which upgrade would make the most difference?

[sikoniko]

I am considering saving up for an upgrade. Consider having about $3000.

My current setup has has 804's as mains, htm1 as center, dm603's as rears and an as6 (i believe) as a sub.

My options would be:

1. Upgrade mains to 803's
2. Upgrade rears to 805's
3. Upgrade Sub to 850
4. Upgrade rears to 804's (maybe buy floor model or something)

I listed those in cheapest to most expensive. From the recent discussions, an 803 would not be beneficial if I had a good sub.

If I upgrade to 805's, I would need stands. My room would not accomodate wall mounts and I would lose the full range of a floor stander in the back.

My problem with getting a sub is that I live in an apartment and wouldn't be able to use it fully. This would be for its long term application.

The last option, and what seems the best, would be to upgrade my rears to 804's. My biggest question is, is this overkill? I understand it is ideal, but is it overkill?

My room would not accomodate

[DrBoom]

I once thought about getting all the same speakers, which I would've considered doing with 805's, but not with anything larger/more expensive.
When it comes to 804's or higher, I guess there is a benefit to it, but I find the cost too high to justify the purchase.
And it seems a bit like a waste to have such a capable speaker for surround duties only.
Maybe if you listen to a lot of concert dvd's or multichannel DVDA and SACD's it makes more sense, but for movies I doubt it's worth the money.
The 805's are very well matched to the 804's, although they 're not identical.
But the overall sound is very similar.

I wouldn't upgrade to the 803 either, unless you prefer that speaker's sound over the 804.
For HT, there's no use getting an 803 because it's still not "large" enough to be set as large in the processor (imo).
For stereo, if you find the 804 lacking bass, add a sub.
The only way I could see the upgrade to 803 worth it, is (like I said earlier) if you actually prefer the overall sound over the 804.

So my choice would either be the sub, if you are in urgent need of more and/or better bass.
Or the 805's, if you find that the 603's don't integrate well with the 804 and HTM1.
Since I can't hear your system from over here, I can't make the final call, but I'd go for one of these 2

[sikoniko]

I wouldn't say im in urgent need for any of it. The reason to buy now is because when the bills are paid off, i will be buying a house and getting married. that is all well and good, but at that point, my fiance wants to put any money we have into redoing the kitchen and bathrooms for resale value, before anything near the living room gets touched. with that in mind, pretty much what we have when we get married is what is going to last me for quite some time. It bothers me that i won't be able to finish this upgrade, but it is pretty expensive stuff.

its funny, but im not worried about the tv.. i feel that a lot is going to change in the next couple of years. i would just like to have all my speakers in the same series.

[DrBoom]

Well, if you're worried about getting everything in the same series, and you want to complete your set before you get married, I'd get the 805's as rears.
It's the least expensive option, and it completes your set with the same series.
Subwoofers don't necessarily have to be from the same series or even the same brand, but it is nice to have all speakers from the same series.
You can always add a sub later, but the 805's won't remain in production for ever, unless you want to buy them used.

pretty much what we have when we get married is what is going to last me for quite some time

So hurry up and buy those 805's before the wedding :B

[Aussie Geoff]

Hi,

I'm with Dr Boom on the 805's first if you are noticing any inadequacies in the rear sound - or (if it is the bass that is getting to you) which I suspect it would with the AS6 sub - then get that dream 850 sub for visial matching for the fronts... (good for the spousal acceptance factor - since the 850 is one of the few subs you can just have "out there" on display... with the B&Ws and match...

Indeed (in my heart) I know for me, it would need to be the sub 1st - it just makes that much of a difference for ALL types of playing, music, HT etc....

Geoff

[sikoniko]

I have also posed this same question to my 2 local b&w dealers and both said without hesitation that the sub upgrade would be best. One dealer said, he would recommend me to at least upgrade to the 675, and then trade up from there as i had the money.

tough decision, that is for sure. I could afford a pair of 805's (floor model) this month, but it would take a couple months to get the cash up for the sub.

