B&W Owner's Thread - Page 2

I currently have B&W 605s2 mains with lcr6s2 center, 601s2 rears and ds6 sides. I run a B&w asw675 sub for LFE effects. I dunno man, but to me this is serious gear. I have spent alot of my hard earned time setting this up properly in my main listening room, and I cannot part with the B&W sound for life. I have "bought" into their sound by virtue of my ears. I think the 605s2s are hard to beat for HT. I have listened to alot of others similar in style as the deftechs but cannot compare. The extra 4 8" powered subs in my towers makes for a rediculously realistic HT for me. As far as moving on to say the 703's, I like them better for music only (its a small margin imo), but for HT I don't think they compare to my 605s2s.

Yeah, going with higher end speakers is really best left to systems that will be used for critical music listening IMO. Any faults in lower quality speakers are often covered up by the viewer's distraction by the film on the screen/TV or the actual story line.

I don't know what you mean when you say "for HT I don't think they compare to my 605s2s." It is your opinion as you openly admit and you have every right to feel that way. I do agree with your sentiment concerning the lack of necessity to have higher end speakers in the movie/film watching situation. Are you saying that the 605s sound better than the 703s, or are you saying that when using them for HT you think it is a better choice (I don't see how it could be better for music only, but uncomparable when HT is used as a guideline, especially since there are many musical aspects to HT/film/movie soundtracks)?

I haven't compared the 703s to the 605s, but considering that one is a floorstander that uses the matrix bracing (I think) in the cabinet, as well as other higher-end B&W features, and the other is a bookshelf speaker, I do find it hard to believe if only because the 703 covers more of the lower frequencies than the 605. Then again, I felt the 703s sounded better than the 804s, so it isn't totally implausible I guess. I just don't see how it could be better in one situation (music) but terrible (in comparison) in another.

I think you are confusing the 605 with something else. The 605 is a floorstander, with a built in amp for the woofers. Think 604 but with self powered woofers. I think the 605 has been discontinued.

For some reason in the 700 and 800 series the lower numbers are the bigger speakers, while in the 600 series the higher numbers are the bigger speakers. Don't know why they did it this way.

That is something I wondered as well. wonder if they will fix the numbering scheme or if they think it is too late. I originally had 604's and 603's in S1. They were great sounding speakers, but I can say when I did my first upgrade, which was to N805, there was definately a noticeable difference for HT in the level of accuracy and quickness of the speaker.

Hi Kalman. I've wondered where you have been.

Got a great deal on a set of 703s in Cherry although I need black. Can I paint them? Has anyone attempted this? or should I just deal with the eyesore and not cheese up a really nice set of speakers :>)

Thanks in advance.

I would try to trade them before painting them

Does anyone know the maximum frequency where the woofer driver crosses over to the midrange driver in the 800D? I believe it is around 350 Hz if I am reading the B&W website specifications page correctly.

I'm trying to get a sense of where I should listen for the differences between the 802D and the 800D when I go and listen to the 800D again in the near future. I've heard many times in the past that the only differences are related to the woofer and its output. If I don't like any speaker better than the 802D when I go out to demo in the $20K range soon, and if I am significantly impressed with the differences I hear in the woofer output of the 800D compared to the 802D (which I haven't been in the past, but I haven't put in nearly enough critical listening effort previously and focused on the entire sound instead of where the differences lay), I may buy the 800Ds and move the 802Ds to the rear surround channels, as well as purchase the HTM1D. If I don't find speakers I like better in the $20K range and the differences are not significant enough between the 800D and 802D for my tastes, I will just buy the 804S and likely the HTM2D (perhaps the HTM1D if I change my mind between now and then).

I want to do some very extensive A/B testing between the 800D and the 802D in the woofer range. Has anyone heard of any other differences between these two speakers besides the differences related to the woofers (woofer driver, woofer cabinet size, woofer wiring, etc), because I've heard those are the only differences? Better to ask and be certain that the only differences are in the woofers, even if I've heard the answer several times already (I'm neurotic like that...), besides, you never know when someone who knows a little bit more than everyone else will wander along.

