JBL 104 Compact Powered Desktop Reference Monitors (Pair)

The 104 puts a 0.75-inch soft-dome tweeter on the same axis as a 4.5-inch woofer, so the two drivers arrive together and the stereo image stays put when you lean out of the sweet spot. That coaxial layout is the reason a box this small images like a larger monitor. Sixty watts of Class D, split thirty per side, drives the pair to a 104 dB peak with response from 60 Hz to 20 kHz.

One cabinet is the host and carries the amplifier, volume knob and all the connections; the second is a passive extension fed from the host. Inputs cover balanced quarter-inch at +4 dBu, RCA at -10 dBV and a 3.5 mm unbalanced line, so a console, an interface and a phone can all stay connected. A front headphone jack mutes the speakers automatically. Cabinets are ABS with a metal grille in matte black. This is the non-Bluetooth 104; the 104-BT adds wireless streaming.