Bowers & Wilkins - 800 Series Diamond Dual 7" Passive 3-Way Floor Speaker (Each) - Gloss black

I purchased this speaker to create a designated 2-channel system in October 2020. This review may become lengthy, but with the limited information/reviews on this speaker, I think it will be beneficial to prospective buyers researching. Setup: Speakers: B&W 803 D3's Integrated Amp: McIntosh MAC7200 Speaker Wire: AudioQuest 14 gauge USB A/B: AudioQuest Forest First off, the craftsmanship of these speakers is amazing - nothing else can compete when it comes to build quality of these speakers. Add to that the reputation of B&W, and it is hard to resist these speakers if you can pull off the expense of them. I love the fact they are basically pieces of art, that will look amazing in any modern setup, yet are also some of the best sounding speakers money can buy. They are heavy beasts, coming in at 150# a speaker, but that heft is a byproduct of the quality you are getting with these speakers. Many reviews around the internet show that these speakers (or B&Ws in general) are very polarizing - you either love them or hate them, based on being "bright" or a little harsh sounding. I was very nervous waiting to receive these based on all the hype around how "bright" they are, but i went with my gut, and the fact that when i listened to them in the Magnolia Design Center, they sounded great. Now with them setup in my room, paired with the McIntosh, I couldn't be happier. When i A-B test them against my other setup (Def Tech 9080BP's and Marantz 6014), it is like a veil is over the tweeters of the Def Techs, and it gets lifted and sounds so clean/pure with the B&W's. When listening to acoustic or vocals, it isn't even a fair fight. It completely changes the listening game, and is so much nicer/authentic sounding. I didn't realize how "dampened" the tweets sounded on my Def Techs until doing this A-B test. A-B Tests: Song: Norah Jones - Nightingale Song: Chris Jones - Long after you're gone Song: Miley Cyrus - Jolene (backyard sessions) Lindsay Stirling - I wonder as I wander Hayley Western - Scarborough Fair Adele - Hello With these tests, each time the vocals are so much cleaner and more clear, with the background being much "darker"...I cannot believe how much more real/enjoyable listing to the B&Ws is vs. the Def Techs. The one negative I would point out is that because these tweets are so "bright", with some songs, it can be a little "harsh" on the ears, when you have to either turn down the volume vs. the Def Techs, or turn the treble down a notch on the receiver. Majority of music does not require this, but every once in a while the B&W's are a bit too bright for enjoying the song at an elevated volume. I would definitely recommend getting a receiver with tone control, as I think these speakers require some adjustment (to the warm side) with some recordings. Adele's "Hello" is a great example. With the Def Techs, the sound stage is HUGE and the warmer sound is very enjoyable, no matter how loud you play. With the B&W's, I had to turn the volume down significantly, jus to make it thru the song. It was far too harsh/bright for my ears to take for 4 minutes. In all, I think these are amazing speakers, and really offer a "different" sound than anything else. Are they bright? Sure. Too bright? Not with most content. It truly makes the vocals sound real, vs. it always sounding like a recording or that the artist is singing thru a bedsheet. I would STRONGLY recommend a receiver that has tone control, as well as a receiver known for being "warm", to offset some of the B&W's brightness. It appears there is a HUGE amount of audiophiles who pair McIntosh with B&W's, as did I based on this, and couldn't be happier. If you're looking for a speaker with amazing build quality, a great reputation, a totally unique sound to anything you've heard, and a piece that you can take serious pride of ownership in, this is the speaker for you! I went back and forth between the 805's, 803's and 802's, but for a 10'X24' room, I think the 803's is the sweet spot. An 805 would have struggled to sound "big and open", and i think the 802's would have been visually too heavy for the room. 803's are amazing!

The entire 800 d3 series are the best speakers in the market by any measure. A larger size simply provides better bass extension. The headed models are sonically equal again, larger models simply offering additional bass extension and the possibility of even higher volume levels. The 803 is the smallest headed model, at almost 150lbs each small is relative. What is amazing is that with their rather modest woofers it can still provide frequencies of less than 20hz at less than 1% harmonic distortion. In effect it pretty much blows the previous 802 model out of the water in every dimension, spectacular indeed. These speakers will do justice to any genre, from Def Punkt to Stravinsky to everything in between. Beware, these speakers are supernaturally revealing, you will plainly differentiate an extraordinary recording from an awful one.

B&W is one of the most revered maker of high end speakers, and they are truly amazing (there is a reason the BBC and Abby Road use them). the team at my local magnolia was really nice and knew their proucts, but the "corporate defined setup" for the 803D3 was to run with a ROTEL CD/PRE/AMP setup. The rotel chain does not do the speakers justice and cannot drive the speaker proplery, a speaker at that level needs to run on some more advanced hardware to show in full, specially the amplifiers , sorry to say but the demo was somewhat underwhelming due to the setup choices, nice details in the mids and highs, but lack of authority and pace/tempo in the base, imaging was ok, but not as open as hoped for, suspect limitation of the Rotel DAC here, did not have enough time to change to different gear... This speaker should be driven with nice DAC and a stereo McIntosh (keep the mono blocks for the 802D3 demo?) thanks and hope this is considered