Typical Characteristics of a McIntosh / B&W system


I've owned high end McIntosh (always receivers, not separates) and B&W speakers before. Sold my last setup 4 years ago when I moved to a small apartment.

I'm finally in a place where I have a listening room, so I recently bought the McIntosh 6700 receiver and B&W PM1's. It sounded great in the store, but sounds mostly like crap at my place. It's WAY too bright. Sounds decent at low volumes, but if I turn up to normal listening levels or, heaven forbid I go to 11, it becomes unlistenable.

I'm sure my room plays some factor as I haven't treated it yet, but my $450 AudioEngine's sound amazing in the room and this $12K+ setup sounds like crap.

I will say that when I auditioned the McIntosh/B&W's in the store, I realize in hindsight that I listened to a lot of acoustic-y music. Even at home, the set up does ok with that style. But everything else sounds pretty crappy.

Perhaps my ears have gotten overly sensitive to music on the brighter side. Or maybe this receiver or McIntosh in general are skewing their sound to be overly bright/revealing/clean etc.

Any opinions on this? Are McIntosh/B&W setups known to be overly bright?
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You have nice components. They sounded great when you auditioned them but in the showroom. So time to explore your room. And experiment with placement of your speakers relative to your listening chair.

You already said the room is not treated. Its impossible for us to know what this means but I am guessing you have hardwood floors along with windows and a lot of highly reflective surfaces. If so, add some throw rugs, heavier furniture, drapes, etc.

Finally as Audioquest4life points out, the design of the PM1 would make the speaker prone to beaming. So take a serious look at how they are positioned. Forming an isosceles triangle, where the distance the speakers are from each other is less than the distance of the speakers to the listening chair is a good place to start. Set them up in this arrangement and start making minute adjustments, a inch or so at a time. You'll be surprised how critical placement is with good 2 channel like what you have. Good luck.
Friend is running a Mac integrated, cd/sacd player with B&W802 Diamonds and they match great. It is likely you are dealing with a room issue more than anything. I use B&W800D and recently moved. My new room initially had no bass (opposite of every other room I have used). Placement is key but the room plays a huge role. My speakers are closer to the back wall than I would have preferred and I have added some room treatment panels with significant effect.
My experience, with the McIntosh 6600 integrated is that it took awhile to break-in -- I have had mine for 8 months and its sound is still improving. Give it time. I couldn't be happier with my purchase.

The link below describes a similar experience to yours with the MC452 which, when broken in, lost its initial brightness--replaced with all the beauty that McIntosh is known for.

I hope you enjoy your great new gear!

http://www.audioaficionado.org/mcintosh-audio/7928-mcintosh-mc452-review.html

I am planning to buy a pair of B&W CWM7.5 S2 in-wall speakers and a B&W IWS-4 in-wall subwoofer powered by a B&W SA250 Mk2 amplifier. What model McIntosh integrated amplifier would you recommend for the CWM7.5 S2 speakers? Recommended amplifier power for the speakers is 25 to 150 watts into 8 ohms. I was thinking of either a McIntosh MA252 hybrid (100 watts into 8 ohms), MA352 hybrid (200 watts into 8 ohms) or MC5300 (100 watts into 8 ohms).