Hifi Pig

Sony SS-AR1 is a 57Kg, $27 000 loudspeaker that up until now has not been available in Europe. This scenario looks set to change as the company have been demonstrating the loudspeakers at this years Munich High End event to German dealers.

The SS-AR1 is predominantly a wooden loudspeaker with the baffles being sourced from the Japanese island of Hokkaido, where cold winters are reflected in the incredibly tight grain of the wood. Finnish birch is used for the side and rear panels.

Construction of the loudspeaker is meticulous and the design of the SS-AR1 is such that it helps control resonances – essentially the cabinet is two separate enclosures; one for the woofers and the other for the mids and tweeters. Each of these sub enclosures is bass reflex ported.

Drivers are sourced from Scandinavia and include twin 200mm aluminium woofers, a 130mm midrange unit (which incorporates a sliced paper cone to help suppress any resonance) and a 25mm soft dome tweeter.

KEF has announced the introduction of its new LS50 Mini Monitor speaker; a concept derived from the legendary LS3/5a and designed to bring professional studio monitor concept into the home.

The LS50 monitor is claimed to deliver a “rich, multi-dimensional ‘soundstage experience’ that is out of all proportion to its size.”

Patent-pending acoustic designs, together with technologies from KEF’s latest flagship Blade loudspeaker, provide a “studio experience – even in the smallest of spaces”.

At the LS50’s heart beats the highly acclaimed KEF Uni-Q driver array, capable of mastering an exceptional range of dynamic highs and lows over a large listening area.

The cabinet features constrained layer damping to reduce resonances in comparison to regular damping pads, while the baffle  shape has been optimised for smooth on and off-axis dispersion as well as incorporating a ribbed rear surface to reduce cavity resonance at the rear of the driver.

The port has been optimised using computational fluid dynamics to offer lower turbulence at high levels.

The KEF LS50 comes is high gloss piano black cabinet with rose gold Uni-Q driver. Recommended retail price is £800.00 per pair.

NOLA will debut the Grand Reference VI (Pictured) at the upcoming 2012 Munich Hi End Show. This 4 tower system is the flagship model from New York State (US) based Nola and now incorporates Unison Crossover Technology so one pair of mono block amplifiers or one stereo amplifier can drive all four towers. Drive units have been upgraded to reduce moving mass and increase speed across the board. Nola say that “This system is considered by many to be the finest loudspeaker system available.”

NOLA will also debut, in conjunction with Upscale Audio, the KO Loudspeaker at The Show Newport Beach on June 1-3. KO is the top of the company’s Boxer collection and incorporates state of the art NOLA Reference Series concepts at a much more affordable price. Utilizing the company’s mirror-imaged short line source open baffle array the KO can fill medium to large rooms with ease, while providing “very high sound quality”. The KO loudspeaker from Nola employs four 4½” open baffle dipole midranges, four 1″  silk dome tweeters and 2 cast-frame aluminum cone bass drivers in separate ported chambers. A 90 dB sensitivity combined with an 8 ohm impedance allows KO to be driven by a large selection of amplifiers, including valves. New Unison Crossover Technology provides improved power utilization for higher effective efficiency. KO is available in Piano Cherry or Piano Black.

For dealers contact the company

The widely regarded Finnish loudspeaker manufacturer Amphion has announced its latest Ion+ which is said to give a perfect near-field performance and room filling live-like sound.

The new Ion+ has a frequency response of 52-25 000Hz and crosses over at 1600Hz and a quoted sensitivity of 86db. It is a two way design with a 4.5 inch aluminium mid/bass cone and a 1 inch titanium tweeter.

The Amphion Ion+ claims both musicality and netrality and will retail fro just short of 1000€ a pair