Problem with that is that I think long term, I dont want 805's. I would rather have the scm1's if I were to get a bookshelf speaker. that way I could hang them on the wall when I got a house. and if the room didnt accomodate that, i could leave them on stands. just more options.

my ideal 7.1 system would probably be 804's for front and surround, and scm1 for rears and the 850 as a sub. only reason i dont say 802's is my fiance hates them, and they are out of what i can afford on my income.

so, do i go for the quick fix, or be patient...

[Aussie Geoff]

The answer is in your own words...

Sikoniko,

Sounds like you have just defined your own answer in the words in your post...

1) Buy the ASW850 as soon as you can afford it
2) Get 803s and move the 804 to the back (magic for 5.1 DVD-A and SACD)
3) Get the SCM1 for the sides and go 7.1

Awesome....

PS - Now it is time for those 2 dealers who recommended the ASW850 to come to the party with a price that makes it hard to say no....

Geoff

[sikoniko]

i was left with the impression that with a good sub, i wouldnt need to worry about the 803's...

[gostan]

Sikoniko:

Everybody does say that the 804's with the 850 sub are magical. My new 803's, HTM-1 and 850 sub are waiting at my dealer for pick-up tonight or tomorrow. I will let be interested to see if the 803's and 850 are overkill.

I will be (temporarily) using my CDM1NT's as rears. I only have a 5.1 system. I have an option tp either: (i) purchase an almost new pair of 803's or (ii) trade my 1NT's for either a pair of 805's or 804's. I would probably lean toward the 804's as rears as the the stands for the 805's are pretty steep.

If I were you and I were making one change only at this particular time, I would upgrade the subwoofer - Geoff, as usual is correct about the sub. Personally, I did enjoy the sound of the 803's over the 804's at my demo's and I cannot wait to hear them; especially after 100 hours or so.

Stan

[sikoniko]

Sikoniko:

Everybody does say that the 804's with the 850 sub are magical. My new 803's, HTM-1 and 850 sub are waiting at my dealer for pick-up tonight or tomorrow. I will let be interested to see if the 803's and 850 are overkill.

I would hardly imagine the 850 to be overkill, even matched with the 803's. I would think that that sub was designed to be put with the signature 800's and sound great. You will probably have some overlap that one with 804's would not have, due to the more bass in the 803's.

In saying that, Im just wondering if there is enough gain for home theater (803 vs. 804) use being of primary concern for the price difference. If music was even at 45% of the equation, Im sure the 803 would show its value. For me, right now, I can hardly turn my 804's up to a volume where they shine.

That puts me back to the predicament with any purchase I make. I calibrate my system at 75, with a volume level of 60, and the highest I turn the volume to is 50, and that can be loud for my room size, especially a dts track.

It is a real tough call for me. Either way, I am planning for the big picture. I just want to get started I guess.

With such a monster of a sub, I would be ecstatic to have my front soundstage finished. But would I really be able to use it well?

If I upgrade my rears to the 805's for the time being, Id have to get stands, and know that I would be trading them in down the road. at the same time, I will be sacrificing the fullness I get in rear sound, for a higher quality mid and treble.

I know I am answering my own questions, it is just a tough decision. On one hand, my current bass is very bloated and unaccurate sounding, but on the other hand, my rear speakers dont blend as nice as I would like, and I would like to upgrade them to nautilus before the product line ends, which at this point is only rumor and speculation anyways. They [rear spealers] do sound good, but there is a noticeable difference.

I did my budget, and realistically, I would have to wait a couple months for the 850. I could buy a lower line now with the intent to upgrade a few months down the road.

[Aussie Geoff]

Consider what you said....

Sikoniko,

On one hand, my current bass is very bloated and unaccurate sounding,

You will hear that bass for every minute of every sound format except pure bypass stereo...

On the other had, except for DVD-A and SACD, the rears are more used for localised effects etc, while the main speakers are playing simultaneously, thus disguising the rear speakers limitations more.

