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JBL PRX712 Review


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OK, so I may not be in Al's "speaker of the month" club, but I've owned my share. My latest purchase is a pair of JBL PRX712 boxes. I already owned the PRX718XLF subs and really like their low end extension. When my RCF 522A's failed for like the 5th time I decided I can't trust them anymore (and I'm out of spare amps). Given the street price of the 712's, I decided to buy a pair.

 

General observations

 

  • I’ve only used once so far and in a large hall (old big wooden “big band” venue). I put them up a bit higher than I normally set my mains, but used the 10 degree downward mounting option. I wanted to see if they’d reach the back of the venue. They did a good job. Fine for toasts and pre-recorded dinner music in the back of the room, but focused more SPL and high end on the dance floor when we started playing (I turn the speakers in toward the dance floor). I can see the downward angle being what I use most of the time and great for small venues where you want the speakers over heads but need near field, dance floor, coverage.
  • These are my first JBL speakers, but understand what’s meant by the “JBL sound”. I’ve heard it before. It’s pretty “in your face” in the mids, but not in a bad way, unless you’re the local yutz “sound company” that likes to bring 4 SRX double 15 boxes into a small bar, boost the mids and run full out. It’s hard to explain really. I want to say it’s on the harsh side, but A) it’s easy to tame by just making a cut in the parametric to taste between 1K-4K and B) I think I like the sound. It’s on the aggressive side, but has energy and seems like a good “rock box”.
  • I have 2 shows this weekend, a small bar and an upscale wedding venue so I’ll have used the speakers in pretty much all the typical situations except outdoors and that’s not happening for 6+ months.
  • As expected, it pairs nicely with the PRX718XLF subs. It’s nice setting the input gain on both boxes the same and knowing they are matched, versus using mixed brands and guessing. It also looks nice as a matched set.
  • At the end of the day, given the pricing available on the PRX stuff, they are a solid deal. I was able to get the subs for $1050 and tops for $650 (both locally too!) IMO, it’s a pretty nice FOH setup for $3,400.

Pros

 

  • Good looking box (full face grill with cloth backing, “DuraFlex” finish looks nice)
  • Solid monitor angle with wide base
  • 10 degree downward mounting option is smart and practical. It works well even in large halls as it allows the sound to go 15 degrees up and 35 degrees down
  • Reasonably light given the wooden enclosure and ferrite magnet
  • Smart to make the LED lighting an option as to whether you want it on or off
  • Nice input panel options and controls.
  • The covers fit snugly, seem to be decent quality, and are moderately priced

Cons

 

  • Single handle is awkward. A second handle on the top would be nice
  • Only a single monitor angle
  • Seems to limit a little early (but it’s a soft limiter and seems to get louder even when it starts to limit). Regardless, the 135 dB seems a bit optimistic.
  • DuraFlex finish is “just OK”. A small piece peeled off near the bottom of my PRX subwoofers to reveal it’s a pretty darn thin coating of the stuff. I’d suspect this is true of other boxes in the space.
  • When I first auditioned the speakers I plugged in my iPhone via the RCA jacks in my living room. It didn’t sound very good at all and I was worried. I use that same iPhone through the PA and it was night and day different (this is with EQ flat too). That leads me to the conclusion the RCA inputs sound like poo (no high end and just muddy)

 

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Good read. I have the mrx series, I have stopped using the 10 degree down tilt and just mount them flat, it seems to give better overall coverage in the room in my opinion. Question if you have the gain set the same on both the subs and bottoms which starts to limit first? the 12's or 18's? Thank you for the post!

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Question if you have the gain set the same on both the subs and bottoms which starts to limit first? the 12's or 18's? Thank you for the post!

 

 

It's kind of a loaded question as it depends on the material and EQ. In this case the tops were limiting and not the subs. Just barely though and likely due to EQ I had on the tops. Also, the hall was pretty boomy and it was a wedding so I wasn't trying to crush the place with low end. Given the size of the place I guess it doesn't really surprise me. I'm just not used to seeing the limiter light up on my tops. My old Yorkville NX550Ps lit up on every snare hit, but I have NEVER seen the limiter on my RCF 522A's light up. They can get scary loud.... like can't stand directly in front of them loud.

 

I don't know how much louder the JBL's would have gotten, but didn't need to find out. Frankly at the point I was as tickling the limiters, if I needed more SPL more cabinets would be the right way to do it and this wouldn't be enough PA for regular use. This place was as big as any we play though and did fine.

