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B&W Owners Thread

I guess I can join the club with a pair of CDM1NT standmounts and a CDMCNT center that I picked up yesterday 5 minutes from my house.

The natural cherry cabinets are in great shape with a few very minor small marks while the grills are also free of any tears or fading.

The only downside is that one of the tweeters from the 1NT is dead along with what seems to be a couple of failed caps in the HF crossover as probing around with the multimeter shows no continuity between the solder points of the two capacitors.

The upside is I paid less for the three speakers than it will cost me to order a replacement tweeter from B&W and have it shipped to Canada. :D

I guess I'll also have to repair the crossover in that one speaker too so I'll have to look into that.


This morning I was doing some work in the kitchen while listening to the center and the other 1NT in stereo just to get a better feel of them.

I listened to a few CDs, Dire Straits - Brothers in Arms, Santana - Supernatural and Neil Young - MTV Unplugged album with a Denon DVD-2900 along with some FM out of a Rega Radio R tuner all sent to a Rega Mira integrated.

I definitely am getting some pleasant sound out of that mix of components for an investment of a few hundred dollars, and that is including the cost of the Rega/Denon gear listed!

I guess I really need to start selling off some of the other stuff I've picked up over the past few years so I can put a little of that money back into these speakers.
 
mcyuke said:
I guess I can join the club with a pair of CDM1NT standmounts and a CDMCNT center that I picked up yesterday 5 minutes from my house.

The natural cherry cabinets are in great shape with a few very minor small marks while the grills are also free of any tears or fading.

The only downside is that one of the tweeters from the 1NT is dead along with what seems to be a couple of failed caps in the HF crossover as probing around with the multimeter shows no continuity between the solder points of the two capacitors.

The upside is I paid less for the three speakers than it will cost me to order a replacement tweeter from B&W and have it shipped to Canada. :D

I guess I'll also have to repair the crossover in that one speaker too so I'll have to look into that.


This morning I was doing some work in the kitchen while listening to the center and the other 1NT in stereo just to get a better feel of them.

I listened to a few CDs, Dire Straits - Brothers in Arms, Santana - Supernatural and Neil Young - MTV Unplugged album with a Denon DVD-2900 along with some FM out of a Rega Radio R tuner all sent to a Rega Mira integrated.

I definitely am getting some pleasant sound out of that mix of components for an investment of a few hundred dollars, and that is including the cost of the Rega/Denon gear listed!

I guess I really need to start selling off some of the other stuff I've picked up over the past few years so I can put a little of that money back into these speakers.
Click to expand...

Nice setup, for sure.
 
wgb113 said:
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/artic...ns-sells-out-to-a-tiny-silicon-valley-startup
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I was just about to post the same link. Very, very strange business move. To quote the article:

Bowers & Wilkins’s most devoted customers will probably be skeptical about a Valley startup being the best steward for a fancy speaker brand. Audiophiles often turn their noses up at digital music companies, which have a reputation for sacrificing fidelity for convenience. “It will take some explaining,” said Atkins. “I think when the verdict comes back, it will be clear that this is exactly what Bowers & Wilkins should be doing."
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Explaining is good and all, just don't sell out the firm's goodwill and reputation for short-term profits. It'd be a shame for B&W to suffer the fate Philips did to Marantz in the '80s (or as Alpine did to Luxman, Jensen did to Advent, Sanyo did to Fisher, etc)
 
When I first heard the buyout news, my natural reaction was "this cannot be good." But the more I read, the more my gut says this could be a good thing.
 
I'm hoping it's a good thing and that they don't dumb down the brand. The other concern is what they'll do with what remains of the factory in England where they make the 800 series...will it be shuttered and moved to China with everything else?
 
My first pair of big boy speakers back in the early 80's were a pair of B&W's I really liked them. Took them to college with me and wound up selling them for the equivalent of beer money. I currently have a line on a pair of mint, barely used DM-602's not sure what variant (Sx). The price is right and I was looking for some reviews from any current owners with regards to pros & cons.
 
Well, I'll be sticking with my TOTL (in 1981) B&W DM-16's until I've a son to pass them along to. My dad bought them new in 1982 and they're in some of my earliest memories.

My next "new" set of speakers will actually just be removing an 8" Plessey Rola driver from a pair of early 1960's custom sealed enclosure speakers (lovely tone, though no detail.... Will use later for a guitar cabinet) an will install Dayton USA PS220 8 inch full range drivers and rear port the cabinet. Thankfully the cab is roughly the required size for those drivers so it should sound great with a low powered tube amp ;)
 
KeninDC said:
When I first heard the buyout news, my natural reaction was "this cannot be good." But the more I read, the more my gut says this could be a good thing.
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Definitely agree. It sounds like the buyer is going to keep everything the same but they are going to be developing software to help merge the two products. This does not sound that bad at all.
 
