[PMAT]

With your budget I would ask the dealer to come out and help.

[yyz]

I heard the Blade 2 at a show recently where they played it with the Hegel Rost, Hegel H360 (integrated), and a Hegel monoblock. The H360 is close to the 4B-SST. It sounded fine with the H360 in a fairly large room, maybe 25 x 30.

I am going to buy the Blades and I am currently debating between the Luxman c900u (pre) and Luxman m900u (stereo amp) vs the Bryston 7B-SST3. Not sure what preamp to go with the 7B-SST3.

[Xinon]

I have the 7B3, and they are very good, upgraded from 4B SST2.
I use the Bp26 Mps2, that is very often overlooked, but is actually a very good match with Bryston amps at a fraction of the cost of other high end pre amps.

[Hoiman]

The current 803D's recommended amplifier is 50-500 watts @ 8 ohms @ 90db/W/m, which is within the 4B-SST2's range.

There is no problem with the B&W, the amp is just good but with real low it has to work hard. And the amp is not an 4BSST2 but an 4BSST.

[Hoiman]

With your budget I would ask the dealer to come out and help.

I did as you can read, but he was also flabbergassed, and he recommend another amp. But I like my amp so this is not the speaker for us. Now that we have listened to the B&W the whole day we 're convinced this is the speaker for us. We didn't had budget for this Blades, we just wanted to hear them, how they would sound in our house.
The dealer made a deal with us we could buy the Blades and then get the Esoteric amp for free with it.

[john1970]

Seven years ago I purchased a store demo pair of B&W 802Ds for a steal of a price and have been pairing them with Bryston electronics since then.  IMO Bryston pairs very well with B&W speakers.  The original setup was a used Bryston 4BSST (then shortly after a 4BSST2) amp and a BP26+MPS2 preamp. 

I visit local audio stores once in a while, but I to date have not heard any system (speaker, preamp, amp, DAC, source) south of $40000 that would make me want to switch.   Might upgrade to the latest version of the 802Ds, but given their retail price and that my current version sounds better than anything else I've heard there is no reason for me to do so. 

[Hoiman]

The song that really got bad on the KEF Blade is a song from London Grammer, "Hey now" (if you wait). It starts at around 1:15. The 24bit version.

[Marius]

HI,


Why don't you try the Model T Signatures. At at least half the price for the T's,  the Kef's and B&W's are no match, or even coming close...
A dealer suggesting you should change the Amps because the Blades don't sound good.... well, just think again ..
Cheers,
Marius

[Hoiman]

Why don't you try the Model T Signatures.

I would like to try them at home, but the problem is I don't a dealer who can help me with that.

[Marius]

I would like to try them at home, but the problem is I don't a dealer who can help me with that.

you know who to call

Cheerio,
Marius

[Hoiman]

you know who to call

Yes I know. 

[95Dyna]

In my opinion, it sounds more like a room problem than an amp problem. I once sold a pair of Quicksilver 90 watt monoblocks after buying some new speakers, thinking it was the cause of problems in the bottom end. Unfortunately, the problem persisted with a high wattage/high current solid state amp, too.  I ended up keeping the second amp (I still miss those Quicksilvers) and buying a different pair of speakers. Problem solved.

+1 The room can have more effect on the sound you hear than the amp.  Bass traps for what are probably standing waves in the 60 hrz range.  How does your room compare on three dimensions and with treatments from the room at the dealer?