A little Patience sometimes pays off! (Kef LS50 content)

Dougsat very very true +1

I needed some acoustic treatments to make my LS50 sing. The speakers are sounding great now in my small office. I have some pictures in the virtual systems section with the treatments.

I think I have the ideal sized room for the LS50. Even with this great sound now I plan on changing the setup to some floor standers to get more bass. The LS50s will move to a TV or bedroom.

I currently have a Peachtree Nova 150 integrated driving the LS50's and it is a rather good unit. I have had better quality electronics on the LS50s in the past but not with the acoustic treatments. The sound I get from the Peachtree + acoustic treatments is the best I have ever had with the LS50s.

I have the LS50w (active), placement and treatments most definitely play a big part. KEF touts them as being able to be placed anywhere, and while they will sound good. To get them to sound great you need proper placement, despite the DSP built in. 

In a difficult room, open concept with a large glass window in one of the walls, and a  decent sub Dayton audio 10" hf in a 1.6cu ft enclosure they sound really good about 1ft away from the back wall. But pull them out another foot and the soundstage really expands in depth without loosing the slam and energy.

However in room that I've been using with Primaluna Integrated and Focal 1008be2 ( and really happy with), placed in the same spot they just didn't have much depth to the soundstage. I re-arranged a few pieces of furniture, carefully measured placement according to Cardas calculator and they definitely opened up.

Just my 2¢

mdr

yyzsantabarbara,

     Are you opposed to adding a properly positioned sub in your small office?  Even a relatively small sub, if properly positioned in your room to optimize bass performance at your listening seat, can likely provide the improved bass you'd like.
     There're even wireless subs if you're concerned with intrusive cables and wires.  
     To set one up properly, just place the sub at your listening seat, play some music with good and repetitive bass and slowly walk around the perimeter of your room.  Once you find a specific spot where the bass sounds best to you, position the sub at this exact spot.  To verify, sit at your listening seat, play the music again and make sure the bass sounds good to you.  If it does, you're done.  If not, try re-positioning the sub in small increments until it does (always best done with you listening at your seat and a helper moving the sub.).  If having difficulties, you may need to just to begin the procedure again from the beginning.
    Google "small home audio subs" to check out options.  This option will probably be less expensive, too.

Tim

The ls50’s are very good, very high quality speakers, but are small and have limited bass extension.

I find they are also not as inefficient as some similar but also not the easiest load to drive so a beefy amp with higher current delivery potential is still needed for best results.

So within their limits and in a great overall combo they are great speakers. Push them outside that in a larger room or with lesser gear upstream feeding them and not so much.

No one speaker is always the best in every room nor with every setup. Nor will any particular sound always appeal most to all.

Put the ls50s in the right system in the right room and more people will be happy than say with similar lesser speakers.

Even in a smaller room a subwoofer is pretty much required for the lowest octaves. Without that you can’t compare ls50s to other good setups that go full range. With it, they can compete with most anything out there, at least in a smaller room.

I find they do tend to suck me into the music and I can listen to mine happily for extended periods which means they are doing very well.

Also the UniQ concentric driver design lends itself to a very coherent presentation in smaller rooms where listening position is fairly close to the speakers, so quite good as near field monitors.

In larger rooms, I would tend to lean towards other models.

Live and learn...