Looking for a room friendly speaker with great bass ? Kudos Titan 808 - a hidden gem

In my 35 years in the hobby I’ve tried a bunch of different speakers…mostly bought used. In the UK it’s fairly common practice for dealers to lend out their speakers for in home demonstrations - that’s the best method to hear how the speakers will sound in your room with your electronics. Unfortunately in the USA that’s not the standard practice. One can hear a pair of speakers in a dealer showroom but it will tell you nothing about how they will sound in your room with your gear.

So buying a pair of speakers is often a crapshoot- how will they sound in your room ? Some of us have smallish rooms or difficult rooms in terms of room acoustics. In addition to room size and room acoustics, there is also the speaker placement issue. Many speakers sound best when pulled 3-4 feet or more from the wall behind them - many of us just can’t accommodate that placement due to aesthetics or the size of the room….

So what to do if you want a full range speaker with deep, tight bass that will have a very high likelihood of working in your room ?
The Kudos Titan 808 is the answer to that question. Although they are not popular in the USA, they are an extremely well regarded in the uk where they are made. They are designed to work well for the typical UK listening room which is often smaller than USA rooms and can go just a few inches from the wall behind them. They can also work well pulled out a couple of feet.


The use an Isobarik bass design ( an internal bass driver behind the outward facing bass driver) for deep, tight, tuneful bass. The bass is the best of any speaker I’ve heard in 35 years in the hobby. The bass is vented through an opening between the upper and lower cabinet of the speaker. Even in small rooms there should be no bass boom - just deep, tight, well controlled bass.

They use top level SEAS drivers and the wonderful SEAS Crescendo tweeter. In addition to the great bass they have a wonderful organic quality to the sound. 

Another area where they excel is in the PRAT department- they get the pace, rhythm and timing right which is what makes a speaker engaging to listen to.

These are super well regarded on the Naim forum with Naim users but in addition to Naim gear they work well with pretty much any quality amp. They are 91 db and a nominal 8 ohm load so not so difficult to drive.

Just a fabulous, all around speaker that does pretty much everything well and will work in almost any room.
 

They are often overlooked in the USA but they represent tremendous value especially at their used price of $16-$17k ( $40k retail)…..a hidden gem in the USA market