B/W 702 s3


I bought a pair of B/W 702 s3's last year.  They sound average to me.  My question is would bi-amping them with Rotel RB1582 MII's be a dramatic change.  My local shop suggested to even try bi-wiring them.  Before I do I wanted to get some opinions and feedback

speedysteve4

@speedysteve4 

my Carver JBL gear consist of; Carver TFM 35 X2, preamp with sonic hologram, JBL 4312' and JBL's 4309

That clarifies things a bit. The JBL could go only as low as 50Hz at best. That means the bass you're lacking is not exactly ultra low frequency.

 

Likely, there's a bass suckout around that range. The JBLs might have sounded louder, but it could be due to the Carver outputting an uneven load across the bandwidth. There could be more gain around the 60Hz region.

 

In this case, use the equalizer on the Wiim and try adding gain around 60Hz.

btw the 12" cone on the JBL 4312 has a surface area of 452sq.in. The 702 has 133x3=399sq.in. But the 702 has a larger cabinet volume. I'm not sure how that compares overall in the mid-bass upper-bass region, but the 702 is almost a full range speaker. I still think adjusting the EQ would be the first place to look. I don't think moving the speakers will do much unless you make a drastic change.

I just want to add that my Martin Logan 20i cover the same range (46-25000), but I would not consider them even remotely close to almost a full range speaker. I’ve listened to BW 804 D4, but even those seemed like they could benefit from a sub or a more powerful amp (they were connected to some English brand amp around 150 wpc as far as I recall )

In my case, updating the speakers - and the amp - and adding a sub finally brought the sound to where I wanted it.