Besides - there is now and will be for several more years a very health second hand market in 805s...

Geoff

[gostan]

My initial impression of my new 850 (after about 3 hours of various listening) is thank g-d that I elected to go for the 850 over the 800. It is simply amazing. And I have not yet had the opportunity to do a full re-calibration. I now have a real sub to replace my ASW2000. I will report further on my new 803's, HTM1, and 850 over the next few days. I cannot wait to put in about 100 hours of break-in speaker time on them all, but I think that it is finally time to go to sleep.

[sikoniko]

gostan, please keep us updated on your system.

Ok, after speaking to an installer at my local b&w shop last night, I feel as though I am left with 2 options.

His opinion was basically that I should not be overly concerned with the rear speakers at this point, and that any upgrades really should focus on the soundstage. A point I was following when I started this upgrade.

Here is where this leaves me. I can:

A. Upgrade my 804's to 803's.

or

B. Begin the upgrade process on my sub by buying something in the 1500$ range now, and over time, upgrade to the 850.

I know I said 3000 was my limit to begin with, but after looking hard at my budget, it just isn't realistic.

The dilemma this brings me is that I've never heard either the 850 or the 803 so I don't know which would bring me the most gain. especially since I wouldn't actually be getting the 850 for about six months most likely.

My guess of what I am going to hear from people is that, because my mains are already in the nautilus line, I probably would be better off upgrading my sub. Is that true?

If I went the route of the 803's, would I notice much of a difference since that would be the quickest short term end result?

Or If I upgraded the sub, I would probably be looking at the asw 700 or 750 for now.

[Aussie Geoff]

Gostan,

My initial impression of my new 850 (after about 3 hours of various listening) is thank g-d that I elected to go for the 850 over the 800. It is simply amazing.

I'm glad... They are just great aren't they... I was feeling a little guilty about talking you into the extra $700....

Geoff

[Aussie Geoff]

Sikoniko,

The The ASW 750 is surprisingly good and MUCH better value / sound than the 700... You would notice the difference... Maybe your dealer can give you a 750 with a 6 or 12 month upgrade option to the 850?

Geoff

[gostan]

Geoff:

I was more concerned about the physical size of the 850 as my existing listening/ht room is quite small, and I was concerned about all of my equipment and hd monitor, etc. fitting on one long wall (it just barely does). I would have put the $700 in the upgrade the rear speakers future fund anyhow. I decided to future proof myself as I hope to have a larger listening/ht room within the year and if I purchased the 800 I would have been in no man's land as far as my dealers upgrade policy is concerned.

Stan

[sikoniko]

we want pics gostan! or i do anyways.. heh

[Rags]

The real weak link in your system is your sub - I personally could live with the 600 series for rears. Change the sub and you will be astonished what a difference it makes to the overall movie experience.

The ASW850 is a fantastic subwoofer. Im hopefully moving my HC into a larger room in the house and am currently toying with the idea of ordering another one of these. The only thing that puts me off is that I used to own two ASW750's and they suffered from integration problems.

Any of you guys have experience/ideas regarding two sub setups ?

[gostan]

Here is a real quickie photo of new setup. I hope this works.

Stan

[watchthewaves]

System setup

Hi gostan,

Am new here, having been following things on this forum for a couple of weeks only. If you don't mind me chipping in, after having seen a pic of your setup, there might be some things you wanna try:

First off, get your N804s out of the corners, or at least away from the side walls (try your speakers away from the side walls, with the distance to side wall different from the distance to the front walls behind the speakers). You could do this by moving your equipment rack to the side wall, thus giving you more space up front. Simpler would be just to swop places with the equipment rack and sub, but may not get as significant an improvement.

Also, might want to try tilting your centre speakers upwards so that the speakers are firing at you in your listening position.

Are your speakers on spikes? If not, might also want to try that too.

I think you might find a difference when your speakers have more space to breathe.

