My Constant State of Change System...

[cube-tube]

I've been playing around with these little guys the past few days and am really surprisingly impressed with these things. The mighty JBL Studio 530. I say these easily outperform the Monitor Audio Silver 3i and Sonus Faber Venere 1.5's that I had.

Luckily, there's no real difference in sound with the grills on or off, so I keep them on as these speakers are sort of ugly with the grills removed.

[Pete812]

Yeah, not the pretties looking speakers, but I'm glad you are hearing improvements in sound

[cube-tube]

Yeah, not the pretties looking speakers, but I'm glad you are hearing improvements in sound

Actually, I quite like the looks of them... As long as the grills are in place. I only wish we got the cherry veneer over here in the states, but we only got the all black version. They're very unique looking speakers, but man do they sound great. I'm so glad that that giant horn sounds nothing like a horn at all. I'm seriously considering upgrading the capacitors and resistors on the crossover networks, because why not.

[cube-tube]

Listening to this album right now via Qobuz...



Some of her more "odd" music, but the sound quality is there in strides, and makes these JBL's sound even more impressive. I've listened to this album several times lately and in recent years, and it never sounded this good even with my beloved X-Statik's! Now that's saying something! Obviously, the Sonus Faber Venere 1.5's and Monitor Audio Silver 3i's don't even come close to what these JBL's are doing.

Yes, I know, totally different gear, totally different room... Still, those speakers couldn't get anything near this level of sound.

Very convincing reproduction of vocals and piano with weight and body, detailed, silky smooth treble that has space and air, and the fact that they completely disappear in the room. Finally for the first time in years, I've got a pair of speakers in a room that are capable of vanishing, leaving only the music behind. For the past couple of days, I've been tweaking their placement as well as crossover points and gains on the subs.

In short, there were plenty of super high dollar systems at that Florida Audio Expo show that I went to earlier this year that didn't even come close to this kind of sound. There were some of those smaller systems that were priced up to the $70k mark that didn't sound anywhere near this good. They were either way too shrilly or dull, and drastically recessed mids, and either no bass or way too much.

[hornucopia]

"Finally for the first time in years, I've got a pair of speakers in a room that are capable of vanishing, leaving only the music behind."

Wow-that's exactly how I describe my Ocellia Calliopes.
Those part-horns look great -I get something similar from Opera Consonance horns-but with 54 kgs of casework!
The sound-or non-sound? - of a good horn!-and only 600 dollars, max!!


I share your opinion of Shows-you go home thinking 'I do better at home"!

[Macca]

They measure pretty well too, https://www.audiosciencereview.com/f...-review.12298/

[cube-tube]

"Finally for the first time in years, I've got a pair of speakers in a room that are capable of vanishing, leaving only the music behind."

Wow-that's exactly how I describe my Ocellia Calliopes.
Those part-horns look great -I get something similar from Opera Consonance horns-but with 54 kgs of casework!
The sound-or non-sound? - of a good horn!-and only 600 dollars, max!!


I share your opinion of Shows-you go home thinking 'I do better at home"!

I know from these past few posts it seems like I'm hyping up these speakers, but they really do perform way above their price point. Granted, they're not the end all be all speaker obviously, and there's plenty of much better speakers out there, but for up to the $2k mark, I would say in the right system, room and set up properly, these JBL's will give those higher end speakers a hard run for their money.

I really like the looks of those Ocellia Calliopes. At first glance, I thought they were open baffle. Bet they sound great!

They measure pretty well too, https://www.audiosciencereview.com/f...-review.12298/

Yes they do. They certainly bring music and musicians to life in my room. And thankfully, they don't have that typical horn or JBL sound.

P.S. - Crapgame from Kelly's Heroes! Love that movie. Just watched it again about 2 weeks ago... For the millionth time! It never gets old.

[cube-tube]

Been tweaking subwoofer positions and settings a bit more. Getting better and better all the time.

[Firebottle]

Brilliant, a horn mid/tweeter done well can be sublime. I'd love to hear those JBL's.

I have rather a different setup with electrostatic panels but with ribbon tweeters/super-tweeters.

[cube-tube]

Brilliant, a horn mid/tweeter done well can be sublime. I'd love to hear those JBL's.

I have rather a different setup with electrostatic panels but with ribbon tweeters/super-tweeters.

Alan, stop by sometime when you're in the neighborhood and I'll let you have a listen!

I have a pair of Martin Logan SL3's in the spare room at my brother's house. I disconnected the crossovers in them a few years back to run them actively bi-amped. Sounded great too I might add. But if I were to run them in this system, I'd have to open them back up and reconnect the crossovers, which is a bit more labor intensive than just reconnecting a couple of wires. I've thought about it, but then again, I only have 80 watts on tap these days, so my amps might run out of steam before the SL3's begin to come to life.