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Great review! I often forget to do a pros and cons list, but it definitely is helpful. I had the same experience with my NX55Ps liming all the time, often on snare hits. "Thunderstruck" was the worst song to try to play through these speakers. In generale though, they seemed to have very little headroom compared to all the speakers in my current arsenal. It's unfortunate about the RCF 5 series' amplifier issues. I hope to hear the HD12s soon. I have a Yamaha DBR12 that should be coming in at anytime, so I'm excited to test this new line out. I'm expecting they will be similar to DXR though, just light, less features and hopefully a better finish. The warranty is still 7 years though!

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Great review! I often forget to do a pros and cons list' date=' but it definitely is helpful. I had the same experience with my NX55Ps liming all the time, often on snare hits. "Thunderstruck" was the worst song to try to play through these speakers. In generale though, they seemed to have very little headroom compared to all the speakers in my current arsenal. It's unfortunate about the RCF 5 series' amplifier issues. I hope to hear the HD12s soon. I have a Yamaha DBR12 that should be coming in at anytime, so I'm excited to test this new line out. I'm expecting they will be similar to DXR though, just light, less features and hopefully a better finish. The warranty is still 7 years though![/quote']

 

 

Thanks. Nothing really earth shattering in my initial impressions review. Oddly though I've not found a whole lot on the web as far as reviews go on the 7XX PRX stuff. I very briefly considered the RCF 745 boxes, which my RCF dealer says sound incredible. (about $1500 US per box). I'm just leery after the nightmare of the 5 series stuff. Plus, for pricey boxes can't they just make the darn things look "normal" and give them full face grills. At the end of the day, when I realized the PRX712 could be had so cheaply, I figured they were worth a shot. If they didn't cut it for FOH I would just use them as floor monitors.

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Nice review Abzurd.

 

I haven't heard the 712, but did quite a bit of time with the 612m. It is my understanding that they are quite similar in their sound.

 

I loved the way they looked. I was amazed at how light they were (I understand that the 712 put on a little weight though). They sound good all the way to clip and into the red unlike many powered speakers.

 

I ended up loving the DSR112 more due to the punchy low mids it has. It was a tough decision for me though because the PRX was quite a bit lighter, and was a matched speaker to my XLF's (which nothing else in this price category even came close to in sound, so this was the sub I was going to go with for sure). I ended up paying $700 each for the DSR's and the PRX was running $800. You got a fantastic deal. If I would have gotten your deal, it might have made the difference :)

 

So now you are a JBL man ;) It is a fine rig Abzurd. I have not heard even a single report of a 712 having issues, so I suspect you are going to have a long and uneventful run with these FOH speakers.

 

FWIW, the DSR112's have an outstanding coating on them. Even more durable that the one on my XLF's. I do wish they were a bit lighter and had a side handle on them though. The tilt mount was also a feature I wanted but didn't get. That has got to be handy. The DSR112 also doesn't sound very good for music playback without doing some eq work. Too much on the HF to my ears. The PRX seemed more tame in that respect. More even.

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Well, for now, yes, I guess I am a JBL man. The sub just had the low extension I wanted and the tops just made sense to try, especially for the price. I'll likely sell one of the FBT Vertus rigs and keep the other. They are just stupid light, small, convenient and perfect for small upscale gigs. When both systems used though, it's becomes more involved to deploy and I guess I'd rather have a single sub and top per side that can just "do more".

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Funny - I've had some failures with a few PRX612m and was looking at RCFs for better reliability.

 

I just got a 612 back from repair under warranty and it took six weeks! Yikes! Hopefully the 7 series won't have the same problems as that's the way I'd like to go, just to keep the same brand on my tops and subs (PRX618xlf).

 

I really like the 10 degree tilt - I use it a lot and seems to improve the sound bouncing of the back walls in small venues.

 

Good luck with your new PRX712's and thanks for the nice review.

 

 

 

 

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JBL has always voiced to achieve that granularity.

 

Get yourself a parametric and sweep very narrow around the 2k-6k region and slice it out.

:)

 

 

 

 

Thanks, I was doing some parametric eqing Saturday with them. I'll say the snare never sounded better.

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I've been using 712's for a couple of months now. I purchased them to supplement my 612's. I really like the 700 series. I posted a comparison between the 600 and 700 series here a little while ago.

