Hi
I recently came from an audition of a JBL 530. The person is an aspiring audiophile who's traveled the world and bought a pair of these on the recommendation of an audio store in Tokyo, Japan. He bought an entire Accuphase system , integrated, DAC. The accuphase were 90's vintage i-e indistinguishable from current Accuphase . The JBL was new.
The person is relatively inexperienced and through some friends contacted me to help him make the system "better" ... then I saw those strange looking speakers ... .. smallish and was somewhat amused to see the JBL logo ...
System starts playing .. something is weidly right about the reproduction ... bass is lacking ... he can tell and so do I.. Soundstage is non-existent ... music is however reproduced correctly in some innate sense of rightness whatever that means... Voices are clear and dynamics are realistic
We pull the speakers from the walls, use some chairs to make an impromptu stands ,they were on a furniture with the electronics .. push things , move things and ... An incredibly gratifying system ... PErhaps a bit of DSP would help in the bass .. Definitely needs subwoofers (plural) suggesting him a swarm such as those made by Audio Kinesis.. He's not yet ready to plunk more than the speaker to the subs..No yet ... and cringe at the added complexity this would introduce ... Not a tweaker, a listener. A music lover. Afraid of the minutiae of setting up DSP and multiple subs but does feel the need.. His love of music however have him enjoying the system for what it is: A good , honest great sounding audio system.
Rated sensitivity is low 86 dB but with the (also) modestly rated amp (70 wpc @ 8 ohms) there is no sense of strain even when playing loud ... unless it is a bassy track where clearly the smallish woofer is hitting its limits and you can hear port noise ..else a serious sounding speaker with none of the peakiness and honkyness associated with horns but all the dynamics and liveness... and yes it plays loud ... And it plays right . In the sense one feels when confronted to a good speaker.. Please name your favorite brand here but this is a weird feeling of rightness
This speaker is virtually unknown in the US. It is made by an American company ... And it is just one of the many speakers made by the same company that are thoroughly unknown to the American audiophile. It isn't that they're (audiophiles) ignore those; it is they can't even audition them, they're not marketed here. Not at all and ..not the slightest... I would dare anyone to easily find a 4367 while we're at it or a a S4900 or anything from the JBL Synthesis line to which this speaker belongs. So to JBL or any JBL connected person ( Hi Amir )... What is going on here? How can you (JBL) so thoroughly neglect the domestic market? How can you leave so much space to products that are inferior in so many ways to yours. Why not take a page from the Internet consumer-direct people and make a go a this market yearning for better products at sane prices? Why? Oh why this obscure, strange, ineffectual attempts? Why ? oh! JBL why? ... What really is going on?
I recently came from an audition of a JBL 530. The person is an aspiring audiophile who's traveled the world and bought a pair of these on the recommendation of an audio store in Tokyo, Japan. He bought an entire Accuphase system , integrated, DAC. The accuphase were 90's vintage i-e indistinguishable from current Accuphase . The JBL was new.
The person is relatively inexperienced and through some friends contacted me to help him make the system "better" ... then I saw those strange looking speakers ... .. smallish and was somewhat amused to see the JBL logo ...
System starts playing .. something is weidly right about the reproduction ... bass is lacking ... he can tell and so do I.. Soundstage is non-existent ... music is however reproduced correctly in some innate sense of rightness whatever that means... Voices are clear and dynamics are realistic
We pull the speakers from the walls, use some chairs to make an impromptu stands ,they were on a furniture with the electronics .. push things , move things and ... An incredibly gratifying system ... PErhaps a bit of DSP would help in the bass .. Definitely needs subwoofers (plural) suggesting him a swarm such as those made by Audio Kinesis.. He's not yet ready to plunk more than the speaker to the subs..No yet ... and cringe at the added complexity this would introduce ... Not a tweaker, a listener. A music lover. Afraid of the minutiae of setting up DSP and multiple subs but does feel the need.. His love of music however have him enjoying the system for what it is: A good , honest great sounding audio system.
Rated sensitivity is low 86 dB but with the (also) modestly rated amp (70 wpc @ 8 ohms) there is no sense of strain even when playing loud ... unless it is a bassy track where clearly the smallish woofer is hitting its limits and you can hear port noise ..else a serious sounding speaker with none of the peakiness and honkyness associated with horns but all the dynamics and liveness... and yes it plays loud ... And it plays right . In the sense one feels when confronted to a good speaker.. Please name your favorite brand here but this is a weird feeling of rightness
This speaker is virtually unknown in the US. It is made by an American company ... And it is just one of the many speakers made by the same company that are thoroughly unknown to the American audiophile. It isn't that they're (audiophiles) ignore those; it is they can't even audition them, they're not marketed here. Not at all and ..not the slightest... I would dare anyone to easily find a 4367 while we're at it or a a S4900 or anything from the JBL Synthesis line to which this speaker belongs. So to JBL or any JBL connected person ( Hi Amir )... What is going on here? How can you (JBL) so thoroughly neglect the domestic market? How can you leave so much space to products that are inferior in so many ways to yours. Why not take a page from the Internet consumer-direct people and make a go a this market yearning for better products at sane prices? Why? Oh why this obscure, strange, ineffectual attempts? Why ? oh! JBL why? ... What really is going on?