It has arrived - speakers are here!!

brianle

I think light bass in your setup is due to the combo of b&w 802 and tube amp. I know a couple of people prefer the 801 over 802 for deeper bass

Joey_V

brianle wrote: »

I think light bass in your setup is due to the combo of b&w 802 and tube amp. I know a couple of people prefer the 801 over 802 for deeper bass

I think there might be some truth in that. I feel bad if I move away from the 211FE however, since it's pretty much as good as it gets for PP amplification without going into stratospheric pricing. I think there is so much good with the 211FE that I would be hesitant to move away. But will see... got work to do.

I might be willing to go 800 diamond with the 211FE, or maybe the Strads which are slightly (93db) more sensitive and have way more slam.

It's not that I'm dissatisfied, but my goal is realism. I will admit, I am very very picky about the sound I'm after. Either way, I think these speakers are absolutely stunning.

Joey_V

I wonder if I should keep it at the 4ohm taps.. I will switch it to the 8 ohm taps on the amps and see if I can feel a difference.

Bring in your 845, I want to hear SET on these guys. Let me just get ready, I'm too embarrassed to have you over just yet. It's like I live in some cave right now.... it's sad really.

EndersShadow

Whats the blue tape marking on the wall?

Joey_V

EndersShadow wrote: »

Whats the blue tape marking on the wall?

That's where my GIK panels will go.

[Deleted User]

Joey,

Nice man! Don't consider selling those Cary's, as the setup is not really dialed in yet. Also, the Cary's will probably be fantastic for another setup that you are planning.

Can't wait to have the official 802's grand opening. I will need a taxi to get my drunk **** back home!

Halen

[Deleted User]

On second thought, I will probably go lights out and pass out at my cousin's house at Tour 18.

Halen

marvda1

DSkip wrote: »

I'm hoping he gets it set up soon and tries to convert a couple of Texas Usher guys to B&W.

ain't happening, no way

[Deleted User]

Marvin, we doing BBQ again!

Halen

marvda1

halenhoang wrote: »

Marvin, we doing BBQ again!

Halen

just let me know i'm sure we can round up some meat and beer

RamZet

You made the correct choice in speakers. Break them in yet?

[Deleted User]

DSkip wrote: »

marvda1 wrote: »

halenhoang wrote: »

Marvin, we doing BBQ again!

Halen

just let me know i'm sure we can round up some meat and beer

Just call Todd so he can bring some more of that excellent honey bourbon he has. I think he's my favorite North Texas Polkie now, if for nothing more than pouring me a glass of that.

Waaaa!!! You found another Honey Bourbon guy! Good stuff!

Now if we can get all these guys to LSAF....

Halen

Wardsweb

Have you tried pulling the speakers out away from the wall an additional foot or two? Your room is the number one thing that affects the sound. You have heard it before, placement, placement, placement. You may be surprised how giving them some room to breath can change the sound.

Joey_V

So I figured out what was wrong with my setup... I had the speakers plugged into the wrong taps!!!!

Oh my god.... in my conversation with Cary Audio, they told me that if I was worried about impedance drops, to tap into the 4ohm taps and so that's what I did.... well, Mr. Skip was a genius... he mentioned something that clicked in my head - the BW802 Diamond are 8 ohm nominal. And then I recall a post by someone who owns my same pair of 802 diamonds and a 211FE and he said that they sounded better from the 8 ohm taps.

So, I plugged it into the 8 ohm taps and let her rip. And boy did she rip. The bass is back!! I was beginning to wonder what happened to the most powerful 845 based tube amplifier from Cary..... and now it's back! Then to be sure, I plugged it back to the 4 ohm taps and it was dismal the amount of (or lack of bass) bass that it was putting out. Back to the 8 ohm taps - and it was glorious once again.

I definitely think I'm probably at 80% good with the sound now. And I don't even have the panels just yet.

Wardsweb wrote: »

Have you tried pulling the speakers out away from the wall an additional foot or two? Your room is the number one thing that affects the sound. You have heard it before, placement, placement, placement. You may be surprised how giving them some room to breath can change the sound.

Yep, I'm doing that... I need to really get the positioning down. I have to start them at the walls and I need to play a bass tone repeatedly and then slowly pull out one speaker and see where it goes.

halenhoang wrote: »

Joey,

Nice man! Don't consider selling those Cary's, as the setup is not really dialed in yet. Also, the Cary's will probably be fantastic for another setup that you are planning.

Can't wait to have the official 802's grand opening. I will need a taxi to get my drunk **** back home!

