IN-5 Black
Kali Audio's IN-5 is a 3-way studio monitor with an 5-inch woofer and
a 4-Inch midrange with a coaxial 1-inch tweeter. The unique
architecture of the Midrange and Tweeter eliminates off-axis lobing,
giving the IN-5 an incredibly accurate, lifelike stereo image.
Project Independence
Kali’s IN-5 is one of the most innovative studio monitors ever made.
Combining the natural advantages of a 3-way design with hyper-realistic
imaging of a co-axial mid-range and tweeter, it offers more
transparency, lower distortion, and a soundstage that must be heard to
be believed.
Performance
Power. Detail. Soundstage.
The IN-5 Studio Monitor is a speaker like no other. Using the same
woofer and tweeter from Kali’s celebrated LP-8, the IN-8 adds a midrange
driver that surrounds the tweeter, and acts as its waveguide.
In doing so, both the tweeter and the woofer are unburdened; with a
smaller workload, they are able to play more clearly and with less
distortion.
The coaxial nature of the midrange and tweeter make the IN-8 an
acoustic point source. Off-axis lobing is thereby eliminated, resulting
in a stereo soundstage that presents the listener with a hyper-realistic
level of detail.
All of this means that the IN-8 is extremely accurate and easy to mix
on, and that mixes made on the IN-8 will transfer wonderfully to other
systems.
Imaging
We know. We keep harping on about the "hyper-realistic" imaging of the IN-5. What does that mean?
When you listen to a stereo set of speakers, you’re hearing
information about where instruments and players were placed when the
material was recorded. Even with purely digital material, producers can
manipulate physical locations of elements in the mix, and you will hear
these on a stereo recording.
Not only does this allow producers to create interesting spatial
effects, but it means that you can work faster and with more confidence.
An accurate soundstage lets you "see" each element of the mix in front
of you, so you can hear exactly what happens when you make changes.
2-way systems with good waveguides, like Kali’s LP-6 and LP-8, do a
good job at conveying this spatial information. However, because the
tweeter and woofer on those speakers (and most studio monitors!) are
separate, this information gets lost in the space immediately above and
below the speaker. This means that at the listening position, you’re not
hearing the full stereo picture.
The IN-5 solves this problem. The tweeter and midrange share an
acoustic center, and the woofer is crossed over at 330 Hz, so the
distance between the woofer and midrange is well under a quarter
wavelength at the crossover point. This means that the IN-5 is
acoustically a point source. As such, it has the same excellent
directivity that the LP-6 and LP-8 have at their sides in a full 360
degrees around the speaker. You’re hearing all of the spatial
information at the listening position, so the soundstage that you hear
will have every detail that’s present in the mix.
Clarity
The IN-5’s total harmonic distortion is less than 1.4%, which is
exceptional. This is the result of unburdening both the woofer and the
tweeter, so that both are doing less work. The woofer is crossed over
at 280 Hz, a full 2.5 octaves lower than on the LP-8.
The tweeter is crossed over at 2800Hz, nearly an octave higher than
on the LP-8. Taking up the space in between in the hero of the IN-5
system: the 4-Inch, profile-optimized midrange driver. This driver has a
lot of work to do. In addition to reproducing midrange frequencies, it
also acts as the waveguide for the tweeter. This means that the shape
needed to be precisely engineered to provide an ideal dispersion
characteristic for the tweeter.
It also means that the midrange needs to stay still. In many other
co-axial or concentric systems, high excursion from the larger driver
causes intermodulation distortion, and degrades the accuracy of the
system. The midrange on the IN-5 is limited to less than 1 millimeter
peak excursion, making it acoustically stationary while still providing
midrange to keep up with the powerful woofer and tweeter.
Boundary EQ Control
A speaker’s given position in a space can drastically change it’s
frequency response. A speaker placed against a wall or on a desk will
sound very different than a speaker placed on a stand, even in a
well-treated space. Hard surfaces like walls, desk tops, and recording
consoles can change the low end frequency response of the monitor, and
degrade the overall clarity of the sound.
Happily, most of the common positions are fairly predictable and easily corrected.
Kali’s team did our Boundary EQ tuning at The Village Studios in Los
Angeles, and came up with boundary compensation EQ settings to help you
get the optimum sound for where you need to put your speakers.
Combined with the LF and HF trims, this will ensure that the speakers
sound their best no matter what room you’re mixing in, or where the
speakers are placed.
Easy Connections
The IN-5 feature balanced XLR and TRS inputs, and an unbalanced RCA input.
The RCA input can be set to -10 dBu sensitivity when you’re using consumer devices like a laptop or smartphone’s headphone jack.
Specifications
- Powered: Yes
- Amp Class: D
- Power Config: Tri-Amped
- LF Power: 80 W
- Mid-Range Power: 40 W
- HF Power: 40 W
- Total Power: 160 W
- LF Driver: 5-Inch Poly-Coated Paper
- Mid-Range Driver: 4-Inch Optimized Profile Poly-Coated Paper
- HF Driver: 1-Inch Textile Dome
- Freq. Response (-10 dB): 39 Hz - 25 kHz
- Freq. Range (±3 dB): 47 Hz - 21 kHz
- LF to Mid-Range Crossover: 280 Hz
- Mid-Range to HF Crossover: 2800Hz
- Listening Distance: 2.2 Meters
- Max SPL: 112 dB