Digital Trends

Great speakers keep getting more affordable. It used to be that a first-rate speaker entailed getting a second mortgage on the house. The eminent British manufacturer Wharfedale, however, debuts its amazing biwireable/biampable Emerald line with an astonishingly high quality-to-price ratio. The Emerald 97 three-way floorstanding speakers, also available in , occupy minimal floor space while gracing any room with their gorgeous sound and glossy real wood finish. Their treble and midrange drivers render voices and acoustic instruments so seductively that you'd swear the performers were right in front of you.And while Wharfedale is best known among stereo purists, two pairs of Emerald 97s (or a pair of 97s with s for surrounds) work beautifully with the to fill a room with surround sound from DVDs or DTS-encoded 5.1-channel music CDs. "