Marantz M-CR612 + Jamo C 93 II

Ever since the first premium one-box systems arrived, there has been a cloud hanging over our reviews. Are you buying this one-boxer as a system for a secondary room, a bedroom, or study? Or are you going to put this in your lounge instead of a real hi-fi system?

We have long begged people not to take this latter course. There is a natural division between the world of one-box speaker systems and two-speaker stereo hi-fi. And it’s not rocket science — it’s simply the difference made by having two speakers that are separated in space. The rest is down to the quality of drivers, cabinet and amplification, and there’s no reason why a premium one-box system can’t have those. But it won’t create real spread, soundstaging, openness. It can sound great: musical, punchy, powerful. But almost by definition, it can’t do that hi-fi holographic illusion of reality.

Of course we say that, but can we prove it? Are we comparing like with like? So alongside the wireless speaker systems in this group, we ran a neat little system — the