Audioengine HD6 vs JBL Studio 180: which should you buy?

For most rooms and most budgets I would take the JBL Studio 180. It leads on sound quality, bass response, treble detail and value for money, and it is covered by a five year warranty against two.

Buy the Audioengine HD6 if your listening happens close up, in a small or midsized room, and you want one box to do everything. It wins midrange clarity by a clear margin, so vocals, acoustic guitar and small group jazz come through with a naturalness the alternative does not match. It also wins on design, with a finish that reads more like furniture than audio gear, and it is the more compact of the two at 432 mm tall, though still bigger than most people expect on a desk. The 150 W amplifier, DAC and Bluetooth are built in, so there is no separate receiver to buy or hide. I would skip it if you play loud music in a large space, since it hardens up at very high volumes and only reaches 50 Hz without a subwoofer.

Buy the JBL Studio 180 if you already own an amplifier or receiver, have the floor space for a 1016 mm tower, and want the most performance per pound spent. The three way design reaches 45 Hz, and 89 dB sensitivity into 8 ohms makes it an easy load for modest amplification. It leads on bass, treble detail and overall sound quality, so rock, jazz and film soundtracks land with more scale and more air up top, and the five year warranty is more than double the cover on the Audioengine. Two caveats worth knowing: both cabinets are tuned identically, which can nudge the stereo image off centre in a two channel setup, and the review pair arrived in poor packaging.