JBL S312's (1 Viewer)

[Andrew_Walton]

I am looking at new mains and the JBL S312's have caught my eye (hopefully they will be catching my ears soon too!!) I am looking for a full range speaker with primary use for 2 channel stereo, and maybe 25% use for HT.

I particularly like the looks of that 12 inch woofer ... I am not a great fan of the bass redirection to a separate sub for use in stereo.

My question is, has anyone here any firsthand experience with the S312's? How would you characterize the sound? Would you consider them to be a worthy full range speaker for use in a good 2 channel setup. Could they do justice to the cannons in the 1812 for example?

Thanks in advance for your comments ...

 

[Phil Iturralde]

Welcome to the Forum Andrew (loved Syndney w/we visited last year), . . . and until other JBL owners comment on the S312, you can read the Product Review by E Town
JBL S312 Floorstanding Stereo Loudspeakers - Mark Fleischmann

I ran a pair of the JBL S312s through their paces with a McIntosh MA6500 stereo integrated amplifier, which is rated to pump 120 watts per channel into these 8-ohm speakers. The signal source was a Rotel RCD971 single-disc CD player. MIT provided the Terminator3 speaker cable, and the interconnects were Monster Cables' M550is.
My initial pre-break-in impression was that these speakers seemed surprisingly lightweight. With overnight play,they got even more coherent. These bulky speakers are capable of more delicacy than you'd think at first sight. Trust me!
Going counterintuitive for the first moments of serious listening tests, I threw tracks from John Eargle's Engineer's Choice II (Delos) at the JBLs, which metaphorically is a little like playing chamber music for an audience of bikers in leather jackets and riding chaps.
The speakers threw back a coherent series of orchestral and chamber sounds, spotlighting little details,but not bending anything unduly out of shape. A group of acoustic guitars were precisely separated, the titanium tweeters delivering all the woody quality of the instruments. A violent orchestral passage by Shostakovich pumped away powerfully but didn't get too boomy -- the speaker's 12-inch woofer is obviously designed for accuracy, not gut-whomping impact.
Pop music proved more problematic. Bass lines still came through with a nice combination of depth and restraint. The woofer managed not to go overboard on deliberately chesty vocal recordings like the title track of Bill Morrissey's Inside. But when I went to another of my vocal canaries-in-a-coal-mine, Joan Osborne's "Right Hand Man," the blues belting became uncomfortably shrill. Putting on the grilles reduced the effect, making the speakers palatable with a wider range of recordings. With the grilles on, most of my playlist sounded pretty good.
Speaker designers got away from broad-fronted speaker enclosures like this one as a way of reducing sound-muddying "diffractions" (sound bouncing off the front of the speaker). Even so, I wouldn't say the S312 sounded muddy. Credit for this may go to the fancifully named Elliptical Oblate Spheroidal (EOS) waveguide -- a little recess that focuses the metal tweeter's powerful output. The waveguide creates a "window" of +/-15 degrees vertically and +/-30 degrees horizontally, thus minimizing room reflections that might come back to hit the speaker.
Bottom line: This is a homely speaker that sounds pretty good.
Performance Rating: 80

click the link above for the entire Speaker Review.
Phil

 

[Stephen Houdek]

I have a pair of S312's!! I absolutely freaking love them. Paired with the Scenter its hard to imagine a better front soundstage for the money.

If you have the room they are worth every penny and I'm sure you would be as pleased as I am.... They sound as good for HT as they do for music. I don't have a sub yet and am quite satisfied with the sub-less base they produce. Have yet to convince my wife we can spare the room for an SVS.

Highly recommended. I think JBL is an often overlooked brand who has a long tradition of building great sounding speakers.

 

[Frank Kanyak]

I have a pair of S414p's for my mains. 80%HT and 20% DTV. They are great!!! Only drawback is I need a SVS ASAP for the extreme low-end 25hz and under...

 

[GregJ]

The JBL S312 are very good speakers but to be honest I like the N310 sound better. I have an older set of JBLs, THX181, which have the same lay out of elements and love the sound. The new "Northridge series" version fix some of thr dependablity issues with the THX models. These speakers produce very strong bass, in fact I was happy using these without a sub for a good while.

Greg

 

[Andrew_Walton]

"I don't have a sub yet and am quite satisfied with the sub-less base they produce. "

That was the comment I was after.

I have tried to enjoy 2 channel with the "small" speakers + sub arrangement, but I find myself having to constantly tinker with the sub in order to produce consistent/clear bass across all of my listening material. Now, all you sub/sat fans out there don't hassle me over "reference" ... I don't care about reference, I want my music to sound the way I like it.

I will retain my sub for HT, but I am looking for a speaker that will deliver sufficient dynamic range for 2 channel purposes ... can't get no dynamic range from a woofer much less than 12 inches IMHO.

Tks guys.

 

[ChrisMatson]

Another for the S312s. I use them mainly for HT (80%) but they sound great producing music too. As others have said, it is hard to find a better speaker at a similar price. I think they look great too!
-Chris

 

[Stephen Houdek]

Andrew,

The 12" woofer is what sucked me into these speakers.

I'll take a front soundstage with a 12" woofer over any bookshelf speaker any day of the week. I wasn't planning to buy a sub for a while and I knew adequate bass response would be necessary.

The 312's only go down to 35hz, if my memory serves, but there are a lot of subs that only go a bit further.