Kef X300A review

As long as they’re at roughly the right height, and they’re pretty forgiving in this respect, they have a wide sweet spot that produces an absolutely fantastic sense of space. Even with the speakers positioned relatively close together and close to a wall, the sound was incredibly immersive, seeming to surround us from all directions.

If you must have the speakers near a wall, you’ll probably need to limit the amount of bass produced from the ports at the rear to prevent low-frequency sounds from reverberating off the surface behind the speakers. To do this, it comes with foam bungs that you can use to block the bass ports completely or partially. It’s worth taking the time to experiment with bungs to see what produces the optimal sound for your space.

The speakers sound fantastic. As well as providing an immersive listening experience from a wide range of angles, the speakers have the kind of neutral, well-balanced sound we want. This means that bass, treble and mid-range sounds are evenly balanced, allowing the original mix of the track you’re playing to be clearly heard. This is a common goal of high-end speakers and monitors, but it’s great to hear the X300As achieve this natural sound so effectively. We were particularly pleased that the speakers have an emphatic and well-defined bass that nonetheless doesn’t overwhelm the mid-range. The speakers really make the most high quality recordings, although flaws in ultra-low-bitrate audio sources were also clearly audible so make sure you media is recorded in the highest quality format possible. Everything from bass-heavy hardstyle to orchestral music was rendered with great clarity.

The KEF X300As are, without doubt, the best-sounding USB speakers we’ve ever heard. Their built-in audio processing hardware rivals that of our favourite USB DACs, such as the Arcam rPAC. However, we’d also prefer the X300A to have TRS, XLR and RCA inputs for greater connectivity and flexibility. You can only use them with a computer or via a 3.5mm stereo input, which is primarily designed with MP3 players in mind.

It’s hard to fault these beautiful-sounding speakers, but they rely upon a USB connection for optimal audio quality, which could be a hard sell to an enthusiast market that remains obsessed with analogue.