Shrill/harsh

I mainly bought these for weight-saving purposes due to the neodymium magnets. In that respect they did their job saving weight. For the price the sound quality is alright but there's better out there for the same or less money. The highs are shrill and harsh, very fatiguing for extended periods. They need a lot of EQ'ing to sound right. I'm guessing this is due to the lack of a proper crossover, which is appalling for a speaker of this price to only include a cap for the tweeter. Kenwood claims the cap works with the woofer's 5k natural roll off, but that's a really high crossover point for a two way set up. The woofers sound nice though. They are pretty clean and rich sounding and have decent bass for what they are. They also say these are "hi-res" audio compatible but the same hi-res files sound far more detailed in my house, and the MP3 versions sound more detailed in my SUV with my 80PRS and active 3 way set up. But then again I'm running ribbon tweeters in both places so I guess it's an unfair comparison, but I was expecting more from these Kenwoods. I'd say avoid these unless you're running an active source or processing unit, or need the weight savings like I did. Or are planning on using different tweeters with them. (These are powered by a JL MX-280/4)

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