New Jamo C103s... thoughts

[RunOutGroove]

So... I really needed a new set of speakers like a whole in my head! I hadn't had my Elac Debut 6.2s for all that long and was really enjoying the sound that I got for them. Those speakers really ignited my lust for great sound becuase before that I hadn't really done much in the way of upgrading my audio gear in years (I'd describe myself as far more of a music fan than audiophile, but that's starting to change a bit). All of this meant that as much as I liked the new speakers, I couldn't help myself but to look at the ads and see what else was available. I found a set of the Jamos selling for really cheap (in brand new condition, no less) and I reasoned that if I sold my Wharfedale Diamond 10.1s (which are also very fine sounding speakers) that I was using as extension speakers (and the Elacs would take their place) then I could finance about half the cost of the new speakers.... so I pulled the trigger and bought the Jamos.

First of all, these things, though they're an odd shape and I'm not convinced of the aesthetics on the separate grills for the woofer and tweeter, they are really beautifully made, particularly since I got the walnut veneer version... which was kind of the deciding factor for me (I wouldn't have been interested in the white ones and the black weren't too exciting). I paid a fraction of the list price, but they really do LOOK expensive... I started out by A/Bing them with my Elacs (one in each channel with everything set to mono). I first pulled out a CD by Flaming Lips, Soft Bulletin which is incidentally a very dynamic recording that really comes to life on nice audio gear. That CD sounded good on both but oddly not dramatically better than the Jamo. Since I didn't hear much of an improvement I had a bit of buyer's remorse for a minute... that is until I put in the next disk, Herbie Hancock's Thrust. The first track on that, Palm Grease has a shaker part that comes up a bit into the song and when that part starts it felt like that shaker was right in my face! I was impressed with the kind of space (the imaging) that my Elacs gave to the music, but that was nothing compared to what the Jamos can do. These speakers, to my ears give the music a truly 3D quality and that's one of the things that I enjoy most. The bass seems very punchy with these things with the sound of upright bass is very woody (something that I really listen for). Note that though the bass was very nice coming just out of the Jamos that it's even better with the help of a little 8" Energy sub that I use with my setup (set to add just a subtle extra kick). One thing that I feel really really shows the quality of a speaker is percussion, so I put on a CD by this guy Leon Parker, who's a drummer/percussionist who's music is truly hypnotic and always recorded in a very audiophile way. That recording (and I can't remember which title, but all 3 of the CDs I have by this guy are pretty similar) showed that the percussion to have a kind of presence that I hadn't heard before; you could really sense the metallic tone of a cowbell and the animal hide of a hand drum.

Finally, these speakers, though rated and just 1 db more efficient than my Elacs (88 vs 87) seem a fair bit louder, making me feel that my 70 watt amp is enough (and I was considering using my Marantz as a preamp with some kind of more beefy power amp). Part of the perceived loudness I think comes from the basic character of the speakers, which is somehow fatter and more solid then the Elacs. If anything I found them to be a bit strident as far as the treble, but the guy that I bought them from explained that he only used them for a short time so they would still need many hours of use to get to that 100 hr break in mark that they're supposed to have. He estimated just 20 hours with the speakers and I'm sure that my week or so of use haven't gotten them near the break in mark, but I feel like they're already starting to sound smoother and I haven't minded turning down the treble knob a notch to get what I feel is the right balance. Overall they seem to have both the mojo and the transparency to make rock/funk music satisfyingly punchy and acoustic jazz type stuff sound nicely realistic.

I don't know enough about what's available to know just how good a value these things are at their full retail price, but I have a feeling that I couldn't be happier with anything for the $325 that I paid for them. These things really sound fantastic with incredible 3D imaging and a sound that seems to work very well for every kind of music that I've thrown at them, from acoustic jazz to heavy rock... If you can find a deal on these things, I would suggest that you give them a try...

