B & W Matrix 801 S3 and tube amplifier


I cannot find an impedance graph for B & W 801 S3.. The manufacturer states min impedance of 4 ohm and recommends amp of at least 50W. I am wondering if a 60W tube amp such as Conrad Johnson MV 60 or Premier 11A would do the job for mostly low level listening in a small-mid size room. Does anybody have experience with similar combination ? Would ss Conrad Johnson amp be a much better match ?
pvctor
I recommend Mark Levinson for the 801 series 3. You should be able to pick up a 23 or 23.5 in your price range. If you go with Levinson you will want to sell your CJ preamp and look for a Levinson preamp.
I agree with Rrog and would add the Classe CAM 350 amps. I used them for 6 months with 801's and performed pretty darn good.

Good Luck
We ran smaller/ mediem tube amps on them Quicksilver mono's and ARC and the quality was all there for acoustic jazz I would try it with the CJ . JohnnyR.
Pvctor - I am wondering if a 60W tube amp such as Conrad Johnson MV 60 or Premier 11A would do the job for mostly low level listening in a small-mid size room. Does anybody have experience with similar combination ?

Hi Pvctor – hows it going fellow canuckeer ?

Yes it should work.

But like anything else in this hobby especially an amp it should be trialed – imo – unless the money involved is no big deal so you can sell it later if you don’t like it.

Set the amp for the 4 ohm tap. My Music Reference RM9 tube amp sounds great with my 801’s at 4ohms. My Classe amp sounds ok with them too.

The 801’s are a fairly easy medium load - imo. Acoustats are a hard load. FrenchFries gave good advice imo – they are looking for a clean signal and don’t go down to 1 or 2 ohms.

The better the signal the better the sound quality. They are like looking in the mirror as far as your gear/room goes.

I asked the fellow that made my OTL’s that I run my 801s with about that CJ amp.

His reply.

“This amp is a copy of the Williamson circuit from 1947 without the driver stage. Not very quick and average bass performance.
The typical EL-34 and KT-88 output tubes have very high resistance necessitating a large turns ratio in the output transformer. On these type of tube amplifiers if a 8 ohm output is connected to a 4 ohm speaker the primary of the output transformer almost doubles in impedance. This affects the power transfer from the output tubes to the transformer resulting in reduced output wattage. The performance will not suffer, just the output.”

Cheers

05-06-13: Marakanetz
frequently blown output tubes guarranteed even at low listening levels as the best case scenario while could be far more complicated problems driving loads that substantially exceeding the amplifier abilities. tube pre OK, but not tube amp.

Must have been quite the scene at your place Marakanetz... When did you own the 801s and what tube amp ?
Ct,

I don't own 801's. I would never think of owning 801 for few reasons: 1. I don't like it's sound(which is main) 2. I haven't heard any successful demo in any room auditioned and with any amp. 3. I can't afford it or simply I would not waste money on the product that I don't like.

I fix tube, solid state and pro audio equipment part time at my dwelling knowing a large array of reasons why I get equipment to fix. After I've got equipment fixed, I'd have a very big chance of it comming back to me in few months guess why?? Because there are too many philes that think they could get arround with low-powered amp or having no idea what is impedance mismatch.

JohnnyR is a dealer that may demo or connect it for a few minutes to the unused speaker and let it go. OP wants to listen I guess a-bit longer. On a used speaker the outcome may become different when speaker breaks-in and voice coils become working at much larger dynamics and frequencies creating substantially more complex loads to the amp resulting higher operating temperatures on all circuit elements becides tubes.

If you listen to small band(no piano) on low volume levels or spoken word you can even use SET amp driving your speakers. Otherwise refer to majority of above posters.