REL Classic 98 Powered Subwoofer

Classic 98 revives REL's 10-inch down-firing designs of the late 1990s, and it is honest about being a different proposition from the rest of the range. A hot-pressed paper cone with an air-dried inner cap sits on a 300W high-current Class D amplifier, in a cabinet finished in natural walnut veneer with a radiused curve, a subtle reveal line, and a rear amplifier panel with white-gold silk screening and contrasting knobs.

REL's own description is unusually candid: Classic 98 plays with a slightly softer touch than their standard models, trading a degree of the speed, clarity and deepest extension of something like the T/9x for warmth and a broader carpet of room-filling bass. That is a design decision rather than a shortfall. It exists for systems where the fast, tight bass of a modern subwoofer does not quite integrate — vintage loudspeakers, valve amplification, mini-monitors — and it does that job better than a more clinical design would. Well suited to rooms between roughly 150 and 400 square feet.