Regarding My upgrade B&W 805s Speaker

[S. Basu]

Hii Friends,

After watching various reviews, I have bought my most awaited dream speaker B&W Nautilus 805S to replace my existing speaker B&W BS 685 S1. My initial observation is that the sound is more open and detailed compared to my older one. But to be very honest I expected more from the spekare. Maybe it's the season of amplifiers. Now I am using Marantz PM 17 & also tried with Quad Power amp.

Please advise me how to get the best performance of the speaker.

 

[Sandip Das]

What kind of other electronics in the chain you have like dac, turntable etc.. Pm 17 not a bad amp at all but 805 need more of it depending upon ur back end gear..

 

[hifimaddy]

805s is a perfect match with tube amplifiers. You can use your PM17 as a preamp and add a tube amp; this will be a huge difference. But I don't know which tube amps will be ideal for 805s. Maybe some other FM's can help it.

 

[heliumflight]

Sansui Au 717

 

[S. Basu]

What kind of other electronics in the chain you have like dac, turntable etc.. Pm 17 not a bad amp at all but 805 need more of it depending upon ur back end gear..

DAC- Mavrick Tube Magic, CD Player: Marantz CD 5005, Turntable: SL-Q212.

 

[Yelamanchili manohar]

One of our forum members was using the exact same speakers with a tube preamp and a Parasound Halo A21 power amp. The tube preamps were from Ayon audio, followed by a KR P135 preamp. Speaker cables were from transparent audio, inter connects were either Cardass golden reference or lessloss. Both the combination of preamps sounded lovely to my ears. In fact that sound still lingers in my head even now

 

[arj]

I have merged the 2 threads as they are similiar

First of all congratulations on a buying a wonderful Speaker ! couple of points
- the speaker will need a breaking if at least 50 hours. please do not make any assessment of the sound before at least 50 hours are done
- this speaker needs at least 50-100W of very good quality power. If i remember right while their impedance is more or less 8-6 ohms, their phase does shift and hence needs a lot more power and that too good quality power
- the better the Speaker/Amp the better needs to be the source..else you will just see the deficiency of the source since then speaker has much higher capability to bring it out

Hence first of all please let in break in before making any evaluation, after that try it with a better source than your current DAC and see the difference . There is bound to be a major improvement. The next in line is a better amplifier.

 

[S. Basu]

I have merged the 2 threads as they are similiar

First of all congratulations on a buying a wonderful Speaker ! couple of points
- the speaker will need a breaking if at least 50 hours. please do not make any assessment of the sound before at least 50 hours are done
- this speaker needs at least 50-100W of very good quality power. If i remember right while their impedance is more or less 8-6 ohms, their phase does shift and hence needs a lot more power and that too good quality power
- the better the Speaker/Amp the better needs to be the source..else you will just see the deficiency of the source since then speaker has much higher capability to bring it out


hence first of all please let in break in before making any evaluation. after that try it with a better Source than your current DAC and see the difference . There is bound to be a major improvement. the next in line is a better amplifier.

Thanks for your valuable suggestion. This is not a brand new speaker, I bought it from another Individual person. I think buring time factoer does not arise this time.

 

[arj]

Thanks for your valuable suggestion. This is not a brand new speaker, I bought it from another Individual person. I think buring time factoer does not arise this time.

thats true..just let it runin and get used to the sound as well.
The speaker (+ amp) controls the presentation of the sound but the quality is most impacted by the source so thats something you must try out

 

[dinyaar]

Hi
The b&w 805s is a good speaker

I did own it over a decade ago when it was sensibly priced. This was replaced by a similar speaker with the diamond tweeter. This one has the aluminium tweeter that can sound harsh/bright if paired poorly

First of all place it on decent, heavy , rigid stands if you haven't already. Try and bring the speaker away from the rear and side walls. Play around with the position till you get a decent response before you jump into changing electronics

Just for your reference I ran this speaker with multiple amplifiers. To name a few the marantz reference 11, ARCAM pre power, bryston pre power , accuphase integrated and finally the accuphase pre power. The marantz was the worst match to my ears while all the rest were fine. Naturally each set of electronics brings its own flavour and it's only your ears that can decide.

I generally have one bookshelf and one floorstander in the same room to enjoy two different sounds.

I replaced the b&w with a focal diablo which I still use and enjoy.

 

[captrajesh]

let in break in before making any evaluation,

This is not a brand new speaker, I bought it from another Individual person. I think buring time factor does not arise this time.

In my experience, even pre-used speakers need break-in if they're transported for considerable distances/ couriered.