JBL SPINNER BT TURNTABLE REVIEW

JBL has been in the audio industry for years now. They have been trying to branch out a little into new categories, and turntables are one of them. The JBL Spinner BT is an entry-level turntable for most and features a built-in phono pre-amp alongside Bluetooth. 

Coming in at £379.99, the Spinner BT is a plug-and-play turntable allowing you to easily get up and running. Let’s dive in to see what this turntable is all about. 

BUILD QUALITY AND FEATURES OF THE SPINNER BT

First things first, unboxing this turntable is a really good experience – every part is well packaged and they make it very easy to assemble out of the box. The instructions are very straightforward, and it really did take less than 10 minutes from unboxing to having the Spinner BT playing. The cartridge is mounted on a removable headshell, the alignment is set up out of the box and was spot on, and even the adjustment of tracking force was quite accurate (I use scales to fine-tune, it was almost correct when following the instructions and setting the counterweight).

Build quality is good overall. The front fascia, rear panel and dust cover are all plastic; the plinth is MDF, the tonearm is aluminium and the platter is also aluminium – it comes with an Audio Technica AT3600L cartridge which tracks at 3g and the stylus can easily be replaced by a lighter 2g tracking AT91 if you so wish. There is a tonearm lift which is smooth in operation – this isn’t an automatic turntable so you do still need to lift it at the end of each side of the record. The feet are good on this turntable and I noticed they are quite soft and help dampen any vibrations, quite noteworthy of a product at this price range.

Feature-wise you get a standard power supply, felt slip mat, single adapter, and a set of RCA cables. The Spinner BT, as the BT suffix suggests, comes with Bluetooth 5.2 built-in with support for aptX HD – this allows you to wirelessly stream the music you are playing to a Bluetooth speaker, receiver, or headphones. I usually don’t understand why you would take an analogue feed, turn it to digital, send it over Bluetooth and then have it converted back to analogue, however, in this day and age it can be a handy feature if you are someone who wants to listen to vinyl late at night with a pair of wireless headphones. It also has a built-in phono pre-amp so you can set the output to line or phono on the rear of the turntable, to use with an external phono stage should you wish. There is one more switch on the back which enables auto-stop, this makes the platter start spinning when you lift the tonearm and move it towards the start position, and stops the platter when the tonearm is returned to its rest. 

The Spinner BT includes plenty of features, some will use them all, others will only use one or two, but it’s nice to have them though depending on your usage. The main thing is that JBL has steered away from any automatic mechanics that can impact the sound quality, this is still a manual turntable at its core. 

SOUND QUALITY

I’ve been using the JBL Spinner BT in my main system, in place of my Rega Planar 3 50^th Anniversary turntable. I have used both the internal phono pre-amp into the Keces S4, as well as the Keces phono input, this runs into a Keces S300+ power amp running a pair Bowers & Wilkins CM8 and more recently Alchris Audio TX-1. I did also test the Bluetooth functionality with the JBL Authentics 500 and I have used the turntable quite a lot to let the cartridge run-in (50+hrs).

In use the Spinner BT is much like most manual turntables, you go through the ritual of taking your record out, setting it on the platter, I use a brush to remove surface dust, get it spinning at the right speed and dropping the needle into the lead-in grooves. My initial impressions of this turntable were very positive, using the internal phono pre-amp you do get a well-balanced sound out of the Spinner BT.

Playing Blink 182’s latest album One More Time you get a good sense of rhythm and the tracking is stable and accurate enough. It sounds as detailed and open as any turntable around this price range can aspire to. The Audio Technica cartridge is widely used on a few lower-cost turntables and does a good job of tracking the grooves with depth, articulation, and linearity. The internal phono stage feels like it has been tuned with this cartridge in mind, it feels like there is a slight upper-mid/treble emphasis (only slight) that leads this turntable to sound slightly crisper through the internal phono pre-amp as opposed to running in into an external phono pre-amp. 

This latter point is something that was evident listening to the Cure’s new release – Songs Of A Lost World (1/2 speed master) – using the phono pre-amp in the Keces S4 seemed to give the sound a little more body without drowning out any of the finer detail. This is a good turntable; it gives you a good taste of what vinyl playback can offer at a more affordable price. Listening to this record, the quiet passages were just that, quiet. The dynamics are handled with ease and nothing was lost in the mix – I’d say it’s mostly the sound staging that is perhaps a little limiting at this point – that is nitpicking, though. 

