JBL Studio 530 Speaker Review

[StevenEleven]

This has been a good week for reviews. Interesting results left and right. (Though I hope that Devialet situation gets rectified.)

Yeah, this site is becoming a great source of diversion and escape for me in these troubled times. Thanks to @amirm and the community. Sorry for the OT. Just wanted to express my appreciation.

 

[StevenEleven]

Thanks Amir! Looks like a fantastic speaker for the price or more. I still wonder whether your perception of "exciting" has to do with directivity. I can't imagine the top octave has all that much to do with it. Just a thought.

If I didn't prefer wider directivity (and didn't think the 530 looks atrocious) I'd probably choose this over the ELAC based on measurements.



How do you come about to this conclusion? How many $300 speakers do you know that measure nearly this well, especially passive ones??

i‘ve got a pair of Pioneers that cost me. . Um. . $120? That measure just slightly better?

Oh yeah, they were designed by the same guy who designed the Elacs. Not a fair fight. Never mind.

 

[andreasmaaan]

@amirm could I please put in another cheeky request that the distortion measurements be performed at one (or preferably a couple of) fixed SPL for all speakers?

I'd like to suggest again two measurements at the equivalent of around 86dB/1m and 96dB/1m, with possibly an additional higher SPL (106dB/1m) measurement for more capable models.

I'm confused by all the different distortion measurements going on here. Why was 10V selected for this speaker? That's a significantly higher SPL than most of the other distortion measurements you've taken.

I've also noticed many other members similarly confused, and comparing distortion measurements between speakers as they are not aware of the different SPLs the each of the measurements are taken at. Just asking for consistency here pls

EDIT: or alternatively, to not take distortion measurements at all. No information is better than confusing/misleading information IMHO.

 

[MZKM]

JBL's Stage series is from 2019 and I'd be curious to see their spins

The A170 towers for $600/pair (on sale for $420) measure pretty well between 200Hz & 7kHz:

I wonder how the A180 & A190 measure in regards to the crossover region.

Too bad the grille heavily impacts performance, as the woofers are ugly.

 

[Prana Ferox]

The binding posts are probably spaced at .75" c-t-c to take double banana plugs. I can't think of the last time I saw someone actually use double banana plugs for hi-fi. I still install my binding posts this way and have no clue what for.

 

[amirm]

No distortion graph?

It is the second graph in the review.

 

[MZKM]

It is the second graph in the review.

I just deleted my comment after realizing this.

 

[MZKM]

Why was 10V selected for this speaker? That's a significantly higher SPL than most of the other distortion measurements you've taken.

It’s ~98dB @1m anechoic, a decent amount of other speakers were measured at this SPL, the Revel M22 that was just measured for instance.

 

[amirm]

I'm confused by all the different distortion measurements going on here. Why was 10V selected for this speaker? That's a significantly higher SPL than most of the other distortion measurements you've taken.

I have been using 10 volt for the past 6+ speaker tests and have standardized on them now. I also have the 2.83 volt ones but I don't think it adds anything to the conversation.

The current distortion graphs are for diagnostic purposes, not for comparison to other speakers. As such, SPL differences are not material. And at any rate, these are ratio numbers so take into account to some extent the varying SPL levels.

Measuring distortion at a constant SPL requires licensed Klippel module. The manual way is tedious so I am not opting for that right now. Over time, I will move to that.

 

[amirm]

EDIT: or alternatively, to not take distortion measurements at all. No information is better than confusing/misleading information IMHO.

What is confusing about this?

We clearly see acoustic events of interest to us as marked.

As I have repeatedly said, don't look to me for exhaustive speaker tests. Others can stick a mic in front of a speaker and make distortion measurements as you ask. You don't need me or my instrumentation for that. Time saved here can lead to testing another speaker than pondering on one for a while.

 

[Bruce Morgen]

JBLs website is infuriating. I'm living in Japan, but am from the US so trying to access the JBL.com site so I can have a chance of reading and understanding it. Also, I can see what's available in the US when I return in 6 months. It recognizes I'm in Japan and ask me which one I'm really trying to access; .com or .jp. However, I CAN NOT click on the button for the US site. I've tried on Chrome, IE and Edge all with the same results. Thanks Obama.

