B&W 802D vs Wilson WATT Puppy

I owned a pair of B&W 802 speakers and upgraded to the 800 a year ago at minimal cost. Front-end is Levinson 33H driven directly by 390s CDP and Synergistic Research Cabling (Absolute Reference).

The new D series was released and I decided to upgrade once again. Dealer setup was Levinson gear and Synergistic Research (Designers Ref) cabling. On demo were the 802D speakers that was fully runned-in. The improvement over the 800 was mainly in the tweeter region with tighter bass but not deep enough. The pricing (after trade-in) however was expensive enough for me to consider other makes.

Wilson Audio dealer was kind enough to bring a pair of used Grand Slamm X-1s (series 2) in my home for a few days (the effort to install these was huge). Unfortunately, they were simply too large for my medium-to-large room but what it did well (dynamics, clean harmonics, better resolution) was enough to switch to a high-end speaker. Went back to the B&W 800 and what a disappointment. In comparison, the 800’s sounded ‘constipated’. Due to room size, the option then was to consider the Watt Puppy 7s (which some reviewers consider these to approach the performance of the Grand Slamms). What became very obvious from this exercise was the awful midrange performance of B&W speakers (802, 800 & 802D).

Before making this decision I decided to give the JMLab’s a listen. The dealer had a pair of Alto Utopia Be speakers on demo and once again it was fully runned-in. Setup included a Viola Amp with source components from BAT. To my surprise, these surpassed the performance of both the 802D and 800. The Be tweeters were more than a match to B&W’s Diamond, bass was first class and was able to go lower than the 802D. The large difference comes in the midrange and cross-overs. Here, JMLab is significantly better (more detail, speakers that disappear given the right track, more cleanly defined hormonics, etc.). I purchased and am currently running-in a pair of Nova Utopia Be speakers. In my room, the Nova’s are performing better than the Grand Slamms. They are excelling in all areas and most importantly, I am rediscovering my favourite CDs!

In summary, try to avoid B&W and definitely consider either the Watt Puppy 7 or better yet, JMLab Utopia (Alto or Nova). B&W’s poor midrange performance, its bad cross-over design (high cut-off frequencies and bi-wiring) together with relatively high 2nd and 3rd order harmonic distortion continues to prevent B&W to compete as a high-end speaker.

The used Grand Slamm X-1s was sold to someone who owned a pair of B&W 801 speakers (driven by Levinson 33 amps). I enquired as to the reason for the change and the Wilson dealer advised the main issue for this buyer was poor midrange performance of 801s. An experience I can relate to.

Midrange magnet and crossover changes were originally introduced in the 800 model. Comparing to the 802, there were some improvements (of which the most noticeable was better bass definition). The marketing stuff on the new D series refers to ‘stiffening’ of the 800 midrange chassis (and its carried to all models as well). I couldn’t find any midrange differences in my listening session of the 802D. They were very much in the same mould or character as the 800.

Looking back at my experience over this midrange is one of fatigue. It tends to creep up on you rather slowly but enough to make you stop. I thought this was the result of bad CDP performance and started looking to upgrade… changing the speakers was the answer.

Bass on Wilson speakers is a step above B&Ws and this also applies to JMLabs (Alto & Nova). My only reference on Wilson speakers is the Grand Slamms (Series 2). Whilst there are improvements in B&W, these don't approach the performance of either Wilson or JMLabs. I find B&Ws can't go low (the 800D specs refer to 32Hz & 25Hz @ -3db & -6db) and don't have the necessary midrange clarity to deliver the critical bass harmonics.

BTW, on low end, the Sophias go down to 29Hz, WP7 to 21Hz, Alto is 30 (25 @ -6db) and Novas 25 (20 @ -6db).

Jungsan: My music preferences vary from classic to pop&rock and I have a strong bias towards natural instruments.

Also, be careful when comparing speakers in fixed price ranges. Some comments suggest that it’s unfair to compare high-end Wilsons and JMLabs to B&W as the price differential is high. I would suggest that you take a total cost view over a longer term (2 years).

Let’s say you shelved out $12000 for an 802D - its obvious sonic performance is a high priority. Once you get over the honeymoon period, you start to realize some weaknesses as I have. So in the case of the 802D, going lower on the bass will mean you either buy a subwoofer or change to 801D/800D. After a couple thousand more dollars (including cabling etc. if you go with the subs) and more time, you realize more performance is needed. This is where you get stuck with B&W as it does not offer a high-end speaker. Now you faced with switching to a high-end make but you loose more dollars on your initial spend as the dealer can’t do a good trade-in deal (or alternatively you go through the hassle of selling privately…).

If you do the sums, it makes better dollar sense to save more upfront and get the high-end speaker than to spend less upfront but pay much more once you add up all the incremental spend. Put another way, you eventually buy a high-end speaker that you could’ve bought upfront but instead have had to suffer more losses.

Hello Jungsan, that's not what I'm saying.

I'm suggesting that costing is done over a 2 year period. So a speaker costing x, one adds additional upgrade costs if incurred giving a total cost of y. Comparatives are then made against speakers at this level.

In your example, y could be well below alexandria's and wouldn't be compared. Instead, should you find a speaker at y or less, and wouldn't need upgrades for 2 years, then this is a better decision.

On THD, i've looked at the 800D white paper. Wilson's for example offer better performance, a characteristic of high-end speakers. B&W also don't show the 2nd & 3rd HD which is worse than the THD profile presented. I will gladly send you the HFN review where this is measured via email.

Hope this clarifies.

Ps- my need for bottom-end performance comes from some instruments that go really low and when reproduced they bring a different perspective entirely versus speakers that can't.