JBL Freedom RXV - Electric, Shuttle 22 RXV - Electric, ES25C, ES80, ES250P Brochure
H
av ing u s ed JBL s p e aker s in
recording studios and at home
for ma ny ye a rs, t here’s some-
thin g a bout t hem I’ve always
found reassuring. I may or may not have
wa r med to t he voicing of a pa r ticula r
model, but I’ve always respected what I’ve
heard. So when cartons bearing the familiar orange JBL logo arrived on my doorstep recently, I was eager to check out the
company’s latest efforts.
The ES Se r ies oc cupies J BL’s uppermiddle pr ice r a n ge, a hot ly conteste d
market where prospect ive buyers know
wh at so u n d s go od bu t don’ t wa nt to
spend stupid amounts of money to get it.
I u npac ked two ES80 towers, an ES25C
center speaker, two ES10 sur rounds, and
an ES250P subwoofer. With their sizable
bulk filling my listening room, I expected
significant sonic results.
The ES80 tower stands waist-high. Its
trapezoidal cabinet, which widens in front
and tapers to the rear, looks very stylish.
(All of t he satellites, and the subwoofer,
work the trapezoidal st yling angle.) The
ES80’s five vertical dr ivers a re a pai r of
6-inch woofers, a 4-inch mid range, a nd
a module wit h two
3
⁄
4
-inch tweeters, one
covering the normal high-frequency range
and the other covering ultra-high frequencies. This sa me modu le appears i n t he
other satellites as well. Two pairs of stout
binding posts allow mono- or bi-amping.
There’s also a rear-firing port.
The ES25C center speaker uses an MTM
(midrange/tweeter/midrange) driver configuration, with a pair of 5-inch midranges
flanki ng the tweeter modu le. Adjusting
the ported cabinet’s two feet can lower
its vertical angle. The ES10 surrounds are
direct-firing, with one 4-inch driver and
the tweeter module. There are two mounting brackets on the back and two ports on
top. Make darn su re the kids don’t drop
pennies in there — or your car keys.
The ES250P subwoofer spor ts a frontfiring 12-inch driver, a downward-firing
port, and a n amplifier rated at 400 watts.
Its cont rol set provides adjust ment s for
level and crossover frequency (50 to 150
Hz with a 24-dB/octave slope), phase (0°
and 180°), and LFE/stereo line inputs. A
switch toggles between LFE (for the mono
low-frequency-effects channel on Dolby
Digital and DTS t racks) and Normal (for
a regular stereo input), with the crossover
adjustment bypassed when the former setting is selected. All six speakers are faced
with removable black grilles.
SETUP
Ins talling the J BL s did n’t present any
unusual obstacles. I placed the ES80 towers 10 feet apart, about 1 foot out f r om
the f ront wall, and toed them in to face
the lis ten i ng p osition. The towe rs a re
supplied with t hreaded spiked feet, but
I used the included rubber feet instead.
As with any floorstanders, t he proximity
of the drivers to my tile floor created a
reflection that colored t he direct sound
path. To mitigate this, I placed throw rugs
on the floor in front of each cabinet.
The ES25C center speaker went below
my TV. Its vert ical angle was good, so I
didn’t adjust its feet. I placed the ES10
surrounds on speaker stands in the back
of t he room. I w ish they had t he same
adjustable feet as the center speaker so I
could have aimed them down a bit.
Subwoofer performance is very dependent on room acoustics and on t he sub
–
+
Snapshot
Classic JBL sound quality from towers
and a massive sub, complemented by
a tonally matched center speaker and
surrounds
Plus
:: Loud, natural sound
:: Clean high-frequency extension
:: Solid low-frequency extension
:: Robust construction
Minus
:: Sizable cabinets require a sizable room
:: Sound may be too bright and forward for
some
The Short Form
Price $2,395 (as tested)
70 JULY/AUGUST 2008 SOUN D & V IS IO N soundandvisionmag.com
ES Series home theater speaker system
JBL
test reports
Ken C. Pohlmann
and listening positions. From experience,
I knew to place the ES250P in my room’s
sub sweet spot, along t he front wall and
between the TV and the left tower.
MUSIC PERFORMANCE
I sta rted my critical listening with stereo
playback, cou r tesy of KT Tunsta l l. Her
debut album, Eye to the Telescope, was a
bona-fide hit and proved that not all new
stars need to be Idols. The JBLs reproduced
the muscular bass guitar on “Suddenly I
See” with good musicality; the subwoofer
prov ided solid fundamental notes while
the towers’ woofers added the attack of the
plucked strings. Likewise, the kick drum,
pulled back in this mix, sounded steady
and strong. The sat/sub blend was seamless — one of the advantages of using towers for the lef t and right f ront cha n nels,
instead of small satellite speakers.
Tunstall’s lead vocal on t he song was
clean, as wa s the touch of reverberation
ar ound it. Deta ils were clearly aud ible,
such as nuances in the vocal echoes on the
line “I can see her eyes looking from a page
in a magazine.” That I could hear all of this
detail suggests good midrange clarity.
