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Just like the summer weather, the British floorstanding loudspeaker market is hotting up. We’ve seen several impressive high value for money floorstanding designs of late that offer serious hi-fi clout for a relatively low outlay. Regular readers will have marvelled at the 3050i from Q Acoustics that we reviewed last month, which received a coveted Editor’s Choice award and is the hottest, value floorstander we’ve seen so far. But contenders are already lining up to take its crown – including this month’s £600 cover star, Fyne Audio’s F303 (p46), and Monitor Audio’s Monitor 300 (p60), priced at just £550.

Wilson Audio is perhaps best known for its high-end floorstanding loudspeaker designs with their uncompromising levels of performance and money-no-object designs. We've been lucky enough to experience some of the brand's extraordinary models at The Hi-Fi Show Live showcases runby our sister title Hi-Fi News, and the brand is sure to draw eager crowds once again to its UK distributor Absolute Sounds' listening rooms at this year's event running from 10-11 November – advanced tickets on sale now through eventbrite. co. uk.

IsoTek has unveiled a trio of new mains conditioner products that include a mains power cleaner, mains synchroniser and 12-way power conditioner. Kicking off with the mains power cleaner, the new EVO3 Gemini is a compact two-way solution rated at 10A and offering filtration of common and differential mode mains noise. It costs £249 and is available from July. The Syncro Uni incorporates DC-cancelling electronics to reduce transformer hum when used with hi-fi separates.

Chord Electronics opted to use the High End Show in Munich (see full show report in the July issue, now on sale)to debut its next-generation analogue amplifier design – claimed to be its first fundamentally new topology since the company’s inception back in 1989. Developed and implemented by Chord’s owner and managing director, John Franks, the Choral Étude stereo power amplifier is describedby the Kent-based company as heralding a new era for powerful, wide bandwidth, low noise and low distortion amplifiers. Based upon multi-feedback and dual feed-forward error-correction amplifier technology, the new design intelligently adjusts and compensates the high-powered MOSFETs, which have been arranged into two banks of four. Power output is rated (conservatively according to Chord) at 150W into 4ohm or 300W in bridged mono mode and comes from proprietary ultra-compact switch-mode high-frequency power supplies – one of which controls the auxiliary rails, while the othertwo feed the high-current active power rails.

Flagship loudspeakers are usually designed to stand out but as range toppers go, few models are as instantly recognisable as Focal's eye-popping Utopia III Evo series. The Utopia DNA has been around since 1995 and as with any crowning model or series, the current Utopia III Evo lineup is the very embodiment of what the company's ambitious team of designers, engineers and craftsman can achieve and a complete showcase of the French company's impressive audiophile capabilities. Back in May, the brand chose the High End Show in Germany (see Show Report in the July issue) to introduce two revamped models to its flagship Utopia III Evo series, which is now in its tenth year, with the Grande Utopia EM Evo and Stella Utopia EM Evo floorstanding loudspeakers. Focal has been in business for more than 35 years and all its products are designed and developed at its base in Saint-Étienne.

There are times when the full benefit of a particular product cannot be totally realised until other changes and developments in seemingly unrelated areas have come to pass. In the case of active loudspeakers, the technical advantages have been known for some time in professional studio applications, but in terms of what that actually means for home audio fans constructing a system, any benefits have to be measured against the practicalities and upgrade path of a more traditional setup. In truth, you have to be completely on board with the active loudspeaker concept to go to the effort of constructing an audio system around it. The blurring of where source ends and amplifier begins has recently started to make the active speaker look like a much more enticing concept.

Elipson has become the latest manufacturer to get into headphones as it launches its new Bluetooth In-Ear No. 1. We’re told the in-ear headphone is but the first of a comprehensive series of portable audio products from the French company better known for its loudspeaker and turntable designs. Offering Bluetooth with aptX compatibility, the new in-ears utilise an 11.