KEF LS 50

YEah sealed or possibly front rather than rear ported speakers will probably be less impacted by placement in a cupboard/cabinet that obstructs sound to the sides and rear, but rear ported might still be fine. Ports can always be plugged/obstructed to various degrees as needed.

If you have the KEFs already, its easy to try for yourself and see/hear. That will tell you more most likely than anything theoretical that can be offered up in a forum in lieu of actually hearing. The ls50s big performance in a very small package would seem to lend themselves relatively well to being placed in a cabinet, I would say. I suspect some partial obstruction of the port might be worth fiddling with.

Thanks for your answers. I dont have the KEFs yet, but was wondering itf placement was critical to their performance. Just as a clarification, the place is not an enclosed bookshelf but rather like a long table or bar that is next to the wall. There will be nothing above or near at the sides of the speakers.

I just purchased a used LS50 with now about 100+ hours on it. I have it on my home office placed on top of my desk. My desk has one 26" monitor and the 2 speakers on each side of the monitor. My speakers are 25 cm from the back wall, 15 cm from the sides, and 80 cm from each other. It gets even worse, my desk is, which is 57" wide, 29" deep, 29" high (though adjustable), is stuffed in a perfectly fitting alcove. I also have 2 additional monitors on a monitor arm that I have on the side protruding out from my desk and above the height of the speakers. I sit back 1 meter from the speakers leaning back with my legs stretched out (the most ergonomic way to sit). I have a monitor tray to help with this.

You would think that the sound would be compressed and sound pretty bad. In fact it is quite amazing. I had the AudioEngine A2's before these LS50's and the enjoyment from the new speakers is exponentially higher. So much so that I recently purchased about $300 of hi-res music from hdtracks just to listen on these speakers. The imaging is very good, the sound seems to escape out of the alcove fairly well.

I work 2 jobs one at an office and another at home. I was getting burnt out and missing my music (on my main rig) but these new speakers have made me enjoy doing my second job so much. In fact I will be starting another home job soon and these speakers have given me tremendous injection of enthusiasm to sit in front of my desk and work.

My sound would improve if I had more space (in 1+ years that will happen) for the speakers to breath. I can only imagine how much more incredible these speakers would sound. I am going to go and listen to the KEF blades soon because since these mini's are so well done the Blades must be something else.

The little KEFs come with two configurations of port-stuffing foam, fwiw.

You could also consider the B&W 685's which are front ported.