ELACUni-Fi 2.0 UF52 Floorstanding Speaker (Single)

This thing for the price cannot be beat. Packaging came damaged which was concerning but Amazon made it right and the speaker works flawlessy. Andrew Jones did a number with these speakers. It sounds phenomenal and much easier to drive than its predecessor. Just wish the build quality was a bit nicer but cant complain at this price range, the money put into this speaker was for sound and not looks.

This is only my 3rd set of towers: first being Klipsch RF3IIs (Dual SVS subs/Klipsch all around 6.1EX setup) then SVS' first set of towers+plus one SVS sub (can't even remember the model number) followed by the Polk S55 (briefly); the rest have been sats/bookshelves: Orb Mod IIs (with Outlaw sub) Q Acoustics 3020i with outlaw sub).- I've never heard a 3-way speaker before- Driving them using a Denon AVR-X2700H 165wx7 (waiting for HDMI 2.1 to upgrade)- Elac Uni-Fi 2.0 UC52 (Center)- Outlaw LFM-1 EX- Polk OMW3 x4 - L/R front high | LS/RS- First blush:- Fit and finish is very nice (granted it's black ash...) most photos I've seen do them a disservice, they look modest, not cheap,- Very dense cabinet (knock test), solid sounding; they've a good weight to them for being so slim- Very svelte for their sound (coming off the Polk S55 which were much bigger (but lighter)- Grill holes aren't that noticeable, I never run grills and would have preferred magnets for a smooth facadeDemo material (so far):Music (all music is either CD or digital mp3/flac - sorry no vinyl here, I don't collect, same for books and most movies)TOOL: Fear Inoculum - whole album gets any system to sing - Parabol/Parabola, VicariousStatic-X: Project Regeneration Vol.1Tron: Legacy soundtrackFight Club SoundtrackSade: Lovers RockDre. Dre 2001Miles Davis: Kind of BlueMetallica For Whom the Bell tolls/black album/hardwired 9love it or hate it, Black album iswell mixed, if not a bit heavy on the midsWhite Zombie Astro Creep 2000Machine Head Burn My EyesPeter Gabriel Passion of Christ SoundtrackPink Floyd Dark Side of the MoonLots of Punk (Black Flag, Subhumans (UK), GBH, Minor ThreatYo-Yo Ma: J.S. Bach's Six Unaccompanied Cello SuitesFilm:Gladiator DTSWinter Soldier (excellent mix imo unlike their recent efforts)Rogue OneGuardians of the Galaxy Vol.1Mad Max Fury RoadTron LegacyWall-eThe Dark KnightGravityCasino RoyalNetflix: (for Atmos)AwayProject PowerStranger ThingsAnother Life (excellent mix, underrated)Game of ThronesGaming:Marvel’s AvengersDestiny 2Doom EternalHellblade Senua's Sacrifice (most excellent use of surround)Lumines remasteredSo it's been a few days since I took delivery with lots of use (they've been on every second I've been awake so lots of music and movies/content, and I've been putting them through the wringer...to get it out of the way...WOW!They are lightyears ahead of the Q Acoustics 3020i or Polk S55s I was previously running, to my ears...so much so I don't even want to do direct comparisons as everything about them is better in every way (except maybe looks, the S55s get the nod there, even with their cheap looking plastic feet, I was quite fond of the overall appearance of them...compared to cheap Black Ash…(which is perfect for dark rooms, I get it). Not that the Elac’s are weak in the looks dept., they’re just generic, aside from the greenish/blue tint to the drivers.They sound incredibly accurate, detailed and very smooth. Tonal quality is fantastic, I'm a fan.I'm straight off the Q Acoustics 3020i so perhaps the brightness is just more detail in the higher end and with much cleaner mids; the Polks for sure had a that laid back sound in comparison. They make the Q3020i sound like PC or surround speakers.I'm not cranking them (well once, on mistake ;) but at -30 (ref) they have really nice detail, excellent instrument separation, and to be cliche, I am hearing/picking up things I've never noticed before on some of my favorite tracks (like that first time you put on a nice set of cans). Juiced them up a bit and I don't think I'd ever have a need to run them as loud as I can get them singing, especially with my listening distance (11' and with neighbors).It sounds like I finally have speakers that meet the quality of my subwoofer, as it's no longer localizable (it's corner loaded to the right of the MLP due to floor plan), the Elac towers put out fantastic bass; for 2 channel I would feel comfortable not running a sub (and I like running my sub a bit hot) - but I've also never had towers that could really output bass on their own - except maybe the RF3II but even then - the elacs put out deep, tight and punchy bass; at moderate listening volumes you can feel the air moving from the woofers.Mechanical sounds, latches, doors, guns reloading, gadgetry clicks and connections, all sound amazing and detailed.I've not listened to a lot of towers and I am sure there a hundreds of models that can throw down bass but I'm very impressed (I've always ran a sub); I ran them large with sub/no sub and small x/o @80 no sub/with sub - set to large they did get a little boomy at volume on bass heavy stuff...it’s nice to have good/clean bass coming from the front, it really blends very nicely, especially with films/dialogue...I’ve got the space for dual subs (would go down to 10”) but I don’t think I need it given the space or the Elacs.Off-axis stereo listening is excellent (I’ve one wonky listening position), especially the center ch in films but as expected, not ideal no matter how good your rig is.All in all, I'm very pleased with them; it's for sure a bump in what I usually spend per speaker but I could tell right away it was worth said bump. Looking forward to breaking them in further.Having not heard the Elac 1.0 or the Debut/Heritage I can’t say they are better (and presumably had I picked up either of those - for much less - I would probably feel the same way (maybe); and not that it’s worth/means much, but it feels nice to get something ‘current’ once in a while.My daughters (who suffer through me tweaking and adjusting all the time) couldn’t care any less about speakers and usually don’t even notice anything different when it comes to A/V had this to say about them (after watching for a bit and being told they are different speakers and prompted for feedback):I asked them if they could hear anything different:“They sound really smooth”“They have better projection”“They sound clean and not boomy”

