What can anyone tell me about B&W speakers (1 Viewer)

[Sonny T]

Greetings everyone,
I have just purchased a 4 year old house with a basement. I hope to be able to have a dedicated home theater room in the near future. When I purchased the house there were some B&W speakers in various rooms of the house, I don't know much about these speakers and I can't get much information on them. Based on what I have been able to find out it looks like these speakers are from the Solid Series. It looks like I have a PB 100 subwoofer, 4 S100 satellite speakers and 2 of the Solid Monitors. I was thinking of buying 4 Polk 55i's and the Polk 400 center. How do these B&W rank with the Polk's and if I use the B&W for the home theater what center channel should I consider?
BTW I have an Onkyo 595 and a Panasonic 31k after reading this forum.
Thanks in advance

 

[Bob_A]

What is your budget for 5 speakers + external sub?
Have you tried hooking up these bw's? How do they sound to you?

 

[Jeremy Hegna]

B&W makes great speakers....and they compare favorably with the Polks.
The speaekers you have are older B&W and you may be able to find out some info on them at bwspeakers.com.
That's pretty cool....a bunch of B&W speakers laying around in your new house. You should be able to use them for something. I am a B&W owner, but a green one at that. I've only been using B&W speakers for the past couple of years and I'm not very familiar with the "Solid" speakers.
Check out that web-site and see if you can find out some archived info.
Jeremy

 

[Sonny T]

Bob.
I haven't hooked up the B&W speakers to my current home theater (11'X13' room w/ hardwood floors, 61" Toshiba RPTV, Onkyo 595, BOSE Accoustmas 10 speakers, with the B&Wpowered sub)the B&W speakers are mounted on the walls in the family room, bedroom and back deck.(the wife thinks these are hers and balks at me taking them for a home theater) The sub adds a lot of kick to my current home theater speakers. As far as budget, I don't know what I'm willing to spend, I was hoping to get the four Polk 55i's for around $650.00 and the center for about $350.00 and then sell the Bose. I was also planning on incorporating the B&W sub into whatever speaker system I wind up with. Of couse a budget of $0.00 would be great if the B&W's would work. Again, I consider the information I get from this board in making my ht decisions, that's why I plan on letting someone else own my Bose.
[Edited last by Sonny T on October 23, 2001 at 07:48 PM]

 

[Denward]

Well, the B&W website has no info on the Solid series other than this pdf file .
I have 603s2 fronts, cc6s2 center, LM1 surrounds, ASW1000 sub and I am very happy.
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[BobPeck]

I auditioned B&W's for mostly music listening (classical & jazz.) I can tell you there imagery is absolutely stunning. IMHO, nothing like it in this price range. Especially with the one notch above the DM 603's, the CM4's.
The only problem I had was that their bass wasn't quite there for me. I'm nitpicking, but I need my bass perfect for two channel stereo, I need the cello's coming through and still feel it (without the upright bass in jazz being boomy, of course.) I ended up with Paradigm Studio/80's for the front. The imagery isn't quite B&W's, but the bass was perfectly balanced (well, I'll see how they sound in my house when they get here in two weeks!)
B&W's are excellent speakers.
In a HT environment (ie, with a sub) they should be excellent.

 

[Jay_E]

I am using the S100's for my surround speakers, the PB100 subwoofer, B&W 601's for mains, and the CC6 for the center. I am extremely pleased with this setup. I would definitely use the existing PB100 sub and the S100's for your surrounds. You could get a CC6S2 for the center or spend a bit more to get the LCR6S2. You probably should upgrade your mains to 601S2s or 602S2s. With these changes you will have a great speaker system. Let me know if you have any questions. Good luck.
Jay

 

[Mark C.]

I have seven B&W speakers in my home, 5 for the home theater plus a dedicated two-channel system. I highly recommend any B&W speaker. Quality construction, quality sound. You may like the Polks, though, and that's great. If your wife wants the B&Ws for the multi-room sound system, let her have them. It will pay dividends in the future! Just get rid of the Bose.

 

[Matty B]

How do they compare against Polks? More like how to Polks compare to B&Ws. In my opinion B&Ws are some of the finest speakers made. I have no reservations in saying that at every price point that make a speaker which is better than anything at that price point. I am also %100 biased. Needless to say, you have inheirited a great set of speakers.