way back in 1946 Paul klipsch had an idea for a speaker design that was pretty
radical for the time he experimented with many designs before he came up with
a large speaker called the klipschorn now over 70 years later the klipschorn
is in its 6th revision and the company that started in a tin shed is now one of
the most famous speaker companies in the world today's review is on a new product
from klipsch that continues the klipsch heritage of great sound but in a
different format than a traditional loudspeaker as people spend more time at
their desk and some living spaces have gotten smaller there has been a trend
emerging in the speaker market of an all-in-one powered speaker these types
of speakers have multiple connections and usually have wireless connectivity as
well we were really excited to get a pre-production model of the fives the
subject of today's video if you want to read our full article on the fives head
over to audioadvice.com by clicking on our link in the description there we
take a deeper dive into everything these speakers have to offer which is a lot
along with this review you'll find hundreds of other reviews comparisons
buyers guides and much more now let's take a look at the fives the brand new
speaker from klipsch
klipsch has been manufacturing powered speakers for quite a few years but the
five powered speakers bring everything they have learned about powered speakers
into a brand-new product after spending a great deal of time with this new model
we think they've really hit a homerun with these they offer up everything you
would expect in a separate audio amplifier and a pair of speakers in an
elegant all-in-one package klipsch put a lot of engineering into
ensuring that the fives could be much more compact than their older powered
speakers while guaranteeing they would not sacrifice any performance by
shrinking them in fact what they came up with is actually a big improvement in
performance to our ears with their slim profile the fives will be able to fit into
a lot of places they're about 12 inches tall six-and-a-half inches wide and just
over nine inches deep this ratio of roughly double the heights of the width
gives them a sleek slender appearance and also has them throwing out some
killer imaging they're available in a walnut or matte black finish the grilles
are magnetic so you can keep them on for an elegant look or take them off for the
more hip look that you might find in a loft or tech forward space the fives
were designed to be totally standalone so all you need to do is add sources to
get music going and boy do they have a lot of source options we'll talk more
about those later klipsch took a new path in the volume control and source input
selector on the fives that adds to the unique appearance they of course come with a
remote but klipsch also put two beefy metal knobs on the top right side of the
main speaker that contribute to their bold look these provide quick access to
both volume and input selection as with almost all powered speakers one unit has
the amps built-in with all the inputs while the other speaker connects up to
the main unit with a piece of speaker wire the fives are different for most
powered speakers because the connection is not a typical speaker wire connection
but with a four wire conductor din plug this has some big pros in one con a huge
pro is that there's actually separate amplifiers for the woofers and tweeters
this concept has big performance advantages allowing these powered
speakers to function much more like higher performance setups the con is
the fact that you just can't place the speaker's further apart by extending
standard speaker wire they come with a 15-foot connecting cable and should have
an extension available in the future there's no question though the bi-amping
advantage greatly outweighs the somewhat proprietary connection the fives are built
to the expectation with high quality wooden cabinets great fit and finish and
the same type of quality connection you'd see on an 800 dollar home theater
receiver the fives performed great with bluetooth and for us connecting was
quick and simple there's an optical input which could be used for a CD
player or TV optical out plus a 3.5 millimeter analog input klipsch includes a
USB input for computer use you'll have no issues with your higher resolution
files as it can handle 24 192 high res audio files the previous klipsch powered
speakers had phono inputs but they seemed like a bit of an afterthought
clips really up their game on the fives phono input which works with a moving
magnet cartridge you can even flip a switch to make it a second analog input
should you need to speaking of flipping most powered
speakers force you to keep the left and right layout based upon one speaker
having the amplifier but klipsch added a switch through the back of the fives but
let you designate if the speaker with all the connections is on the right or
left side that's pretty cool the fives include a subwoofer out but they take
things one step further most powered speakers simply send a full
range signal out of their subwoofer out but do nothing to the main powered
speakers when you connect a sub when you connect to the subwoofer out on the
fives they actually kick in a crossover that
takes the bass away from the fives and send the deep bass to the sub when you do it
this way the mid-range gets even better since the woofer is not having to go
as deep and move as far now we've come to probably the coolest feature the
fives offer an HDMI arc input arc stands for audio return channel this is a new
standard for HDMI connections that has two pretty cool advantages when you
connect an audio piece up to a TV through HDMI arc
the TV's remote control does the power volume and mute of the audio piece it's
connected to while pretty much anything will sound better than a TVs internal
speaker the fives instead of a sound bar allows you to spread them farther apart
which will give you a much bigger sound field now keep in mind if you have an
older TV that does not have HDMI arc you can still use a Toslink digital input
for the same results you'll just need to keep the fives remote control handy for the
volume from a flexibility standpoint the fives are obviously setting some new standards
but what about how they cover all the classic DNA of klipsch speakers starting at
the top the tweeter comes from their reference premiere series it uses their
1 inch LTS ceramic vented titanium tweeters
with their tractrix horn this is a very well proven tweeter you'll find on
klipsch speakers costing far more than these the woofer is a four and a half inch long
throw woofer which also comes from the reference premiere series this might
seem small but klipsch beefed it up with a 1 and a half inch voice coil and it's
long throw coupled with the tractrix bass port
gives us bass down to 50 Hertz which is very impressive for its size there are
two power amps inside the fives that supply 60 watts each to the woofers and
20 watts each to the horn tweeters for a total of 160 watts this combo enables to
5se hit up to 109 DB in sound pressure level klipsch has also added a pretty neat
thing they call dynamic EQ the human ear does not hear the lower bass frequencies
as well as the volume decreases this circuit adds some bass back in as the
volume goes down giving them a very warm sound even at super low listening levels
being klipsch speakers they can obviously play very loud but what kept us coming
back for more was how pleasant they sounded at a very low volume
this makes the fives especially good for you while working when you normally have
the sound turned down to a lower level we were initially so impressed with the
fives that we decided to drag out some speaker stands and measure their
distance off the rear wall to get them perfectly symmetrical some of the less
expensive klipsch powered speakers we've tested could sound a little too
in-your-face and up front the fives maintained that great sense of
klipsch dynamics but the reference premier series tweeter is much sweeter
sounding than what's used in they're less expensive powered speaker models
imaging was just also fantastic with a wide and deep soundstage Dylan's new cut
false prophet sounded just fantastic on the fives
next came a test with a subwoofer and wow did things getting better
coupling the five so small subwoofer really shows how well klipsch engineered
the internal crossover we talked about earlier the change to the mid-range and
mid bass was substantial we used to klipsch R100SW and when you consider this
whole system was less than $1,300 the sound it was throwing out was
spectacular the powered all-in-one speaker market has become pretty crowded
over the last few years as more music lovers want compact systems capable of
providing great sound while their prior models were very good klipsch has taken it
to a totally new level with the Fives not only will they deliver the big sound you
expect from klipsch they also keep that full sound when you turn the volume way
down the end result to us is actually greater than the sum of all the parts if
you have any questions about the fives or any other home audio gear or home
theater gear be sure to give us a call chat with one of our experts at audioadvice.com
or stop in to one of our Raleigh or Charlotte North Carolina
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