Thanks, and here is a useful chart for checking out where certain instruments' frequency ranges are located.

Painting them will ruin the resale value I think.

I left HTGuide because I got tired of how wacky the people were there (there were some insanely inane ideologies concerning audio and electronics - some people's ideas were pure fantasy, but they were being spouted as science, and the moderators played into and supported those insane belief systems). More so I got tired of how fascist the board moderators were, as well as the snake-oil salesman owner of the forum (Lex, the Cat Cables guy) who was so insanely paranoid of losing any cable business that he forbade people to speak of any cables but his own basically (God forbid if you challenge his electrical engineering background. Oh wait... He doesn't have one).

I decided to leave permanently when one of the moderators started an argument with me (audi9, or some name similar to that), then when he lost the series of arguments, he started erasing my posts that proved I was correct. Thus, only his side of the argument could be viewed and it looked like he had won the arguments (which I suppose he did win, if you consider abusing administrative powers a means of winning an argument), especially since the proof (quotes, links, etc) I posted that proved he was wrong had been erased from the thread. Pretty lame tactics by any standards, especially considering that the moderator in this case instigated the initial arguments. It has happened to a lot of people who post there from what I have heard since leaving there, even to people who you think they would have some respect towards.

That kind of stuff doesn't happen here though. This group of fora is much better run than the HTGuide fora, and administrators don't abuse their powers, even when they get involved in arguments and people get borderline insulting, they don't use that as an excuse to be abusive. It is a righteous place. I guess that is why it has such a huge following, is loaded with advertisers, and is exponentially more successful than the HTGuide forum.

Phew... Other than that, I've been posting here since then.

I started out with a pair of B&W 602s3 powered by Cambridge Audio Azur 540A integrated amp with my computer being the source.

I wanted to upgrade to the 705 after a bit but my dealer offered me a deal i could not refuse. His last pair of unopened Red Cherry N805 for 200$ more than what the 705 was going to cost me. I also then upgraded my electronics to Rotel 1070 amp, preamp and 1072 cd player.

1 year later, I upgraded to the 804s and am very happy with my setup. I currently have an ACI Maestro XL crossed over at 40hz which grants me a sweet (imo) full range system.

If the N805 is the previous 805, the one before the currently model, and the 705 is the current model, not the previous series, the 705s might have been the better speaker out of the two of them.

QueueCumber

upload some pic's of your system so we can see it.

Must be nice.

i spent about 2 hrs of his time going back and forth. Im pretty confident the n805 was superior to the 705. But all that is naught because I have the 804s which I really am enjoying. Ill probably stay with the 804s until I get out of college.

Before you exclaim, I dont own a car, thats why I could have the stereo

My first "quality" audio setup, relatively speaking, I bought as a freshman in high school. It was a Carver receiver, Carver CD player and a Carver dual tape deck (dual so I could copy Grateful Dead bootlegs) and JBL speakers. Before that I had other gear, but nothing that was built/designed to be "specialty" audio items. A friend of mine introduced me to the industry by setting me up with his brother-in-law who worked at a mid-fi to low-end-high-fi dealership (1988 or 1989). The brother-in-law gave me a nice discount on the items I mentioned and I would never be the same again.

A year or two earlier I received my first CD player as a present, it was probably one of the first CD players on the market, and I still remember listening to it. It was Sting's first solo album, which had just recently been released I think. I thought I would throw that boring little piece of info in while I remembered it... LOL.

Well, from the chart, I would suggest tympani and bass fiddle, plucked and bowed, would isolate their fundamentals to the woofers. OTOH, all would have harmonics that span the crossover and you might learn more with such sound. Low male voices, too.

Of course, for sheer extension, organ pedals.