[gostan]

SimonS

It is my intention to modify this initial setup. The centerchannel speaker would not fit on the bottom shelf of my Sony monitor stand, so I had to remove the bottom shelf to fit the HTM1 in. I am either going to construct some type of lift-tilt-up device to fit under the HTM-1, of locate a new stand that will better fit the larger center. My wife would prefer that I make a modification to tilt the center, rather than a new stand - as this last upgrade was significant $$wise. Without the bottom shelf, I still only have about two inches total to play with

As for getting the speakers away from the corners is concerned: my only choice in this room is to move the equipment rack to the side wall and flip the sub to where the equipment rack was and move all down to the right with the speakers relocating out of the corners a little. I will require some longer interconnects to the monitor(and possibly speaker cables) to accomplish this. My speakers are on the floor and not the carper, so I do not see what spikes would

I expect to be in a larger listening room within a year and I only wanted to do this upgrade once.

Great to see your comments. I am sure that as the speakers break in that I will become very motivated to make whatever minimal changes I am able to make in this limited room.

Thanks,

Stan

[sikoniko]

Well, I did it. Today I ordered the 850 sub. My dealer said it would be in in about a week. My last hurrah. out with a bang! He is giving me such a great price, I really couldn't turn it down.

[luszer]

Wonderful, congrats on the upgrade. From all the previous posts sounds like the right thing to do and you won't look back

So you stayed with the 804s and went all out on the sub, correct?

I have a little buyers' remorse on my HTM2 purchase. I was planning that between either my N805s or my 9nts this will ( and has ) worked great. The question is that if I make the move to 804 or 803 then I need the take on the additional cost for an HTM1

What % discount did you get, if you don't mind?

Enjoy, Ron

[sikoniko]

I got 10% off, plus he gave me 300 towards my old sub.

I did the upgrade from 805 to 804. I originally had the matrix htm and I upgraded to the N805's. It was kind of funny but my dealer loaned me the htm2 and I was watching gladiator. I swapped them both out during the opening scene and there was a horn section in the htm2 that was totally absent in the matrix htm. It is an excellent center... when matched with the 805's.

I bought the htm2, but at the time still had not bought floor stands for my 805's, and the dealer was letting me borrow his. It was eating me alive to have the same amount of space taken up, and when in combination with the floor stands (b&W) the price wasnt that much different from the 804 so I upgraded to the 804's. They are better sounding floor stands in my book.

I noticed that the htm2, when matched with the 804 sounded very thin. It was pretty obvious to me in movies like underworld, when something panned across the front. It just wasnt a full enough speaker for the 804's and I had to upgrade.

When I started all this, I never intended to go this far. I bought a 30 inch samsung hdtv on scratch and dent from sears for 500$. had to upgrade all my video cables to component once I did that. then, I wanted to upgrade my receiver to get the newer sound formats, dts and ddex. What an expensive, long strange trip it has been.

[Aussie Geoff]

Sikoniko,

What an expensive, long strange trip it has been.

I know - I'm still on that journey.....

However I am confident that with your decsion on the 850 to go with the 804 and HTM1 you will know that for the Fronts speakers your journey is over for some years (unlesss you give up on that hous )

Let us all know how you go with the 850 - I expect that once calibrated it will put a smile on your face for a while...

Geoff

[Mark_C.]

For what it's worth, I think 803s are overkill unless they are for a dedicated home theater room. I have 804s in a two-channel system. A while ago I was looking for something to make the 804s produce more bass. I started looking at outboard amps in the 200 wpc range. But I had two B&W dealers that I regularly do business with tell me a new amp wouldn't improve the bass. Both recommended the Rel Storm III sub, an item that one of the dealers didn't even sell. So I found one on the used market and problem solved. The Rel is unique in that there are separate inputs for two-channel and home theater. It truly blends with the main speakers. I know the Nautilus subs are a big improvement over past B&W subs, but the price! :E

[gostan]

Sikoniko:

Congrats on your 850 decision. You will not regret it. I am really looking forward to your posts after you have it calibrated and have a chance to do some stereo and ht sound comparisons with familiar cd's and dvd's.

