KLH Model 88

Type: Tabletop radio with stereo inputs and built-in subwoofer
Designer: Henry Kloss
Introductory price: $199.99 (1998)
Inputs: Two sets of stereo RCA (CD, tape, TV, or computer)

Name: KLH Model 88
Brand: KLH

Almost everything that survives on the KLH Model 88 comes from a series of full-page advertisements that ran through late 1998. The campaign appeared in Audio (October 1998, p.23) and HiFI-Stereo (November 1998, p.43), among others. The ads billed the Model 88 as "the best sounding radio in the world." That kind of bravado was pure Henry Kloss, the designer behind the original KLH tabletop radios of the 1960s. By the time the Model 88 appeared, Kloss was an Audio Hall of Fame member and an Emmy Award winner, and his name was the central selling point.

The Model 88 was a tabletop radio with a built-in subwoofer. The ads pushed that as a novelty in a package this size. It also had two sets of stereo inputs, RCA jacks meant for a CD player, tape deck, TV, or computer. That makes it less a standalone clock-radio and more a compact system hub. The introductory price was $199.99.

Beyond the ad claims, the paper trail is thin. There is no service manual, no measured performance data from the period, and no detailed specifications (power output, driver sizes, frequency response, dimensions) in the research available. The campaign was short and does not seem to have generated the long review cycle that KLH radios of the 1960s got. The Model 88 appears to have been Kloss's late-career attempt to bring back the "high-fidelity tabletop" concept for a CD-era audience. How well it sold, or how long it stayed in production, is undocumented.