Kal

Check out the thread in my signature, or click here if you are lazy or have signatures turned off. All my equipment is boxed up while they renovate the room where my Home Theatre (optimized for two channel listening), will be located. The thread does have some "before" pictures. I'll post some images here as well, but if you are interested in seeing and understanding what will possibly be the greatest and most expensive single component in my system in the not too distant future, then you will want to read about my Listening/HT room acoustically designed by Rives Audio.







Starting from the left side of the room and going from top to bottom in circumstances where equipment is stacked, this is the gear:

Revel Ultima Sub 30 Subwoofer (3 independent parametric EQs built into each sub, it seamlessly blends with the 802Ds when playing music or watching movies),

B&W 802D Speakers,

BetterCables XLR Interconnect,

Nordost Frey Speaker Cable,

Ayre MX-R Monoblock Amplifiers (very very recent addition, I'm extremely satisfied at how effortlessly it drives the 802Ds, hopefully it will be just as effortless with a pair of 800Ds if I go that route),

Bryston SP1.7, (PreAmp Processor, AKA PreProcessor)

Denon DVD-5910 (relocated to master bedroom and is now being used as a universal surroud and stereo source player with a Musical Fidelity X-Can V3 headphone amplifier and AKG K-701 headphones - I will likely move it back when the HT is complete to use for surround formats and put a Marantz DV-7600 in the master bedroom),

Bryston 9B SST (5 channel amp, to be used temporarily for my surround speakers and temporarily for my center channel),

Ayre C-5xe (U2 Player, or, a universal format two channel output player - except HDCD, so I guess it isn't 100% universal if you include decoding that embedded format),

Ayre K-1xe (Preamp) and further to the right on the floor near the wall is the power supply unit for the K-1xe which is left out of the preamp circuitry case so it can be placed far enough away that even the most zealous and/or paranoid person won't have to worry about EMIs,

Ayre MX-R Monoblock (the 2nd of the dynamic duos - 300Watts @ 8Ohms, doubles to 600Watts @ 4Ohms),

Nordost Frey Speaker Cable,

BetterCables XLR Interconnect,

B&W 802D (2nd in pair...),

Revel Ultima Sub 30 (2nd of the pair - Frequency Response = 20-80Hz, -3dB @ 18Hz),
~Fin~

Oh, on my 30" Apple monitor is the speaker portion of a Niro SSU400 Virtual Surround system, the subwoofer portion (more like a woofer portion than a subwoofer portion) is on the floor beside the desk.

Excellent. Thanks Kal.

Can you recommend some specific albums, pieces, songs, etc, anything that will give me those sounds in enough quantity and quality to be useful in these future demos if I bring them with me? That would really help me the most as I don't know which albums, pieces, songs, etc have these elements in such a way that they would be useful for my future escapades.

Thanks in advance for any more recommendations.

Thats the only thing that had me stumped

mm gotta love the 2560x1600 goodness.

For some nice low bass here are my two recommendations...

For a loud piece:
Felix Hell - Pipe Organ Sensation - Reference Recordings - RR-101CD
Symphonie-Passion - Marcel Dupre

At reference levels, some sustained notes in this track can bottom/motorboat decent subwoofers.

Typically, the bass units will undergo a great amount of excursion.

For a piece that goes from whisper quiet to full organ:
Peter Richard Conte - The Wanamaker Legacy - Gothic - G 49240
Komm, Susser Tod - JS Bach, arranged by Virgil Fox

This piece starts with a very exposed pedal section. Throughout the entire piece, the pedal dips down to low C# or roughly 17hz.

If you dont get the slight odd feeling in your chest while this song is playing, you know that you are not getting the low fundamentals.

