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B&W Nautilus 804 or Opera Quinta? Harsh or warm? Tame or change..?

Ha No one ever got fired for buying KEFs.

They are neutral, linear and have a nicely focused soundstage. They aren't my all time favorite but they are great, reliable, affordable and available worldwide.

What are you using right now? Original 804s? The q7 would be comparable in bass response.

What kind of content? What AVR?
Right now at home I use the DM601 and quite large B&W CM S2 system in living room but this is for our holiday home.
I need something to enjoy music since we spend a lot of time there and also for movies so I need a smaller system like 5.1 with nice fronts.

My plan was the 804N got them for a quite nice deal but they are like very different to anything I have heard the sound is changed its interesting and different but well... not entirely what I looked for, I have more bass and lower mid in my small 601 than in these large 804 its kind of crazy. If you go up to the volume needed for that bass you never ever hear a treble again cause you would need hearing aid :)
AVR I have not 100% decided I guess I start with something older that I have on shelf but I also have some nice amp/preamp setup I plan to use for music.
 
Ha No one ever got fired for buying KEFs.

They are neutral, linear and have a nicely focused soundstage. They aren't my all time favorite but they are great, reliable, affordable and available worldwide.

What are you using right now? Original 804s? The q7 would be comparable in bass response.

What kind of content? What AVR?
is it any special KEF model that I should look out for second hand?
 
Warfedale, Dynaudio or Sonus?
Not the worst but it's usually possible to get something better. I don't know those brands well, so keep doing research. Something might work well.

75% music I listen to everything from classic music country metal I like acoustic music a lot. It
Since you have subs, I'll plug the bmr monitor again only because it excels at acoustic. And benefits from a sub. It can reproduce anything faithfully of course but the wide directivity features make acoustic content reverberate pleasantly in the room. They have a 2 week trial option.

That or the KEF Q7 meta are both great choices. I could go into more detail but you are absorbing a lot quickly...
 
I will do some measurement and see what Dirac can do.
I can get them to play bass but I need to eq them hard like really hard
Why that is needed on this kind of expensive super speaker I am not sure but I will see what it can do properly eq and some measurements
 
Stereophile measured the 805N . The bookshelf version , the 804N was the smallest floor stander at the time.

The 805N

1773671953061.jpeg

I had the 804N but it's been a number of years ago. I don't remember them being that bad in the bass but music styles and rooms will affect that. Naturally a sub would help. I pointed them straight which means I sat off axis and I used Anthem i225 and turned the treble knob left a bit which helped. This was way before the room correction software of today or at least my knowledge of it. Good luck.
 
Stereophile measured the 805N . The bookshelf version , the 804N was the smallest floor stander at the time.

The 805N

View attachment 518185
I had the 804N but it's been a number of years ago. I don't remember them being that bad in the bass but music styles and rooms will affect that. Naturally a sub would help. I pointed them straight which means I sat off axis and I used Anthem i225 and turned the treble knob left a bit which helped. This was way before the room correction software of today or at least my knowledge of it. Good luck.
Thank you! well it can produce bass but it needs a lot of eq I guess it’s because the high treble.
How you interpret the graph you sent looks like a very high peak at the end? It’s that normal?
 
A pair of Revel F206 speakers would be worth a listen
I think they might meet your needs within your budget

 
Thank you! well it can produce bass but it needs a lot of eq I guess it’s because the high treble.
How you interpret the graph you sent looks like a very high peak at the end? It’s that normal?
I would say the peak was normal. Here's a photo of the big B&W Nautilus 801 from Stereophile.
Instead of boosting the bass cut the highs.

1773679002726.jpeg
 
I would say the peak was normal. Here's a photo of the big B&W Nautilus 801 from Stereophile.
Instead of boosting the bass cut the highs.

View attachment 518211
My idea before I decide is to see if Dirac can cut the heights to make it more flat response.
if that is doable we will see, have any one tried?
 
My idea before I decide is to see if Dirac can cut the heights to make it more flat response.

I would strongly recommend not to rely on Dirac, particularly with speakers having some kind of uneven directivity (B&W and KEF are textbook examples) and an environment with more reflective surfaces (what you might have given what you reported about 804N sound). It can from very basic understanding of acoustics not achieve flat response by any means, as this is possible only under the condition that direct and reflected sound can be more or less linear, which is completely impossible with speakers of imbalanced directivity.
 
ok well I will se what Dirac does and what it can do but what you write sounds correct. I have so far no experience what exactly Dirac can do but I understand that it can lower frequencies that are to high or higher the ones that are too low in the room how good it works I have no idea.
My plan now is to use sub and lower the heights.
One of the least expected things I managed to do was to impulse buy one Trafomatic Audio Line One tube preamp second hand. OK I guess I make many angry here ;)
I thought that this with tubes was a bit for lunatics why use an old technology that increases distortion? Well what happened surprised me so I guess I didn't expect it to be good and yes I have not so far made any measurements but it changed the sound a lot.
Wider soundstage, less bright and the singer was like in middle of the speakers in the room, like it was a separate fictive speaker in the room in between the speakers for the singer. I was pretty amazing all other things equal: same source Spotify lossless on Wiim mini, same NAD AMP, same cables same position on speakers same everything except preamp but sound very different.
If it's more correct I have not measured yet will do later. But if it's more natural, less bright and more relaxing and more musical definitely, now I am on the way to keep the speakers.
I might go the way to tame them anyway :) Yes I understand that they will change your way of how music should be presented with its special sound profile. But if it enjoyable I might be geting somewhere? And if I get them more warm less bright and still high resolution... well maybe the tube fans have something right. I can say I have never listen to a tube preamp or a tube amp except for some poor old radio, so this was first experience. They have a different sound that's for sure.
 
How you interpret the graph you sent looks like a very high peak at the end? It’s that normal?
It's the resonance of the metal tweeter dome. The frequency is about 25kHz, so it isn't directly audible.
 
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