The snare sound was appropriately crisp
and snappy, albeit a bit brighter than what
I’ve heard on some other systems. The combination of t he normal tweeter and t he
ultra-high-frequency driver served up lots
of presence and air. The entire top end sizzled with energy, and, in fact, it required a
little getting used to. But once I got acclimated, I was quite happy with that extreme
high-frequency extension.
Expanding my audition to other faves
bot h old a nd new, I worked through my
evaluation checklist. Imaging was accurate,
with a good phantom-center image on pop
lead vocals, and likewise the panorama of
orchestra l inst r uments wa s cont inuous
across the stereo arc. The soundstage was
open and natural, undoubtedly aided by
the plentiful high-frequency response.
Turning my attention to music in surround, I listened to the 6-channel mix on
the DVD-Audio edition of Led Zeppelin’s
How the West Was Won. On this albu m,
the center channel is used lightly for lead
vocals, but since the ES25C employs the
same tweeter module as the towers, the
high end sounded well matched. The center
speaker’s 5-inch woofer falls between the
towers’ 4- and 6-inchers, but its tonal quality is similar enough. On other surround
albums, too, these drivers worked together
to reproduce a realistic soundstage across
the front, with good image definition.
MOvIE PERFORMANCE
JBL got its start in movie sound, so I wasn’t
surprised that its ES system handled with
aplomb the sou ndt r ack to Her o, a C h inese fantasy spectacle directed by Yimou
Zhang. In one scene, t he t it ula r cha racter swirls around a blue room, cutting ties
holdi ng bund les of stic ks. The swooshing sounds of our flying hero, co-mingled
with the ringing of his sword, are panned
th roug hout the surround mix. Here, the
satellite speakers provided great spatia l
continuity instead of the blobs of localized
sound I sometimes hear on other models.
The subwoof er added to t he sw i rli ng
sound wit h low-pitched whooshes — an
effect that was nicely integrated with the
satellites. (A lesser system might have statically localized the low sounds to the sub,
deg rading the sense of movement.) And
when the sticks crashed to the floor in all
six speakers, the sense of immersion was
complete. Meanwhile, dia logue — hardpanned to the center channel — sounded
absolutely clea n. As I expected, t he center speaker’s MTM configuration produced
symmetrical horizontal dispersion.
BOTTOM LINE
In a world of tiny satellites — not to mention cute cabinets that are subwoofers in
name only — it’s comfort ing to listen to
big, traditional speakers from a big, traditional company. JBL has a spea ker-design
knowledge base that’s almost unrivaled. If
there’s one thing it k nows how to do, it’s
putting drivers in boxes and making them
sound damn good.
S&V
ES80 ($549 each)
:: (2) 6-in woofers ; 4-in midrange ;
3
⁄
4
-in
dome tweeter;
3
⁄
4
-in ultra-high tweeter;
42
3
⁄
4
in high; 46
1
⁄
4
lb
ES25C ($349)
:: (2) 5-in woofers ;
3
⁄
4
-in dome tweeter;
3
⁄
4
-in ultra-high tweeter; 18
3
⁄
4
in wide;
16
3
⁄
4
lb
ES10 ($349/pair)
:: 4-in woofer ;
3
⁄
4
-in dome tweeter;
3
⁄
4
-in
ultra-high tweeter; 12 in wide; 8
3
⁄
4
lb
ES250P ( $599)
:: 12-in woofer; 400 -watt amplifier; 19
3
⁄
4
x 15
3
⁄
4
x 16
7
⁄
8
in; 43 lb
:: Finish : black or cherry
JBL.COM :: 516-255-4525
Key Features
Test Bench
Full lab results at soundandvi sionmag.com/jbles
Surround ■■85 Hz to 17.8 kHz ±6.2 dB
Subwoofer ■■34 Hz to 103 Hz ±1.9 dB
L/R ■■ 46 Hz to 15 kHz ±7.6 dB
Cent er ■■83 Hz to 14.8 kHz ±7.8 dB
The ES80 exhibits a 300 -Hz floor-bounce notch
that’s typical for tower-style speakers, along with
narrow band irregularities up to 2 kHz and a 5-dB
drop in level above 7 kHz. The ES25C center shows
similar irregularities between
800 Hz and 6 kHz, and its
response tails off at 6 dB per
octave above 6 kHz. It also
has a deep (20 dB) notch
centered at 3 kHz that
extends from 1.6 to 6 kHz.
Be assured that off-axis
listeners won’t hear the same
sound as someone sitting
front and center. The ES250P
subwoofer only has upper
bandwidth of 103 Hz using
the LFE input. When using
the internal crossover, its
response ranges from 52 to
81 Hz, even though the
crossover is marked from 50
to 150 Hz. To its credit, the
sub can deliver 105 dB SPL
from 32 Hz upward.
—
Tom Nousaine
decibels (dB )
15
10
5
0
–5
–10
–15
20 100 1K 10K 20K
hertz (Hz)
soundandvisionmag.com SO UN D & VI S IO N JULY/AUGUST 2008 71
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