B&W N800 vs Wilson WP7 vs Revel and others

Wvick,
If you get a chance, try to hear the Shahinian Diapasons. I arrived at them after listening to the Watt/Puppies, Wilson Grand Slams, B&W 800's, Soundlabs and Thiels. You can get a brand new pair for $12,000. A lot of money but compared to others a real deal. Gordon Holt compared them favorably to the Wilson Wamms. These loudspeakers make no compromises in the reproduction of live music at live levels!! There are no U.S. dealers that I know of yet they have been in business a long time. For the money you will save on the speakers, fly out to New York and hear what I believe is the best speaker in the world.

Forgot to mention Quad 988's. Absolutely fantastic loudspeaker. I heard these at Promusica in Chicago and they were very impressive. They are the personal favorites of several Promusica employees who have access to speakers many times the price.

Your thread appears to be a bit dated (no new entries since mid-January and now it's April), but I wanted to add the obvious, namely, that your best move would be to demo speakers in your home with your equipment if possible. Doing so is the only way to know what sound you are going to get and to know whether a given speaker mates well with your room and your electronics. If you buy speakers that sound great at the dealer, but get them home and find that they excite a room node or don't have synergy for whatever reason with YOUR room and equipment, you're dead (this is a real risk given that most of the speakers you mention can really do bass and you are using Krell monoblocks, which themselves have prodigious bass). A decent dealer should cooperate with you in this regard (although many, if not most, don't want to do this), especially given the sticker on the speakers you are considering -- their mark ups are usually at least 40% on speakers, and more so on expensive speakers, so they should work to earn, for example, the $10,000 they clear on a pair of Watt Puppys.

Good luck.

I ended up going with the Watt Puppy 7's and am very happy with the choice. I have since replaced the Krell HTS 7.1 with a Krell KCT pre for better 2 channel performance. I still need to replace my old Denon CDP but even with that the sound is spectacular. I am a bit undecided on a cdp at this point and have decided wait a while longer to see what is on the horizon. Any suggestions?

Bill

MahanDave: Not to be rude but you really dont know what your talking about here. Stating a Wilson(which uses generic drivers of AVERAGE quality at best)is a better build over ANY Revel Ultima(or Performa even in some respects) product is a farce at best. Lets start with the paint. WIlson speakers use a relatively cheap clearcoat that has a VERY POOR molecular bond. Its like comparing a Maaco paint job to a high quality MFG.(like Honda)paint job.The Revel's clearcoat is of a much higher quality, and people will see that difference after owning their speakers for many years. Driver selection is another thing. Wilson driver's are generic off the shelf components(some of which are available and used in cheap car audio components, like the tweeter which alot of insiders know about)that are average in build quality.Revel uses either special in house drivers and or high quality Scanspeak drivers.And all their speakers run super flat in their designed frequency window) Ever compare the quality or design of the Xover's? Revel sure holds its own here. How about inlab design and research?The actual cabinet? Revel's cabinet is quite well braced and resonant free, as much as any cabinet Ive ever seen regardless of price. And routing every single surface sure doesnt cheapen the cost of these speakers. I remember hearing the Wilson MAXX speakers for the first time. These are what $40,000??I was pretty damn excisted but my wife and myself found that they were poor sounding speakers in a variety of different rooms that they were auditioned in.Plus their exxageratted SSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!! All Wilson's have this Ive found. Just a week ago the local WIlson dealer got the new Version 7's in. Same ol,same ol. The Watt's are really no better than the Maxx's.They are poor "eq'd" speakers that require alot of room treatment to band-aid them is what I have always heard and felt, and alot of people in my area feel strongly about that too. Ariel I feel is a much better speaker(though I feel build isnt spectacular but well above average) and compares well with many of the best(Like Vandersteins,Revels, B&W 8 series etc), but please keep Wilson's out of that comparision.