an all-new flagship loudspeaker series, topped by the model on test here.
2024 edition of Magico’s s5 floorstander goes bigger... and better?
Magico says its new S5 loudspeaker ‘continues what began’ with the S3 2023 model [HFN May ’24], leveraging new design and test technologies at its Californian R&D facility. These include a Klippel Near-Field Scanner to fully quantify its on and off-axis responses, and a laser vibrometer to identify and minimise vibrations in its 1.21m-tall, 118.8kg cabinet.
Audiovector has returned to the design of founder Ole Klifoth’s first ever loudspeaker – the 1979 Trapez – for a new £15,500 model called Trapeze Reimagined.
The ‘ultimate version’ of B&W’s 700 series flagship gets the Signature treatment, including two bespoke colour options
It’s only about two years ago that Bowers & Wilkins introduced the S3 generation of its 700 series. A major overhaul of the venerable British brand’s popular midrange offering, its attention-grabbing improvements included a notably curvier front baffle with protruding drivers (housed in ‘pods’) and an elongated tube for the ‘Tweeter-on-Top’. This was all quite familiar for anyone who saw the earlier revamped 800 D4 series, so B&W isn’t being untruthful when it claims to deploy trickle-down technology.
German marque’s flagship B series floorstander offers smart bass-tuning potential. Is this the speaker for every room?
Although the largest and most expensive member of Burmester’s B series loudspeakers (which are ranged below its BA and BC models), the £22,700 B38 doesn’t – when viewed front on at least – look quite like the all-singing, all-dancing range-topper you might expect. Yes, it’s marginally taller than the step-down B28 (£17,600), at 1165mm versus 1144mm, but it’s also slimmer, its 210mm width shaving off 13mm. And then there are the drivers, with the B28 having four cascading down its front baffle, while the B38 features just two…
Smallest of a four-strong range of innovative MFB (Motional Feedback) loudspeakers, Philips’ AH585 was in production from 1972-82. How does it fare today?
The Philips Motional Feedback (MFB) loudspeaker has been mentioned a number of times in these pages over recent years. The company achieved considerable success with both its first- and second-generation models, including the 22RH544, but in the UK at least, the third generation is less commonly encountered. The AH585 seen here is the smallest of three consumer speakers, the others being the similar but larger AH586 and the three-way AH587.
Apogee follows the Stage with the hybrid Centaurus Major and Minor but has it made its ribbon technology more accessible
Feeling a bit like the boy who cried ‘Wolf!’, I still can’t help but regard this new range of speakers from Apogee as ‘ribbons for the masses’. But unlike the last models that inspired this sort of reaction – the Stages [p129]and Calipers – the new Centaurs really do make Apogees accessible to a wide range of consumers. And not only by virtue of their cost.
A decade since the S3 was launched, and then surpassed by the MkII, this three-way has been reborn with trickledown tech from Magico’s flagship M9 loudspeaker
The latest version of Magico’s S3 speaker, which was first reviewed in these pages a decade ago [HFN Nov ’14], isn’t what you’d call a mild refresh. Just as the company’s MkII version was a major reworking of the original, so this new arrival has been comprehensively redesigned, drawing both on the technology of the flagship M9 model and the measurement abilities of Magico’s enhanced development tools. It’s yours for a couple of pounds short of £57,000 a pair in the five powder-coat M-Cast finishes Magico offers, or £66,000 in a choice of six high-gloss M-Coat shades, including the striking blue colourway pictured here.
The most compact of three floorstanding models in what will ultimately be a four-strong range, PS Audio's 'triple ABR' aspen FR10 packs a deceptively huge punch
For a 50-year-old company that released its first loudspeaker barely two years ago, PS Audio has not been resting on its laurels. Coming swiftly on the heels of the flagship £30,000 aspen FR30 [HFN Jun '22] are a raft of junior siblings. First up was the £20,000 FR20 [HFN Apr '23] and now we have the baby floorstander of the range, the £10,000 FR10. As an aside, I don't think we'd be letting the cat out of the bag by revealing a fourth model is in the pipeline – the two-way, ABR-loaded FR5 standmount. If it isn't priced at £5000, I'll eat my hat.
These super-compact loudspeakers are simply the tip of the iceberg for Germany's expansive Magnat brand whose ranges encompass the gamut of 'lifestyle' to 'purist'
Bigger is better' seems to be one of those unwritten rules of hi-fi that ensures every audio show is packed with speakers towering high above the audience. Unfortunately, out there in the real world most people don't have the space to wheel in a pair of Wilson Audio Alexx Vs [HFN Jan '22] or Focal Grande Utopias [HFN Dec '18]. So, in an age when tiny houses are proclaimed as the way to go, Magnat's Signature Edelstein might be the speakers that better fit the zeitgeist. But these are not especially low-cost petite models. As 'Edelstein', or gemstone in German, indicates, these particular Magnat boxes – priced at £949 – are positioned as small and luxurious.
There's more to this slender, stylish Italian floorstander than striking wood veneers as trickledown hits the target
Think Sonus faber, and the chances are you'll imagine speakers with luxurious finishes and price tags to match. After all, the company used the 2024 CES event to roll out its Suprema speaker system, comprising two main 'towers' and two subwoofers, with a £695,000 price tag. But such lofty ambition also brings the option of 'trickling down' new technologies to less expensive models, including the £2999 Lumina V Amator floorstander we have here.
Inspired by the diminutive and still current Accordo, the Goldberg variation features a larger cabinet and bass/mid driver, and integral crossover. Is bigger always better?
Odd though this might sound, it bothers me when PM gives me a sequence of exceptional loudspeakers to review. Can there really be that many miraculous designs, one after the other – or am I growing soft? Following models from DeVore Fidelity [HFN Aug '23] and Wilson Audio [HFN Sep '23], and reborn LS3/5As, I find myself with a new Franco Serblin speaker that has rocked my world. The Accordo Goldberg could be, overall, the best yet to come out of the fertile brain of the inspirational if, sadly, late designer.
Quad's first new speakers in some seven years feature an evolved version of the ribbon tweeter seen in its 'Corner Horn' of 70 years ago. Now, of course, they come in pairs!
For nearly nine years, I have been listening to Quad's ribbon-hybrid S-1 speaker – the brand's smallest two-way box-type system – as part of my day-to-day desktop set-up. When they were launched, I revelled in the realisation that they were a throwback to Quad's first ever loudspeaker, the Corner Ribbon of 1949, and the all-new Revela 1 tells you that the company's boffins, based in the UK and China, haven't been sitting idle since 2015.
The Largest Of Q Acoustics' 5000 Series Speakers Combines Inspiration From The Concept 50 With Ideas Of Its Own
Smallest of a four-strong range of innovative MFB (Motional Feedback) loudspeakers, Philips’ AH585 was in production from 1972-82. How does it fare today?
These super-compact loudspeakers are simply the tip of the iceberg for Germany's expansive Magnat brand whose ranges encompass the gamut of 'lifestyle' to 'purist'
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