Yes, I was running 7 Maggies and dual subs for years. Honestly, my 1.6QRs and center channel Maggie were getting long in the tooth having just turned 20. They still performed well, except that the bass panel on one unit could occasionally buzz on the odd heavy bass note. I knew they all needed some factory TLC or outright replacement, and when I came across a few impressive reviews of the JBL 3 Series, I decided to dip my toe. To reiterate, I bought seven 1st generation JBL LSR 305s because of their neutrality vs. the MkII version. I was shocked at how far conventional driver technology has come, hearing something new and highly regarded in my home system that wasn’t a Magnepan (or a Quad ESL57, my other obsession) for the first time in two decades. (I’m also sensitive to time-alignment, so there’s that.) The main thing that has long attracted me to the best planar speakers has been their ultra-low distortion. The spatial presentation of planars is unarguably seductive, but ultimately their dipole radiation invites tons of comb filtering-induced coloration and room echo, no matter how you place them. For that reason, I’ve always resorted to careful acoustic ”props” to deal with the rear reflections, with a limited degree of success. Now I’m in hog heaven since the JBLs just sort of “want to” sound neutral pretty much anywhere you place them. I can even walk down the hall and into the bathroom without hearing a dramatic shift in spectral balance. Naturally I have my septet of 1st generation LSR305s laser-aligned in my media room for distance and angle...to the millimeter, and I’ve retained my room treatment, which is helpful regardless of the speakers involved. Stereo imaging is as good as anything I’ve ever encountered anywhere, but the sense of ”bigness” for lack of a better word doesn’t match big planars. For me, that trade off is worth it, though: what I lost in “image size” is offset by more pinpoint focus, which is entertaining in it’s own right. My latest kick over the past few weeks has been deploying multiple subs (5 in my case, so it’s a 7.5 system now) and tweaking them for level, timing, phase and global EQ for the smoothest, most coherent bass response I can achieve. Take a look at the work of Floyd E. Toole, et. al. for the lowdown on all that. I’m using the excellent Dayton Audio DSP-408 and the results have been pretty spectacular.
