The eagerly anticipated Neat Motive range is now with us. And mighty fine they are too.

 

All share the same 5.5" doped paper bass / mid driver and Neats own titanium inverted dome tweeter. There has been significant development work over the past few months and Neat are confident that these are more accomplished products than the pre production Motive 1's that won a best-at-show award in Bristol last February. Their (relative) lack of placement sensitivity is very un-Neat, not to say, most welcome.

 

All are clean, transparent, dynamic and musical with the sort of mid range resolution that affordable loudspeakers rarely manage to achieve. The treble quality is absolutely top of the tree. Once run in, the mid to top transparency and smoothness is a genuine revelation. They all sound impressively similar to one another and work amazingly well with the Naim electronics of all levels. There is a matching centre speaker, so a musically compelling A/V package is a very real possibility.

 

The Motive 3 stand - mount is aguably a substantial step forward from the iconic "Petite". For the money, the Motive 3 is downright amazing. It does dynamics, scale, colour and vibrant realism that truly belies the size and price. Even the bass carries more authority than you would imagine possible.

 

Whilst the Motives 1 + 2 are bigger and more extended in the bass, they are very much more of the same. The Motive 2 is probably the most appealing package. It goes surprisingly low and images well. The irony is that the greater bass extension means that it goes slightly less loud than the smaller 3. Providing this relative lack of loudness is not an issue, the Motive 2 can fill large spaces and physically disappear from the proceedings. Magical stuff.

 

The Motive 1 offers two-and-a-half-way bass arrangement and trades a little bass clarity for much greater headroom. And still this speaker looks too small to make the sound it does! Against more mainstream rivals even this, the most compromised of the trio, unususlly open and involving. We would happily pit it against more expensive rivals.

 

 

 

 

 

Prices (15% VAT) :

 

 

£1350 (motive 1)

 

 

£985(motive 2)

 

 

£755 (motive 3)

 

 

£494 (centre speaker) Price is £340 if purchased with two or more pairs.

 

 

 

Finishes :

 

 

cherry, natural oak, maple

 

All pictured are in natural oak.