Halen

Uh, yeah... everyone's invited!

halenhoang wrote: »

On second thought, I will probably go lights out and pass out at my cousin's house at Tour 18.

Halen

Haha tour 18? That's where I was looking at before.

DSkip wrote: »

I see those are 8 ohm nominal. Let me bring the 845 monos by and see how they do sometime. It would be worth the effort before you pull the trigger on new amps.

Hey Skip -

I owe you one, you jogged my memory and got me to switch out to the 8 ohm taps and boy, did they come alive.

The 211FE has balls.

Joey_V

brianle wrote: »

I think light bass in your setup is due to the combo of b&w 802 and tube amp. I know a couple of people prefer the 801 over 802 for deeper bass

Brian -

Yeah I made a mistake, I used the wrong impedance taps. Now that I'm using the 8 ohm taps.. the bass is back, baby.

[Deleted User]

halenhoang wrote: »

On second thought, I will probably go lights out and pass out at my cousin's house at Tour 18.

Halen

Haha tour 18? That's where I was looking at before.

Hahaha. You too!! I thought about it for a year. Move out there and save around 100 150g's but I am 45 minutes from civilization or...

I found country club drive......and the rest is history.

Halen

Joey_V

DSkip wrote: »

Glad to hear you got it back man.

It was you who triggered the change.

ZLTFUL

Happy for you man! Spent yesterday in an anesthesia inducing stupor and then all day today running 2 dedicated 20 amp runs for my HT gear (2 channel is next as soon as I can figure out how to get the run into the attic and then back down into the room).

Love the looks of those things...not completely enamored with the B&W sound but I have been stopping by my buddy's shop and putting my ears on the 802s...problem is, he has Magico Q3s, S5s and Q1s in the same room along with some ProAc Carbon 8s in ebony so they have some solid competition (along with his TADs but those really don't do much for me).

Anyway, congrats on finding the source of the deficiencies. Hopefully you can get everything 100% sooner rather than later.

WLDock

Joey_V wrote: »

So I figured out what was wrong with my setup... I had the speakers plugged into the wrong taps!!!!

From the tests and measurements one would think the 4 Ohm tap was the way to go.

From: http://www.ultrahighendreview.com/uploads/documents/b&w_802diamond.pdf
The impedance of the B&W 802 Diamond indicates that it will present a fairly difficult load for the amplifier driving it, with impedance remaining below 4Ω from 60Hz all the way up to 850Hz, except for the small region 250–450Hz. The impedance falls below 3Ω across the frequencies 75–125Hz and gain at 600Hz. The low impedance at low frequencies is further complicated by a phase angle of around –55° at 60Hz. The low (3.5Ω) impedance above 15kHz may also bother some amplifiers.
On the plus side, you won’t need an overly powerful amplifier to drive the 802Ds to high sound pressure levels in your room, because Newport Test Labs’
tests put the B&W 802 Diamond’s sensitivity at just a shade under B&W’s spec of 90dB SPL.

Same thing with the 800's:

From: http://www.stereophile.com/content/bampw-800-diamond-loudspeaker-measurements
My estimate of the B&W's sensitivity was 90.2dB(B)/2.83V/m, which is within experimental error of the specified 90dB. This is higher than average, but is offset by the fact that the speaker's impedance drops below 4 ohms for most of the midrange and some of the bass (fig.1). There are minima of 3.15 ohms at 91Hz, 3.1 ohms at 620Hz, and 3.67 ohms at 21kHz. Given that there are current-hungry combinations of 4 ohms and –52° electrical phase angle at 62Hz and 5.3 ohms and –39° phase angle at 8.6kHz, I believe this speaker should be rated as a 4 ohm load rather than the specified 8 ohms.

Well, its good you are now "All about that bass" again. If you are still thinking about bi-amping...maybe before considering the pricey monoblocks. See what something like a modest yet 4 Ohm capable(400 watts/ch @ 4 Ohms) Halo A21 does for the low end. May be all that's needed or not?
Still, subs well placed, and room correction is the way to get down below 30Hz. Yes, we all respect a minimal(Sub free) full range 2 ch system as subs can be problematic....but even the sound engineers will add subs when mixing/mastering content with lots of low end stuff.


