Ive tested a fair few JBL bookshelf speakers here at TNW.
Well, what if you want both a retro designanda horn-bang out sound?
JBL has a hi-fi speaker for you too: the $2,000 JBL 4309.
While they arent perfect, the speakers maintain JBLs neutral approach to speaker design with an impeccable spatial presentation.
If youve read my review of theJBL HDI-1600, the 4309 sounds alotlike it.
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They both offer 6.5-inch woofers too.
But most notably, theymeasurevery similarly.
Ill let you know which oneIthink sounds better later in this review.
I know, Im such a tease.
I will say right away that Im immediately biased towards the 4309s retro aesthetics.
What can I say?
I live in Brooklyn, and it fits the vibe.
There should really be more of them.
The speakers feel solidly built, and I like how the grille only covers the more vulnerable woofer.
Usually, grilles are detrimental to sound quality, but I could not hear the difference with the 4309.
You could of course always apply EQ elsewhere, but its nice to have dedicated controls on the speakers.
A few words about my review style: I try not to shower speakers with vague superlatives.
There are plenty of other reviews for that.
In some ways, the better the speaker, the less I have to write about.
That is, speakers with a flattish frequency response and smooth directivity.
That same research also tells us our tastes arent as nearly as unique as people tend to assume.
On that note, lets look at how the JBL 4309 performs when put through my test setup.
There are two primary things that dictate a speakers sound.
There is the direct sound that travels in a line of sight from the speaker to your head.
You need good performance in both respects to achieve truly exceptional sound.
Like most speakers following evidence-based design, the 4309s sound is overall, quite neutral and transparent.
Ideally, this would be a flattish line, especially between roughly 200 Hz to 10kHz.
The 4309 ismostlyflat, with a few notable colorations.
Like the HDI-1600, the 4309 does have a slightly emphasized bass.
The rest of the frequency range is nicely neutral.
Next we can look at the purple line thats the predicted in-room response.
Here we domostlyget that, except the messiness in the mids is more pronounced.
All in all, its a very solid performance, and something very close to neutral.
I didnt mind it though; a little spice here and there isnt always the worst thing.
The latter might be a hair brighter too.
Next we take a deeper look at directivity how the speaker radiates sound in all directions.
We want the reflected sound to closely match the direct sound.
If it doesnt, not only will tonality be affected, but the soundstage will become muddy too.
However, one problem with the spinorama is that it doesnt separate horizontal and vertical directivity.
The former ismuchmore important for soundstage performance, and as such very few speakers are optimized for the latter.
Here wedosee a smoothly rising line which is right up there with the best Ive tested.
And that is what we get.
While the vertical response is not as important, it can still color the sound.
This is pretty decent as far as these types of issues go.
A couple of miscellaneous measurements follow.
Heres how the high-frequency knob affects the speakers sound at its maximum and minimum levels.
I found the default tuning just fine.
Something the above measurements dont quantify are the speakers dynamics and ability to play loud.
What else can I say?
The 4309 is another example of JBLs excellent speaker design.
