Heard the B&W N804d3s ...

I too have auditioned the 800D3 at a presentation put on by B&W at my local Paragon botique, here in Michigan. Power and pre-sources were driven by the latest D’Agostino Progression monoblocks, and Momentum pre-amp., wired with uber-high-end Transparent cable.

I must say I have to respectfully disagree with the above assessment of lack of stage depth and width. What I heard was transparency on Joanne Shaw Taylor’s "Blackest Day", as if guitar was in the room directly hooked up to the amp. Depth so nuanced on a couple of vocal tracks from Tom Jones’ "Nobody’s Fault But Mine", and Joss Stone’s "I Had A Dream", were laid bare absent speakers... In my experience B&W’s stage depth lends to the unique texture of each performer’s vocals. Bass extension was just short of subwoofer depths but definitely not missed on Chuck Deardorf’s "Moon And Sand".

So impressed with the presentation and being an 802N owner, I returned home to play the very same tracks, and some familiar pieces that were kindly played for me by B&W’s U.S. division president. My setup with ASW-800 subwoofer, Parasound JC1’s, Denon AVP-A1 3D (Upgrade Co. Moded), Audioquest cables.
Upon listentening in my room’s evironment with treatments and collective synergy, my 802’s (ironically toed-in the same degrees) had everything heard on the 800D3’s... Just not in the inth degree the way guitar sounded directly hooked up to amp. as on the D3’s (and this is in absolutely by no means any slight or knock on the new 800 series’ worth).

So as one poster stated that listening to the new speakers in your room’s environment with your electronics is most ideal. Room treatments are invaluable, and you may consider going up the line of previous iterations. I think my next upgrade will be the 800N’s or D2’s.

I have doen thousands of tests in audio. We always test each part on how much depth it can build. These are not parts based on personal preference, but based on real differences.

Denon is a 2 dimensional brand. This means it build less than 1 metre of stage depth. Even with the best speakers who are able to create stage depth.

It is very easy to compare and test. First you need to know the DNA of each single part of your system.


The paper low drivers of the 802N are extreemly slow compared to drivers of new loadspeakers. The crossovers are also very limited. The 20khz tweeter is also very limited based on technique compared to tweeters who are available these days.

Given the size of my room, 9x10x8, the 800N or 802D2 are way too big for the space. In the current line-up, I would have to look at either the 804 or 805.

I had a similar sized room with the much lesser B&W DM640’s. They worked well with a high current amp (Classe CA-150) but were very lean with other amps I tried. They were too hot for nearfield though and I upgraded to Vandersteen 3A (now Sigs) to cure that and loaded the room with treatments. It sounded OK at best. I did demo a sub and found sub 30 Hz could not be heard in the room but down the hall it was plain as day. Eventually I moved the system to a 3x larger room and placed the speakers at each end of the couch I sit on. Ideal? No way. But the speakers opened up and breathed life into the music in that larger space. There’s imaging but no soundstage so in a way it’s like headphones. I’m fine with that. The quality of the music makes the system sound so much better than the loss of soundstage. So here’s my take. The room is too small for full range speakers. A sub may help but not below 30 Hz. Maybe try a bigger room even if speaker placement is compromised. You could find out like I did that you're missing a lot more than you think.

@wlutke ... Thanks for the suggestion. I’m kind of stuck in this converted bedroom as all other available space is taken up. So, I will try the sub since the lowest FR of the N804s is 45Hz +/- 2dB, which is a bit lean even when compared to some monitors; the sub may fill in the deficient area. Since I listen to 2-channel only, and don’t do HT, FR from the sub at even 30Hz should do the trick. If that doesn’t work, I may just keep the sub and sell the N804s for a monitor speaker.