As far as your child touching the tubes...nice try man! The Mrs. is not falling for it. LOL!
But seriously, keep kids out of the room if possible and teach them early to not touch when they are in the room. Kids should never be allowed to even get to the point where they are touching tubes, chewing on wires, poking holes in cones, knocking over speakers, etc. KEEP AN EYE ON THEM AT ALL TIMES! I can't stress that enough. I has a situation years ago where my daughter got out of site for a matter of seconds and put a nickle in her mouth and was choking. Crazy, because she was in her own room but somehow the coin was dropped in there. This was supposed to be the clean, refinished, new carpet baby-proofed safe haven. I turned her over on my arm and put my finger against her tongue and it came right out...Thank God!
So, a room with such high powered expensive equipment and everything that goes along with that has to be taken seriously when the child is in the room. TEACH THEM EARLY!

[Deleted User]

Congrats to your wife!

tonyb

Dude....you sell those Cary 211's and I will personally fly out there and slap you upside the head. lol Those are endgame pieces right there man.

I'm wondering now if Ted still has his Wolcott's.....another frickin' end gamer.

Joey_V

WLDock wrote: »

Joey_V wrote: »

So I figured out what was wrong with my setup... I had the speakers plugged into the wrong taps!!!!

From the tests and measurements one would think the 4 Ohm tap was the way to go.

From: http://www.ultrahighendreview.com/uploads/documents/b&w_802diamond.pdf
The impedance of the B&W 802 Diamond indicates that it will present a fairly difficult load for the amplifier driving it, with impedance remaining below 4Ω from 60Hz all the way up to 850Hz, except for the small region 250–450Hz. The impedance falls below 3Ω across the frequencies 75–125Hz and gain at 600Hz. The low impedance at low frequencies is further complicated by a phase angle of around –55° at 60Hz. The low (3.5Ω) impedance above 15kHz may also bother some amplifiers.
On the plus side, you won’t need an overly powerful amplifier to drive the 802Ds to high sound pressure levels in your room, because Newport Test Labs’
tests put the B&W 802 Diamond’s sensitivity at just a shade under B&W’s spec of 90dB SPL.

Same thing with the 800's:

From: http://www.stereophile.com/content/bampw-800-diamond-loudspeaker-measurements
My estimate of the B&W's sensitivity was 90.2dB(B)/2.83V/m, which is within experimental error of the specified 90dB. This is higher than average, but is offset by the fact that the speaker's impedance drops below 4 ohms for most of the midrange and some of the bass (fig.1). There are minima of 3.15 ohms at 91Hz, 3.1 ohms at 620Hz, and 3.67 ohms at 21kHz. Given that there are current-hungry combinations of 4 ohms and –52° electrical phase angle at 62Hz and 5.3 ohms and –39° phase angle at 8.6kHz, I believe this speaker should be rated as a 4 ohm load rather than the specified 8 ohms.

Well, its good you are now "All about that bass" again. If you are still thinking about bi-amping...maybe before considering the pricey monoblocks. See what something like a modest yet 4 Ohm capable(400 watts/ch @ 4 Ohms) Halo A21 does for the low end. May be all that's needed or not?
Still, subs well placed, and room correction is the way to get down below 30Hz. Yes, we all respect a minimal(Sub free) full range 2 ch system as subs can be problematic....but even the sound engineers will add subs when mixing/mastering content with lots of low end stuff.


As far as your child touching the tubes...nice try man! The Mrs. is not falling for it. LOL!
But seriously, keep kids out of the room if possible and teach them early to not touch when they are in the room. Kids should never be allowed to even get to the point where they are touching tubes, chewing on wires, poking holes in cones, knocking over speakers, etc. KEEP AN EYE ON THEM AT ALL TIMES! I can't stress that enough. I has a situation years ago where my daughter got out of site for a matter of seconds and put a nickle in her mouth and was choking. Crazy, because she was in her own room but somehow the coin was dropped in there. This was supposed to be the clean, refinished, new carpet baby-proofed safe haven. I turned her over on my arm and put my finger against her tongue and it came right out...Thank God!
So, a room with such high powered expensive equipment and everything that goes along with that has to be taken seriously when the child is in the room. TEACH THEM EARLY!

Thanks for all the input WLD! The difference between 4ohm vs 8ohm taps are very apparent, like not a "let me strain to hear"... it's like in the 4ohm tap, I have minimal bass, no slam or impact.. then on the 8ohm tap, it's like it came to life. Tight and ballsy bass.

I was thinking of going dual amp mono blocks, but that's a LOT of heat. The room already heats up with the 211FE... freaking crazy mono blocks. I honestly did not know bass like this would come from these guys.... the 8ohm taps are really life savers. I remember someone told me this a while back but my memory did not register until Skip reminded me yesterday.

Joey_V

tonyb wrote: »

Dude....you sell those Cary 211's and I will personally fly out there and slap you upside the head. lol Those are endgame pieces right there man.