605 is not a bookshelf speaker. It was the flagship 600 series floorstander before the s3's came out and it was discontinued. Its the big brother to the 604s2. Each 605s2 has 2 8" powered subs built into the towers. Yes each b&w 605s2 has a built in amp section with power cord etc... they retailed for 2200 a pair. Not that price or drivers has anything to do with my assessment. My assessment has to do with for HT only application, I cannot part with having the 4 extra powered subs in each of my mains. w/o my dedicated sub, these rock with the lfe imo. With the sub, I experience great lfe effects for movies in my living rectangle. As for music, I prefer 703 stand alones to my 605 stand alones. If i were to build a system around 703's, from what i have accumulated and heard, I don't think that I would be as happy as I am now as far as the movie lfe and also the center channel timbre matching. I however agree wholeheartedly to your point in that the material in movies is most definitely more than cut and dry "effects" or whatnot. I for one however, don't listen critically with movies. I like crisp clear dialogue and dynamic powerful sound that goes boom only when it should.

My mistake. I assumed that it continued the newer B&W motif of the number *05 beng a bookshelf speaker. I should know better though as I am well aware that the 600, 601 and 602s are all bookshelves... I'm not getting enough sleep. Only every other night for 12 hours or so. My circadian rhythm is totally screwed up now.

For the sake of giving a little more activity to this thread, I'll contribute. I guess I'm allowed to post here, since I am a B&W owner. Though I'm pretty far down the ladder from you guys.

I run a CC3 Center Channel. I guess it sounds decent for a small CC. It mates pretty well with my Jamo 477 mains. I actually greatly prefer it over my previous Paradigm Reference CC. The paradigm was bigger and played lower (thanks to dual 6.5's), but I think that overall, the B&W has much better tonality.

Everyone has to start somewhere. :-)

Jonomega has already made some good organ suggestions. For string bass, try the Buster Williams SACD Griot Liberte (High Note HCD 7123). For male voice, almost anything with Johnny Cash or Leonard Cohen or Hans Theessink's deep voice on Late Last Night (Call Me, Blue Groove BG-4020).

Kal

not so related i suppose but for some mean contrabassoon check out anthony braxton's "orinthology" off the tradition album.

btw--que--how many dead tapes you have?

Wood II by Brian Bromberg contains some of the most well-recorded acoustic bass solos I have heard (not to mention enjoyable to listen to, the guy has talent! )

What is the B&W "sound"? what's different about it from other speakers?

Ron Wasserman's "Duets" also.

For me, it is more of a lack of a particular sound. They get out of the way and let me hear the music as if I were in the studio.

For me, when I have a/b'd different speakers I just hear more of whatever I am listening to that gets masked by other brands.

Great to come across this thread. The last few weeks I had stopped even reading the "speakers" threads due to a certain poster/salesmen from Arizona who seemed to live to post his opinions as 'facts'. He actually argued about the sound with myself and others in a thread on the 802D's (when they first came out) even though he admitted halfway through he had never heard the speakers. At any rate it is great to see a place to talk 'safely' about B&W ownership.

I have a system based around a Proceed AVP, Rotel 1090 Main Amp, Yamaha Surrounds Amp. Speakers are Mains: B&W 802D's, Center: B&W HTM3, Rear: B&W 805S, Sub: Velodyne SPL10BGII. I couldn't be more satisfied unless I could afford a dedicated sound engineered listening room.

My B&W story only started about 2 years ago. I had collected gear for over 30 years, but only in recent years have I had enough cash reach a point where I didn't feel I had to compromise for the sound I wanted with the price. I had never owned B&W's, my last pair of speakers were Vanderstein's. After years of listening to speakers I finally decided the 802 was the pair for me. I bought my setup and was thrilled with the sound when I got them home. Needless to say, about 5 months after I bought the 802's, B&W announced the 802D's. I stopped by my dealer to hear them, and after a 30 minute audition, basically told him I had to have the 802D's. I traded up (even though only months before I told all my friends that I had just bought the last pair of speakers I would ever own). I have made the same claim about the 802D's except that this time I 'think' it will stick.