Judges’ Choice

Our Judges’ Choice Award is not necessarily presented every year — it is reserved for something which doesn’t quite fit into a conventional category, but which the judges want to recognise as something special. And from first announcement of the JBL L100 Classic, through to their recent time in our test rooms, these speakers have been a ‘wow’ — not for everyone, but sure to excite a certain subsection of fans of a certain age, those perhaps who always lusted after the original and iconic L100, which was released in 1970 and became the company’s best-selling speaker ever.

“Not only JBL’s all-time best-sellers, but, from all indications, they were the best-selling loudspeaker system of the decade,” Harman International’s Jim Garrett told us back in January at CES in Las Vegas, where the new models were unveiled. The new version was designed for JBL by Chris Hagen — it is, of course, an updated design, and uses JBL’s newly-developed 25mm titaniumdome tweeter fitted with a waveguide, a 125mm-diameter midrange driver that has a cast-frame and a pure-pulp cone, and a 305mm wood-pulp bass driver. But they feature the same attractive, 1970sstyle retro ‘Quadrex’ foam grille in a choice of three colours — the orange and blue pictured above, plus black. And the new models retain the classic JBL tone too — a taste of the golden age of hi-fi. The price in Australia is $8495. More info: www.convoy.com.au

“A taste of the golden age of hi-fi... the L100 Classic is indeed classic JBL.”