Get a VPN that has a U.S.-based IP option available. Most VPN vendors offer a free trial version that may or may not include a U.S. IP -- if you can find one that does, you can get the job done.

 

[wwenze]

Hiss out of the mediocre actives, dull performance and power handling problems for $600 (list) out of the passives, published measurements that don’t seem to match with reality, QC problems, they talk a good game, but I’m not seeing it. I wouldn‘t trust the brand off the shelf after what I’ve seen here.

Now those Elac DBR62s. . .hmmmm. . .

Yet generally still putting out enough performance, subjective and measured, to avoid getting flakked.

So... JBL is the Bose of objectivists?

 

[Bruce Morgen]

Crossover schematic, full technical manual attached:

Also, an interesting thing I noticed: measured at 1m the flattest response is on the tweeter axis, but the drivers are not in phase at this angle. They got in phase only when I lowered the mic to the woofer level (the deepest notch when the drivers are connected in opposite polarity):
View attachment 56412View attachment 56413

The woofer side is conventional AF, but they're gone to great lengths on tweeter side -- perhaps in an attempt to compensate for driver/waveguide deficiencies.

 

[Jmudrick]

I love these things. Had em sold em bought again. With two subs and driven by the Crown XLS2502 I find little to complain about and the Kali IN-8;is benched for at least the time being. Hard not to be tempted by the ELACs though thanks to our hosts effusive praise...

 

[napilopez]

i‘ve got a pair of Pioneers that cost me. . Um. . $120?

Oh yeah, they were designed by the same guy who designed the Elacs. Not a fair fight. Never mind.

Not sure what you're getting at - these measure on another level to the pioneers and IMO a bit better than the ELACs. Amir's impressions are another thing.

 

[StevenEleven]

Not sure what you're getting at - these measure on another level to the pioneers and IMO a bit better than the ELACs. Amir's impressions are another thing.

Then we have a difference of opinion, and I’m fine with that. And believe me, mine‘s a lot more humble (and a lot less expert) than yours.

 

[HammerSandwich]

At the retail price of $600, the 530 does not get there and my strong recommendation would be for the ELAC DBR-62. But for $300, if you are open to some EQ and don't shake the wall as much as I like to do, the JBL 530 is fine.

Hmmm... DBR versus JBL + 2x Dayton subs...

 

[napilopez]

Then we have a difference of opinion, and I’m fine with that. And believe me, mine‘s a lot more humble (and a lot less expert) than yours.

No expert here - just was trying to highlight some context; you won't find many speakers $2,000 plus that measure this well. That the ELAC may be a bit better by some metrics is impressive, but it's also a newer speaker

Anyway, too bad they're so ugly.

 

[HammerSandwich]

Brain freezes whenever it sees theta, sigma, epsilon, etc. I just have to wonder why omega doesn't confuse me.

Weird. Omega should produce some resistance.

 

[Chrispy]

Many thanks @amirm Very interesting little speaker and a good review



This roll-off in the high frequencies is likely to be caused by the air in the compression chamber of the compression driver acting as a low-pass filter, and is actually a common (minor) problem with high frequency compression drivers.

It can be mitigated by reducing the volume of air in the chamber (the frequency of the filter is inversely proportional to the volume of air), but this may involve other tradeoffs, and is obviously not the approach JBL took with this driver.

I did see this in the 590 review as to measured high frequency response:

The ‘jagged’ appearance of the
trace above 16kHz is measurement error
that’s to be expected when measuring a
horn-loaded compression driver due to
path-length differences from different parts
of the horn to the measuring microphone.
Therefore you should ignore the ‘jaggedness’
and instead concentrate on the overall trend
of the response. You can see the Studio 590’s
response rolls off to 20kHz, then picks up
again to be only around 5dB down at 25–
30kHz, then rolls off to 40kHz.