On to Architects – Holy Hell. Once again using the Keces phono pre-amp, it handles this heavy and dense mix without skipping a beat. Better cartridges and turntables do dig out more detail, there is better separation out there, and the treble is not the most refined, however, the Spinner BT did deliver a thoroughly enjoyable listening experience. 

Lastly, I used Sigur Ros – Átta, this has a lot of quiet passages and shifting dynamics yet, once again, presented no issue for the Spinner BT. It was impressive how quiet this turntable is, often lower cost models are a little constrained in this department however, this was dead silent when it needed to be. I do stress again that this is not a high-end turntable, yet for a more affordable system it delivers a lot of quality and convenience for its price. I wonder how far you could push it before you get to the limits of the main turntable itself, I think it would do very well with cartridges up to £150 and not show itself up at all. 

In terms of Bluetooth playback, I did pair the Spinner BT with the JBL Authentics 500 speaker and it worked without a hitch, the sound quality over aptX HD is perfectly serviceable and aside from a little bit of latency (normal for Bluetooth) I could not fault it in this department. Bluetooth is of course mostly for convenience and the best sound will always be delivered via cable to your HiFi of choice. 

QUIBBLES

The colour options available may not be to everyone’s taste. (I thought it was cool- Ed’)

CONCLUSION

For people looking to dip their toe into the vinyl playback world without one, damaging their records (suitcase turntables, I’m looking at you) and two, breaking the bank, the JBL Spinner BT is a very worthy turntable. Yes, I can think of some turntables that may offer slightly better sound at this price point, however, the Spinner BT is a full package that includes phono pre-amp and even Bluetooth. It is easy to setup and sounds great for its price point. 

As much as I enjoyed going back to the more refined Rega, I cannot say that the JBL ever sounded wrong when it was set up in my system. I think that is the most important thing for me to highlight, this turntable gives you subjectively good playback at an affordable cost – and is a big step up from those cheap all-in-one players that you might find in the middle aisle at ALDI.

AT A GLANCE

Build Quality And Features:

Tons of features

Solid build quality

Sound Quality:

Smooth and well-balanced

The internal phono stage compliments the pre-installed cartridge

Value For Money:

You get quite a lot for your money here and I consider it good value for what you get

We Loved:

Easy to setup and use

Natural and even sound quality

We Didn’t Love So Much:

It’s only offered in two colours, Black/Orange and Black/Gold 

Elevator Pitch Review: The JBL Spinner BT is a great entry-level turntable for vinyl enthusiasts – or a step up from a cheap all-in-one. It’s well built, easy to set up, simple to use, and sounds great whether you use the internal phono pre-amp or hook it up to the phono input of your integrated amplifier. What the Spinner BT offers is a well-balanced sound that is enjoyable and engaging to listen to. It’s also a turntable that would easily handle a slight cartridge upgrade in the future, when you find yourself itching for that next tweak. Overall, it’s a very well-thought-out bit of kit at an accessible price, thus making it a sensible model to consider at this price point.

Price: £379

Oscar Stewart

SUPPLIED BY JBL

SUPPLIED SPECIFICATIONS

• Type: Turntable
• Plinth Materials: Black finished MDF
• Platter Materials: Die-cast Aluminum
• Tonearm Materials: Aluminum
• Tonearm Features: Removeable Head Shell, Adjustable Counterweight, Adjustable Anti-skate
• Cartridge supplied: Audio Technica AT3600L
• Replacement Stylus: Audio Technica ATN3600L
• Wireless Output: Bluetooth 5.2 with Qualcomm aptX HD audio
• Bluetooth profile version: A2DP 1.4, AVRCP 1.6.2
• Bluetooth frequency range: 2.4 – 2.4835 GHz
• Max. transmit power: <2.0 dBm (EIRP)
• Bluetooth transmitter modulation: GFSK, π/4-DQPSK, 8DPSK
• Analog Outputs: 1x Stereo (RCA) pair
• Phono stage: Defeatable MM Phono stage
• Signal to Noise Ratio: >65dB
• Motor Type: DC Belt Drive
• Power supply: 12V DC 1A
• Dimensions (inc lid down): 6.1” H x 17.1” W x 14.5” D (155mm x 435mm x 368mm)
• Product Weight: 11.7 lbs. (5.3 kg)
• Shipping Dimensions: 10” H x 21.5” W x 17.9” D (254mm x 545mm x 455mm)
• Shipping Weight: 18.8 lbs. (8.5 kg)