I'm wondering now if Ted still has his Wolcott's.....another frickin' end gamer.

Hahaha.... end game pieces.... maybe, but I can tell you, there room for improvement here...

I think I can probably improve the source. The preamp I know I like.. I'm going to roll in some silvanias 6sn7 into it.

I would really like to hear a great SS amp with my tubes through these speakers. But the price of a pair of SS mono blocks would bring me into 800 diamond territory so not sure if that's the smartest move.

Man, if only that Houston Craigslist worked out, i'd have 800 diamonds and a pair of 1201 mono blocks. Dang it.

WLDock

Joey_V wrote: »

I was thinking of going dual amp mono blocks, but that's a LOT of heat. The room already heats up with the 211FE... freaking crazy mono blocks. I honestly did not know bass like this would come from these guys.... the 8ohm taps are really life savers. I remember someone told me this a while back but my memory did not register until Skip reminded me yesterday.

The heat from the Cary and the Mc 601's would be crazy! Ever hear of anyone using class D to biamp the 800/802's?
Something from the likes of Wyred 4 Sound, Bel Canto REF500M, Emerald Physics EP100.2E, etc How well would the tube/Class D hybrid combo match up? Interesting, Rogue Audio uses a tube/Class D design in their Medusa and Hydra amps....so I guess it can work?

Joey_V

DSkip wrote: »

Tube monoblock heat will depend greatly on the monoblock and its design. My monoblocks don't put off too much heat. In fact, they put off less than my Jolida SJ-302a did. I need to get that Jolida repaired and get it back into the mix somewhere. I kind of miss it.

Well these are hot, probably because of the amount of tubes and the amount of power it puts out.

Joey_V

WLDock wrote: »

Joey_V wrote: »

I was thinking of going dual amp mono blocks, but that's a LOT of heat. The room already heats up with the 211FE... freaking crazy mono blocks. I honestly did not know bass like this would come from these guys.... the 8ohm taps are really life savers. I remember someone told me this a while back but my memory did not register until Skip reminded me yesterday.

The heat from the Cary and the Mc 601's would be crazy! Ever hear of anyone using class D to biamp the 800/802's?
Something from the likes of Wyred 4 Sound, Bel Canto REF500M, Emerald Physics EP100.2E, etc How well would the tube/Class D hybrid combo match up? Interesting, Rogue Audio uses a tube/Class D design in their Medusa and Hydra amps....so I guess it can work?

I think my old Plinius was hot when on class a. I think anything class a is hot. The macs are a/b... so not too hot.

WLDock

I guess the MC don't get as warm as their earlier stuff. Still, that's 1200 watts of a/b and 140 watts of class A or 210 Class A/B for the Cary. I would bet playing an intense full range film score for about an hour at good volume 85-90dB would make for a nice warm and cozy room....remember those 802's are going to pull some current.

It all sounds like fun to me!

Joey_V

WLDock wrote: »

I guess the MC don't get as warm as their earlier stuff. Still, that's 1200 watts of a/b and 140 watts of class A or 210 Class A/B for the Cary. I would bet playing an intense full range film score for about an hour at good volume 85-90dB would make for a nice warm and cozy room....remember those 802's are going to pull some current.

It all sounds like fun to me!

For sure man.

I think Cary does 70 a piece in class a, 110 in a/b, 150 in b. But I get what you're doing by combining the two as a total for heat in the room.. Hehe

I would like to hear what dagostinos do on this set up but probably money is better spent on improving the speakers to the 800 diamonds or strads. But to hear some dags on this would be nice, even if it's just an audition.

In addition, I would also really like to move up the source chain someday.

But right now I'm trying to set up the network so I can listen to more music.

Joey_V

nbrowser wrote: »

hrm Joey_V's discovery has me reconsidering changing what taps I have my RTiA7s hooked up to on my tube amp, worth a A/B experiment made even easier with nanners on the amp end...

Try it, just don't go over 8 ohm taps.

Joey_V

nbrowser wrote: »

Joey_V wrote: »

nbrowser wrote: »

hrm Joey_V's discovery has me reconsidering changing what taps I have my RTiA7s hooked up to on my tube amp, worth a A/B experiment made even easier with nanners on the amp end...

Try it, just don't go over 8 ohm taps.

I've currently got them connected to the 4 ohm taps on my little tube intergrated, they slam fairly well but I'm curious to see what they'd do hooked up to the 8 ohm taps, might have as much discovery as you did. Worth a shot and should only take oh...5 minutes to accomplish.

Yeah let me know how that works. What's the impedance of your speakers?