How good were they?

[wilbee50]

I'm 64 years old and have extremely fond memories of JBL speakers of the past. My roommate after college had a Paragon and a very good friend had a pair of Olympus S8Rs. My best JBLs were Lancer 101s with an 075 added to each, since I couldn't afford the bigger systems at the time. I went on to own mirror imaged Dahlquists with a sub, Magneplanar Tympani I Ds, and currently have a pair of Thiel CS 3.5s. I follow vintage JBL speakers on EBay and find myself lusting for Olympus or similar with the S8 or S8R components. If I find a pair and audition them, is it likely I will be disappointed, or will I sit back and say AAAAAHHHHHH, I've been missing this sound ever since. Is there a new speaker out there that has a sound similar to the system I seem to be craving? I realize what I'm asking for is purely subjective, but I'm still curious what some of you out there think of this.

[Val]

I have the s8 and love them. With the help of this forum I built DIY boxes for them in 2005 (http://www.audioheritage.org/vbulletin/showthread.php?7140-LE15A-375-075-Box-Design).

I absolutely love the way the LE15A reproduce bass notes. They have a pretty narrow band tough forcing the 375 to handle 500Hz and up. This means that the 375/H93/L91 horn is a bit honky in the mid-bass. In my opinion the S8 component set has a gap in the mid-bass. I believe this is why JBL added a 10" in it's later 4 way systems. I use a 2245H sub to help the low end.

The 075 is very cool to look at and so is the L91 lens. The 075 has a bit of harshness in the 7k - 10k band. Something that I believe was addressed in the slot tweeter.

I love these speakers even with their limitations. I am in the process of tri-amping them and one day I hope to replace the H93/L91 with a DIY smith horn.

If I was starting from scratch and wanted a vintage JBL rig I would lean towards a pair of 4345's but then the grass is always greener.:)