Stan

[sikoniko]

I have the 850 in the back of my car now. Will take it home in an hour or so. am excited.

[Aussie Geoff]

Sikoniko,

We're excited for you!!

Take your time calibrting it!

Geoff

PS - Big aren't they!!!

[sikoniko]

I dropped it off at home and put it in its new home. Havent had a chance to do anything other than that at this point though (not even install the foot spikes). Had to return to work. It looks a little smaller than the b&w as-6 I had. I thought that was interesting, because I expected it to be a monster.

[sikoniko]

Got it installed, and calibrated. It is definately too much for my current room size. I have the volume turned on to about 8 o'clock (on is between 6 and 7 I believe) and my receiver set to 0. I can rest assured that this sub will have a long life though, and the investment will be worth it.

Unfortunately, I have a commitment at my fiances parents house, so I can't watch any movies tonight. I have been patiently waiting for my new sub to watch any movie, and I have Kill Bill 2 patiently waiting for me.

I still can't believe its size. The pics I have seen always made me believe that it was some monster, and it is actually very similar in size to the as-6. I just wish the grill wasnt a circle. would be easier to hide from my fiance. heheh.

guess this is the end of my system upgrade for the next five years. It's good to know that speaker-wise, all I will have to replace are my surrounds for quite possibly the rest of my life. now receiver, dvd player and tv are a different story.

will report back once I've watched a movie or two. Is there any break-in for a sub like there is other speakers? If so, any idea how long on this beast?

[gostan]

Sikoniko:

I hope that you had somebody to help you carry and set your 850 in place. Congratulations and enjoy. It is a superb upgrade for your existing system as well as any future upgrades.

I myself will be listening to a lot of music until my replacement bulb for my Sony KF-50WE610 arrives on Saturday morning. Let me know how Uma Thurman looks in Kill Bill II. I am sure that she is going to sound better.

Stan

[sikoniko]

Uma looked bloody a good part of the movie.. and maybe im too critical, but that nose... anyways, kill bill vol. 2 lived up to the excellent audio of the first one. The bass was very subtle.

I recorded star wars 2 off hbo (hd) the other night and started to watch it for some real bass in the opening scenes. Im afraid I won't be able to watch this movie. There is just too much bass, however, very clean, and low. I will be evicted.

This sub blends in nicely with the speakers. it can be absolutely subtle, to a room shaking monster. Now i NEED a house to enjoy it. too bad i spent all the money, and then some i had for a down payment... on the bright side, when I do get the house, won't need to be purchasing a system for it. definately not a good sub for an apt, but then again, is any?

[sikoniko]

I am wondering if my posts have come across overy negative towards this sub. It is definately an amazing sub, and there is a tremendous difference from my previous sub to this one and my home theater viewing will have a dramatic difference in the low end regions. My hesitency to purchase this, was never that I didn't trust you guys. I asked for your opinions, and I appreciate it. I was very uncertain how much of a difference a good sub would make.

This sub definately needs a lot of room to breathe, so while it is not ideal for my current living situation, it will definately grow in value as my living conditions grow, and its value will only increase over time.

Thanks for the advice. If you are ever in the jacksonville, florida area, come by for a movie. heh.

[Aussie Geoff]

Sikoniko,

Double check your calibration levels...

Then try some music - sub = ON and Sub = Off (a quick toggle with the processor). I bet you will find that even at moderate (appartment friendly ) levels it is surprising the extra depth the 805 adds to the musical sound stage....

Also walk around the room while playing a bass heavy track - if the bass changes significantly in volume you should consider moving the sub or altering the processor sub distance setting or (last resort) the phase on the sub. When properly se-up the sub should be seamless at any volume and not be "too much" for the room - just able to play (if needed) way louder than is sensible for the room...

If you have trouble getting the calibration just right - Your dealer can help here if needed....

Geoff