These replaced a cherish pair of Polk towers ive had since 1990 . Over the years I had tried other brand yet these were the first to challenge my allegiance to my faithful old poles . Rest on my old friends. Well done !

Full sound with great balance. Great upgrade for my home theater.

UB5 was my first ELAC speaker and I love it. I've been having it for 1.5years and a couple of months ago I added the new center channel (UC52) from the new UniFi 2.0 line. I have immediately noticed that the UniFi 2.0 doesn't have magnetic grille and that the build quality and overall solidity of the speaker was bellow what I was used from UB5.I thought that it's probably because it's just a center speaker and I blind-fully purchased UF52 hoping that it would have similar build quality to my original UB5 but I was very, very dissapointed.1. Magnetic grilles are no longer there. If you like your speakers without grille, you will now see the holes.2. The build quality is very, very bad. I have a set of Polk TSi300 which are three times less expensive and I the new UF52 are in line with those3. The legs for the grilles are made out of a very cheap plastic and both of my speakers came with broken legs! not only that, but some remained stuck in the speaker housing itself and difficult to remove.4. One of the speakers came chipped on a corner and you can see how the material looks like5. In terms of sound, I think they are very similar to UB5 but have a bit more bassI don't understand why ELAC has cheapened out a series that started to be very good. It leaves me no other choice but to look for a different brand as I believe the value of UniFi 2.0 in terms of build quality is matched by a 3x less expensive speaker.

They come in individual boxes. One had a big red sticker that said "B-STOCK" and had all the UPC and serial number labels carefully cut off the box. The other box had been opened too. One speaker was bad, the other just B-stock, and I had paid for new. The one speaker had a blown driver and was wired out of phase internally. It had probably been returned for that reason, and Amazon just shipped it back out.I bought a pair at Bestbuy because this experience with Amazon was so bad. The pair I got at BestBuy were ALSO returns with opened boxes. I brought them back and waited another two weeks for another set. Finally got a new set.So I mostly had issues with the sellers, but I'm giving Elac this 3-star rating because they need to control this better, with any of their authorized dealers. And also because they clearly have a serious QC issue.The speakers are amazing, but the quality control is incredibly bad.