JBL Professional CBT Series Column Loudspeakers

How JBL's CBT Series column speakers can overcome the challenges associated with tricky acoustic spaces.

HARMAN's JBL CBT (Constant Beamwidth Technology) range of column loudspeakers are a workhorse for the AV install industry. Especially for installations in tricky acoustic spaces, CBT's are supremely flexible problem-solvers with highly impressive full-range audio quality to match.

The primary purpose of the JBL CBT Series is to overcome the challenges of highly reflective or reverberant acoustic environments  - think houses of worship, lecture theatres, concourses - by directing sound precisely to the audience. Put simply, JBL's CBT speakers are designed to direct sound only where you want it.

Conventional loudspeakers typically have a wider coverage pattern with limited mid and low frequency control. This results in sound reflecting off room boundaries, delivering to the listener direct sound from the speaker itself plus any number of unwanted reflections. The differing arrival times of these reflections create a lack of clarity for the listener, a reduction in intelligibility. 

Image: Conventional speakers create unwanted reflections off boundary walls, severely impacting the clarity of sound reaching the audience.

Image: Highly directional speakers, such as the JBL CBT Series, dramatically increase the intelligibility of the audio reaching the audience by targeting sound only where you want it.

Furthermore, conventional loudspeakers have a significant drop-off in loudness (SPL) over distance, thus front-to-back coverage of a venue is not consistent. 

The JBL CBT Series solves these issues.

Read the full article on the website of our sister company Sound Technology Ltd.

A guide to JBL Professional CBT Series column loudspeakers

The CBT Series is available to hear at our offices in Hertfordshire and soon at the Innovation House Experience Centre in Bracknell.