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I used to own a pair of B&W 703s and drove it with a McIntosh MA6500 solid state amp. It sounded great in a 12 x 12 room (9ft ceilings); more power than I could most of the time.
I had always planned on trading up to the 804s, but through an odd fluke, the dealer allowed me to go with a pair of 803s (the non-diamond version) instead, for the same price. What I initially thought was a godsend, has turned out to be less than ideal.
First of all, the Mac amp does not do the speakers complete justice. The mid and high end is as expected, just wonderful, but the low end, while ample, does not have the impact that I had with the 703s. Regardless of what the B&W specs say, I believe the 803s are much hungrier than the 703s.
Second, the 803s are just too large in three ways: 1) They are much physically larger than the 804s. 2) They require a much larger soundstage, e.g. they must sit pretty far from room’s walls and corners, making them very difficult to place unless you have a really large room, and/or have latitude to move furniture to less than ideal places. 3) Finally, I never thought I would say this, but they have too much bass for even my tastes, at least with my room characteristics.
I plan on trading down to 804s eventually; Do you gurus think the Rotel RB-1080 will do a better job of driving my current 803s, and my eventual 804s, than my current Mac amp?
I was told that Rotel makes high current amps better suited to the 803s and 804s. I am into two channel audio, sourced from a CD player.
I had always planned on trading up to the 804s, but through an odd fluke, the dealer allowed me to go with a pair of 803s (the non-diamond version) instead, for the same price. What I initially thought was a godsend, has turned out to be less than ideal.
First of all, the Mac amp does not do the speakers complete justice. The mid and high end is as expected, just wonderful, but the low end, while ample, does not have the impact that I had with the 703s. Regardless of what the B&W specs say, I believe the 803s are much hungrier than the 703s.
Second, the 803s are just too large in three ways: 1) They are much physically larger than the 804s. 2) They require a much larger soundstage, e.g. they must sit pretty far from room’s walls and corners, making them very difficult to place unless you have a really large room, and/or have latitude to move furniture to less than ideal places. 3) Finally, I never thought I would say this, but they have too much bass for even my tastes, at least with my room characteristics.
I plan on trading down to 804s eventually; Do you gurus think the Rotel RB-1080 will do a better job of driving my current 803s, and my eventual 804s, than my current Mac amp?
I was told that Rotel makes high current amps better suited to the 803s and 804s. I am into two channel audio, sourced from a CD player.
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