Home > Consumer Reviews > JBL Control 1x Personal Monitor Speaker System (Pair)

I first heard these tiny, unassuming speakers in the control room of an FM radio station. I was immediately struck by their clarity, openness, detail, imaging, and punch. No, you won't be rattling your neighbors window with the lowest notes of Bach's Tocata and Fugue, or Public Enemy. You will, however, be amazed how good a really small speaker can be. I have owned a pair for 15 years and my esteem for these little wonders has only grown. (I used to sell high end audio). Plus, they are built like a brick you-know-what, have metal cat-proof grilles, are almost waterproof, handle 150 watts, and the price keeps going down! Who knew?

I normally don't buy speakers without listening to them first, but in August 2006 I took a gamble and purchased a pair of these, I'm not at all disappointed!

I have a pair of these hooked up to a Pioneer amp, which in turn is hooked to my Mac Pro via optical.

Highs are very pronounced, but may be slightly brassy to some. It's really up to personal preference, my ears are very sensitive, so I notice treble more then others. I also might have been hearing more treble due to the fact I was listening to mainly 128k AAC audio (which or notoriously brassy).

Since these speakers are only 2-Way, I did notice a slight lack in the mid-range area but it wasn't super pronounced. The mid isn't bad, it's merely acceptable. It will be on par, or better with most high end computer speakers. So that should tell you something right there.

Lows come through very clear, no distortion from the woofer at all, no matter how high I cranked the volume. Don't expect these to shatter the earth though, even at high volumes; As others have said, no matter *what* speakers you get, you'll want a sub-woofer to "feel" the music.

These seem to be built very well. The cases are plastic, but it's very high grade stuff, and the units are put together very well, no creaks or soft spots.

So, in summary:
There are a couple of audio soft spots with these, however you have to take them for what they are, studio monitors. They're meant to reproduce sounds as close to original as possible, which I feel they very accurately do. A lot of modern generation speakers rely on flooding the listener with either treble or bass to make up for lack of response or fidelity. These don't. The fidelity is great, the response is great. Coupled with a decent sub and receiver this makes for a great computer or home theatre on a budget setup. JBL has been selling these for over 25 years, and they're still popular, so they must be doing something right!

If you think that the Bose are good sound and good looking, think again. They may be good looking but their sound does not even come close to this JBL.

Listen to everything else, then this. You will be amazed by the clarity delivered by this value / low cost speaker.

Perfect for home threater use (rear), cause it may lack some base, a sub-roofer will do it.

Do not get the flat Bose.......

I am using these speakers with a very low watt Sonic Impact T-Amp. The speakers respond wonderfully. With the T-Amp they fill a medium sized room with really nice sound--very clean, very nice reponse across the frequency range. I have not used them for really loud rock music, so I can't comment on that aspect, but they exceeded my expectations by a lot.

Gave these to my parents who moved into a smaller 1-level villa. Space is a premium now and replaced their large speakers with these little guys. Better sound than the large speakers and a very crisp clean sound.

No disapointments here.