Picked up a pair of DM6's over the weekend to go with my DM5's but it looks like the Surrounds for the Mids and Woofers need to be replaced (I have a thread going in "Speakers").
Anybody know of a source for the rubber surrounds? I tried AK member Rick Cobb but he doesn't carry them and says I need to find surrounds made for B&W.
 
2 pair of DM6's here and a pair of DM14's.I've owned the one pair of DM6's since new.These have the three L Pads.The second pair I purchased as a restoration project a few years back.told they had one bad tweeter.Not a problem there as I have a couple of working TW20 and one that just needs a solder job.But I have a scraping noise in one woofer.Will probabaly attempt to do something with it this winter.
My DM14's are presently being used for that WAF syndrome as they aren't nearly as overpowering in the living room as the 6's.,but one day the 6's are going to be wired back up.I like the 14's but prefer the 6's.They are presently being driven by a modded Acurus A250
 
Actually the surrounds are good.some one attempted to repair(forget what they are called)the pleated area in the magnet and frame with silicone.I think the scond pair had a hard life
 
I bought a pair of floor model DM603 S3s in 2007 as well as an LCR600 S3, all for 40% off. Great deal. Got a similar deal on my Pioneer Elite AVR.

Stereophile loved the DM603 S3, and, in 2005, named it their budget product of the year (http://www.stereophile.com/content/...-2005-budget-product-year#VcUZ5J5Aba6HC4BD.97).

I'm not sure what anyone thinks of Stereophile, but it seems to me that it's nice that a relatively respected magazine gave the that sort of kudos. I love my 603s, and run them on my AVR's small setting, but crossing over to the subwoofer at 50 Hz instead of 80 or 100. My subwoofer is a bit of a beast (http://hometheaterhifi.com/volume_11_4/earthquake-supernova-mkv-subwoofer-10-2004.html) so I just feed it stuff below 50 Hz and everybody's happy. My receiver doesn't have to push that really hard, deep stuff, and, since it lets me bi-wire and bi-amp my 603s (I know, I know, I know... I think it sounds awesome, and since B&W likes to put dual connectors on their speakers, you gotta figure they want you to bi-wire and bi-amp 'em!).

Those 603s image like crazy. I've had 'em for nine years now, and I still get up occasionally to see if I'm playing music through my center channel. Nope. Just great stereo imaging. On top of that, when paired with an excellent vinyl recording (for instance, the MoFi pressing of Los Lobos' Kiko), you not only get that left-to-right pan and that front-to-back depth, but you also get crazy open space between instruments. Very cool!!!

Would I like to get nicer speakers? Sure. Why not. But for now, these are mighty fine pieces of audio hardware.
 
Anyone remove the metal mesh cover to their NT tweeters and use felt under the front bevel directly below the tweeter assembly to 'soften' treble diffraction?

I run the CDM1NTs and read about a 'tweak' to do this.
 
DM4 owner. Mine have the white woofer surrounds--should have gotten a picture with the grills off. Oh well, maybe next time..... I just love the sound of these speakers. They don't require a powerful amplifier, either--just a high quality one.

B&W 002.JPG

B&W 001.JPG

B&W 003.JPG
 
l bought a set of dm309's, 303's and lcr3 new back in about 2004, l think the 309's are a very under appreciated speaker, great sound esp mids for a 300 series. I also have a pair of matrix 2's that l repaired the tweeters on, nice solid speakers. Am currently repairing a pair of dm220's, had to rebuild the crossovers and replace one tweeter.
Would love some of the above models you guys have, maybe one day.
 
I'm still using the Matrix 2s I bought when I graduated college in the late 80s, driven by the same Adcom 555 amp. Liked them so much that when I started working from home a few years ago I picked up a set of Matrix 1s and an Adcom 535. One of the Matrix 2 tweeters needed a repair (broken coil wire), but they remain wonderful IMO.
 
Thats a great endorsement for the matrix 2's you have, l only wish l had an amp like yours to really make them shine, l bet they love that many watts and the very high damping factor of the adcom.
What do you think of the matrix 1's? l have never heard any.
Out of curiosity, did your tweeter coil wire fracture from corrosion on the straight section where it angles down to the terminal soldered joint as this is where mine were both broken.
 
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