 

I did an outdoor show two weekends ago that had me using the 600 and 700's together. It was a music in the park event with multiple bands. As there was no "stage", I didn't have room to center cluster, so I ended up doing a stack on either side. The stack consisted of 1 718xlf, 1 618 xlf, one 712 and one 612 placed upside down on top of the 712. It was a pretty tall stack, but everything was ratcheted down. The audience area had a rise as you moved further back from the performance area. The FOH had to be located back about 120 feet because the ground started to level enough to place a table with some boards.

 

While I didn't have anything to measure, the volume was more than adequate for multiple "rock" type bands. I actually had headroom to go even louder, but it wasn't needed. Everything was very well balanced. Subs were "aux" fed with kick and bass, everything else was handled by the tops.

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Glad to hear you like them! I also have the PRX712/718 combo and love the simplicity. No crossover or amp rack needed. I also have two additional subs (also prx718) for outdoor events where I wanted more low end. But I have never needed them for any of the indoor events I do.

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I'll throw in my two cents for what its worth. I'm a JBL guy..I've owned EV, Yorkville, Yamaha, but I keep going back to JBL. I owned 1 x 18 618 XLF and 2x612m's. The sub was too much for me (bulky/heavy) so I bought 2 x 715 XLF's and I'm glad I did. I never listened to the 712's but seriously contemplated selling the 612's and buying 710's. I never had one problem with my 612's, but thought I'd give them a try. Keep in mind the 710's and 612's weigh almost. the same. I had no desire to add 8-10 lbs per speaker to get the 712's I did an A/B at the store and saw little to no difference in the 2 speakers. There was a little more high end out of the 10's and little more bottom out of the 12's which I would have expected, but not enough to sell and take money out of my pocket only to get a speaker that was smaller in footprint. I'm not really sure how much more the 712 can do over the 612. I contacted JBL before I made the change and plenty of you here warned me the715 and 618 subs were totally different animals ...and they are .. I love the 715's

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I added this to the "Cons" list.

 

  • Rather loose fitting pole mount is a bit annoying. If not perfectly level the speaker can swivel on it's own. And you can't blame my speaker poles. They are "JBL" branded, which are really rebadged K&M. Still, they are as high a quality pole as you'll find. A layer or two of gaff tape will give more friction and increase the diameter of the pole.

 

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Thanks Craig. That worked pretty well. I actually removed the "con" from my list as it really couldn't fit much better. Even a small patch of gaff tape made the speaker very difficult to remove. It can't really sit tight on a pole as you need the leverage to lift it off so it has to be pretty friction free. I guess I just miss the thumb screws on the RCF boxes.

 

I own K&M poles that have ring locks on each end and poles that are threaded, but I don't have one that's threaded on one end with the ring on the other. I doubt it's possible, but I guess I'll see if I can combine the 2. Otherwise I'll be taunted by the K&M 21367, which has both. It's important to me now because I'm mounting lights on top of the speakers and it needs to be solid.

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I can get them for less, but still pricey. the thing is I have 3 sets of K&M poles so roughly $600 worth.

 

The lights are ADJ Dotz TPar system. The only weight spec I found is for the whole thing, case, stand, controller and all, but I'd guess it's maybe 15 lbs. They are COB LEDs so pretty light. It has a channel on top for dance lights, but we just use a very small laser and a relatively small LED dance light. It's pretty stable currently and that's with the mount sitting loose inside a hollow pole. I'm going to cut a pipe and drill a safety pin mount in it.

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Abzurd,

 

Not to veer too much off topic, but would it be possible to show how you have the lights mounted to the top of the speaker? I'd also be interested in a review of the Dotz (perhaps over in the Lighting forum?)

 

Thanks!

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Abzurd,

 

Not to veer too much off topic, but would it be possible to show how you have the lights mounted to the top of the speaker? I'd also be interested in a review of the Dotz (perhaps over in the Lighting forum?)

 

Thanks!

 

 

I'll do another thread on that. I just finished "version 1" yesterday and took pictures.

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That freaks me out a little... my PRXs don't sit that tight on their extension pole. Do you use a shim?

 

 

Yes, actually mentioned in the thread. Also the weight isn't very much and I keep the speakers a bit lower than I otherwise would. I haven't used in a gig yet. This Saturday will give it a go. I'll probably get the K&M poles with the locking ring.

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