 

[Nixxuz]

I had a pair of the C10 centers at one point running on their sides. I wanted to get in on a massive sale on the C-103's for $129 a pair that Amazon had a couple years ago, but missed out. The C-10's were $99 each, shipped. They sounded great, especially for the price. Later that year, there were a few more sales, (more on that later), and I picked up a pair of the C-109 towers in gloss white for $400+ tax with free shipping. For a while I figured those might be my endgame speakers. I later got into DIY so they ended up getting sold, but all of the Concert series are REALLY nice for both sound and finish.
The sales were really weird. Acoustic Sound Design apparently came upon a bunch of the C series in a warehouse they bought or something, after they had been discontinued. They decided to sell them through Amazon at a deep discount, but seemingly only when they needed a quick cash infusion or something. They would put around 20 pairs of various speakers on sale , which would immediately sell out, and then, sometimes a week later, sometimes even a few hours later, do the same thing. This went on over around a 3 month period before Xmas of 2018. I even had a week period where I didn't know for SURE if mine had actually been shipped, or I missed out, due to some info from FedEx not getting updated for a few days. Amazon actually refunded me the purchase price a few hours before the speakers showed up because neither they, nor FedEx, nor ASD, could figure out if they were actually shipped or not. I did the right thing that time and allowed Amazon to charge me for them again, but it was almost a case of free, 80lb each, $3200 MSRP speakers.

 

[RunOutGroove]

Yeah, those sales were pretty crazy. I felt like I got a good deal on a used price (barely used though) but to buy the same new at less than half of that would have felt pretty lucky.... I probably would have bought a DAC or something with the money I saved!

I can't seem to square why there would have been sales for that much of a discount. I thought that it may have been something directly from the company where they were trying to get lots of folks to use the speakers and spread the word about them, but since it seems that they must not have sent many of the to reviewers, as there aren't too many reviews to be found that can't have been the case. I understand that discontinued models can go for cheap, but as cheap as they were selling these things seems kind of ridiculous. Either way, even for what I paid for my pair they seem like excellent speakers. I feel like these might be the last pair that I ever buy! Now I'm getting the urge to upgrade the sound-source components and eventually get a better phono cartridge, better phono preamp and a DAC to run with my CD player (and maybe eventually some kind of streaming service, like so many others are doing). Still, I'd think that those kinds of upgrades will be only subtle improvements compared to what I got with these Jamo speakers (and the Elacs did sound very good)...

 

[Nixxuz]

That's pretty much what I did, until I had felt that my front end had exceeded the Jamo's ability to get any better. And I got bored and needed a project anyway. Which has led to multiple OB/FR/? experiments in speaker building. I don't think I'll ever get that piano gloss white finish with my skills though lol.

 

[RunOutGroove]

That's pretty much what I did, until I had felt that my front end had exceeded the Jamo's ability to get any better. And I got bored and needed a project anyway. Which has led to multiple OB/FR/? experiments in speaker building. I don't think I'll ever get that piano gloss white finish with my skills though lol.

Wow... The sound that I'm getting out of my old Marantz and these new Jamos is so good that I don't really have any desire to upgrade that part of it. I might hear an improvement if I did, but I'm not left wanting in any way.

The DIY speaker thing though is a very cool project(s) in my book. Are you designing your own stuff or working off of plans? As far as that finish goes, I don't know what goes into a lacquer type finish like that but I can imagine that it would be pretty labor intensive. Probably lots of coats with lots of rubbing/polishing between each of them. Personally, I'd rather see a really sharp veneer anyway, which is likely to be expensive, but I'm guessing easier to do well than a really high gloss, immaculate lacquer finish...

 

[Nixxuz]

Designing my own. It's really not terribly hard to do it "mostly" right, despite what some OCD types think.

 

[RunOutGroove]

Nice! I'd much prefer that finish to anything that's a black or a white lacquer... or really any kind of lacquer. I play drums and in the days when I was more obsessed with gear and looking at a lot more of it, it seemed that very often the most expensive lines of drum kits weren't radically different than the more affordable ones, except in one respect: the finishes tended to be really deep, really glossy lacquers. More expensive to produce than a simpler, less shiny, less "perfect" finish but the look was never all that attractive to me. I'd rather see the wood underneath rather than everything else in the room reflected off of the finish...