JAMO HAS BUILT its reputation as Denmark’s pre-eminent manufacturer of loudspeakers. Having tested many of its more innovative products, I have been consistently impressed by the manner in which they have been prepared to break new ground in the "quest for the Holy Grail".

To create a good loudspeaker, you have to start with appropriate drivers and then the cabinet also plays a significant role in the resultant sound quality. The underlying reason for this interaction between the cabinet and its drivers relates to cabinet resonances which degrade the purity and integrity of the reproduced sound.

That interaction is frequently extended beyond the initial transient when the walls of the speaker cabinet exhibit resonances with minimal damping characteristics. When that occurs, an initial transient excitation can be extended for periods of as much as 50 milliseconds or more. The net result is a pronounced coloration of the sound.

The Concert 8 Series main front speakers are beautifully made and give outstanding performance for their size.

There are many ways through which such problems can be minimised. B&W in England have developed their modular foam-filled honeycomb structure, which has proved very effective. A simpler (and less expensive) way is to add mass combined with an efficient damping mechanism. Jamo have adopted this strategy and applied it to the design of some of their latest loudspeaker cabinets.

The Jamo approach involves the use of a double-plastic layer wall structure, whose internal cavity is filled with a special mixture of high density mineral sands and what Jamo describes as "a resonance deadening binding agent".

This structure results in an extremely heavy cabinet which then displays very good control of cabinet ‘coloration’ and other less obvious anti-resonant characteristics.

Why am I bothering to tell you all this? Well, the Jamo Concert 8 and the Jamo Concert Center are the centrepieces as it were of the 5.1 channel loudspeaker system that I have just been reviewing. Those three speakers were supported by a pair of small Jamo Concert Surrounds for the rear speakers of the system, with a Jamo SW3015 Subwoofer providing the low bass content.

Home entertainment is currently undergoing a dramatic change as more and more homes install a DVD player with that ubiquitous 5.1 channel audio capability. The aim of the game is to replicate your local cinema’s Dolby Digital Sound System in your living room. While that sounds like a tall order, it is now far easier to achieve than one might think.

The basic elements that the latest generation of home theatres have are: a reasonable size screen, a good DVD player, five channels of sound amplification and the five speakers that go with it. Lastly, a self-powered or externally powered subwoofer is desirable.