Well, let me give you my thoughts about the whole shebang. Let's start with the whole cast of characters:
And, starting from the bottom of the food chain, we're definitely talking about the KEF C55's, the dark black things sitting next to the HPM-100's on top of the 4333 monitors. No treble at all. "Do the tweeters even work?" no treble at all. And, yes, they do work. And, no, they don't have any controls to adjust the tweeters. NEXT!!
Next up would be the JBL L80t's, I'm afraid -- the smallish "towers" in front of the 4333 monitors. Actually, the mid-to-upper range was fine, but Jay mentioned much less than satisfying sound from the bass department, and I didn't hear anything that would make me doubt that assessment. NEXT!!
That would be the Infinity RS 2.5's, the big, beautiful floorstanders on the edges of the picture. With the amazing EMIM mids and EMIT tweeters. To a certain extent, you could appreciate their sound -- there is really something special about that high end -- "transparent," I think you'd call it. But.... That's how you could describe the whole speaker -- "transparent," as in "no body at all." Switch over to anything else, and all of a sudden you have room-filling, satisfying sound. There was a real lack of coherence between the mids and the really quite underperforming-by-comparison bass. NEXT!!
OK, let's take a rest here. The speakers I've just gone through really have something "not good enough for prime time" to me. As Jay would probably call 'em, "eBay fodder." Now, I'll be making comments about the rest of the speakers, but these are all "dang well good enough for this old boy" -- they are fine, full-bodied, and very satisfying speakers. Some have more "character" than others, and that can be both good and bad, depending upon your preferences. So, just take that and run with it, and ENJOY!
Next up: The JBL L100's. If you've been paying attention, you'll notice that these don't have the proper LE5 midranges in them. No, I've been playing around with the 104H midranges I "stole" from my old 4312A monitors, and that's what's in the L100's right now. The "original specification" L100's have a very characteristic forward sound, and on some stuff they are absolutely dead solid PERFECT. But, on some other stuff, you could wish for a little less "forwardness" and a lot more "warmth." That's pretty much what the 104H midranges give the L100's, but I can still hear something in the crossover between them and the tweeters that just doesn't sound right. I'll be putting the LE5's back into them, and leave well good enough alone!
Next up: The Pioneer HPM-100's. Yep, Jay and I were very much in agreement during our little comparison. Just like the L100's, the HPM-100's do indeed have a "characteristic sound," but it's quite a bit different from the L100 sound. Frankly, it's a lot like the sound from any JBL with the 104H midrange -- it's a "darker" sound, with a kind of a sense that the sound is coming from an "enclosed space" -- there is a sense of "space" about them. This is different from "imaging," but it's a different kind of "sense of space" compared to "imaging." Bottom line, there's more of a "warmth" to the midrange, as opposed to the original-specification L100's very "forward" sound.
Next up: The Phase Linear P-530's. Switching to them from the HPM-100's was very eye-opening -- well, "ear"-opening -- first of all, the P-530's had a much more "open" sound. And, the bass is very nice and full and powerful -- kind of like the L100's very agile yet powerful bass, but with much more of a "foundation" to it. Otherwise, there's not much more you can say about the P-530's sound -- it wasn't "warmer" or "darker" or "forward" or anything -- just like Goldilocks and the Three Bears, it was "just right." Just very coherent from top to bottom, very clean and detailed, and nothing you could really point out to "describe" the sound aside from how much you just plain enjoyed it.
Jay touched on the one pretty amazing thing about the P-530's -- the tweeters. Folks, I have the things cranked down to "minus 4" on a scale with "0" at the default, and down to "minus 6" or all the way up to "plus 6." Yet, I've done very careful testing and matching with listening material that I've been familiar with for decades, and all of the cymbals and such come out just right, in the very same balance as they do with all the rest of my speakers. So, that is one VERY hot tweeter, if you like to knock the balance all the way over to the high end!
Finally, the 4333's pretty much took the cake in the roomful of speakers. Really, the sound is very much like that of the P-530's -- again, just very balanced, coherent, and clean. The 4333's are the "professional versions" of the L300 Summit speakers, and I really can't say I've heard from Jay's what I recall from my encounters with the L300's from three decades ago. Back then, I thought the L100's sounded more like "real live music" than anything else I had ever heard -- very much probably due to the fact that their forward nature essentially "puts the performer right in the middle of the room." But, the L300's always sounded "larger than life" to me -- just dripping with richness and a touch of sparkle on the top. But, Jay's 4333's have just been very clean, balanced, and coherent -- no "bigger than real life" at all. Now, perhaps that's because I always heard the L300's at several times the listening level as I've been able to hear Jay's 4333's, but for whatever that's worth, there you have it!
thoots
