What has driven Paul Barton's design of speakers for more than 30 years is his discovery, during long research and double-blind testing of speakers at Canada's National Research Council, that not just individually distinctive models but whole ranges of consistently satisfying speakers could come out of the correlations made at the NRC between measured performance characteristics and the sound that listeners perceived as pleasing and realistic. Working outward from that realisation, Paul and PSB have produced not only legendary performers like the Alpha and the Stratus Gold, but the growing array of models that prompted Lawrence B. Johnson of Stereophile Guide to Home Theatre, to say: "From the top of the line to the bottom, designer Paul Barton's speakers represent exceptional value and rare musicality."

Now we take another step — taking the design principles that work so well and applying them to a updated range of speakers whose distinctive, modular construction and elegant systems-engineering bring unmistakably high-end performance down into the price range most people think of as "medium priced." These speakers embody not just great performance and wonderfully logical mixing and matching for home theatre systems, but a further, typically PSB leap in value for a whole series of speakers.

All of the new Image models mix and match supremely well. They use the same 5-1/4-inch or 6-1/2-inch Metalised polypropylene-cone woofers with rubber surrounds, and the same new optimised 1" aluminum-dome tweeter in all models. Whether you build a music/theatre system gradually or plunge in all at once, you can be sure they will sound like each other, look like each other, and fit your decor. All have full magnetic shielding to allow placement near TV and computer monitors, and their front-panel ports maintain full low-frequency response when you place speakers close to walls. With their slim frontal areas and their elegant "floating" grilles, the Images all look as striking as they sound.

Using common components in different models helps ensure the 'family sound' that's so important for matched home theatre performance. And the modular combinations of the four elements allow us to amortize the costs both of the drivers and of the baffle mouldings, all of which would be far more expensive if produced in smaller quantities for just one model. This elegant systems engineering is what makes the sound quality of the Images possible at reasonable prices. The sound is as clear and "open" in the least expensive systems as in the top models in the series, and what you get as you go up the line is incremental improvement in low-frequency extension, power handling, and subtleties of detail.

The Image S50 offers the best of both worlds. Its surround ambience is very convincing, thanks to the way the two speaker panels are angled to radiate indirectly. But because the speakers are wired in phase, in a bipolar design, rather than out of phase in a dipole array, they also provide all the localisation needed for soundtracks with directional surround effects. Surround recordings of music also profit greatly from the soundfield of the S50, and small rooms sound much "larger" than they do with direct radiator speakers. The more demanding you are about surround sound, or the more demanding your listening conditions are, the more we think you will appreciate what the S50 has to offer.

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