This center speaker sounded odd out of the box, after tuning and tweaking the receiver I was able to fold it into my home theater. It is heavy, expensive and needs to be tuned in. So why am I giving it 5 stars, in short I tested against my other JBL centers, the Stage, and the 530C and it stands above those fantastic speakers. That said the 530c gives it a good run but does not match the range, detail, and room filling power. The price is rough, but the sound is jaw dropping when fed high quality vocals. Sounds clean and smooth, great detail with a good sound stage. My setup: I have this center paired with JBL 590 fronts, 530 sides and rear, JBL 500 sealed sub and SVS 16 ultra in two port mode. Running Yamaha Rx-A3080 I'd love to try out the new towers and bookshelfs but the cost is just to much and honestly the 530c was the weak point of the 500 series speakers, it's not bad but does not keep up with the 590's in a larger room. I hope that helps as I did not find any online reviews that were simple and compared to other JBL centers with JBL speakers. Bottom line, this speaker is not for everyone, but for those willing to pay, tune, and tweak its impressive.