JBL TI-2K opinions?

[wu6fiend]

What is the prevaling opinion on the JBL TI-2K speaker? I've never seen/heard them, but they seem to command a very high (to us regular folks) price tag. The retail on them is around $3300 including stands, I am told. Does anyone on here own a pair, and how do they compare to others in the JBL lineup (Studio L Series, which I own, for example)?

Theres a pair for sale, at a reasonable price, and I'm tempted...

(They would be replacements for my beloved L100Ts, in my office, which is a standard size bedroom. Driving them would be a vintage Sony TA-N77ES/TA-E77ES combo. Not that I'm getting rid of the L100Ts, but just looking for variety.)

(I think Titanium Dome owned/owns a pair???)

[HCSGuy]

I have a pair, and love them, but they are not a traditional JBL speaker, and don't have the traditional JBL sound. Maybe because they were developed and built in Europe. High frequencies are amazing - the Ti025k has much more real detail than an 035Ti without being as bright. Bass definition is really good and pretty flat. It's probably my favorite bookshelf speaker.

However, it is not very efficient and doesn't seem to like to play very loud - moderate volumes are great, but when I've tried to really crank them it sounds like they go into power compression - you feel like they should be louder than they are, and transient's are no longer sharp (I'm running Bryston 3BST). Second, they're really deep! 16 1/2" takes it out of "Bookshelf" range for me, and you will be hard pressed to find a pair of stands that securely hold them. Mine come out about twice a year for listening in my office and I balance them on an 8" x 14" plate on top of the 8"x8" plate of a standard speaker stand, but if I had them at home with my kids I'd have to make a new, larger set of stands to hold them.

Lastly, parts from these are Harman only - they're rare enough you won't see them parted out on Ebay. The tweeters on these were $90ea from Harman and are only protected by one wire hoop running vertically. As they look awesome without the grills, mediocre with them, I think they may prove too attractive for young fingers to avoid. Lastly, if your pair doesn't have boxes and you decide to sell them, you'll be hard pressed to ship them later - love the shape, but I think you'd have to use those expanding foam bags to pack them.

If the pair you're looking at have good tweeters and are a good price, take them - the few pair I've seen sell on Ebay on no-reserve sales have gone for $500-570 or so. But if you're replacing your "Beloved" L100T's, You may have a hard time finding a JBL that sounds more different (though I would say in a good way

Just buy them. You owe it to yourself to hear them and will be a better person for it.

[vettedrummer]

I own a pair of these along with the matching center channel speaker. They are used as the front of my living room home theater setup. This is not the main HT room, but just a place to watch TV and DVD's if I don't want to use the real theater in the basement. They are a very nice sounding speaker. I have the JBL stands that were offered with them and they really look nice on these stands. There is no way the grandkids could knock these over they are just too heavy. Sometimes I use them to listen to music, but it's mostly movie soundtracks for these JBL's. These sound nothing like your 100's, but have a sound all their own. Not the JBL I know, but not bad either. Cheers, Frank