I have owned the 802's within the last 6 months. I had them for two years in my home. I also had the Montana XP's and the Mezzo Utopias,all in my home for several months. To get the B&W issue out of the way,they are not even close to the Mezzos in any way what so ever. The Mezzos excel way above the B&W's. B&W has to be the best marketers in the world,"Stereophile Speaker of the year" there is more invloved there than speaker ratings,that's a gurantee. The B&W will suck every bit of life out of your amp and still remain slow in transitions. The Mezzo is quick and very easy to drive,a great combination for tube amps although I use them on solid state.The Mezzos bass is very fast and the midrange and tweeter are as good as any that exists with exception to the new JM Berylliums,they will set a new reference in speakers. The B&W tweeter lacks detail,it is vailed,its best point is its mid range and it is very slow due to the kevlar.JM's have the w sandwhich material which they hold a patent on and it's index of ridgidity is over 20 times higher than Kevlar for a woofer cone and 8 times higher for a midrange cone.It's mass is very low to produce fine detail and allow for maximum acceleration on transitions...in a nut shell,B&W's "claim to fame" Kevlar is ONE of the things that keeps them from keeping up with the highest end speakers.I will echo these statements against their 800 Signatures as well,they have improved them,but not to the level of the JM's,not even close.The Montanas will also perform at a level above the B&W,their weakness is their attention to detail in craftmanship,which has a negative effect on their resale.I could go on all day,of coarse there will be someone who will disagree with me because they heard the Nautilus compared to a pair of Definitive Technologys or a Paradigm down at their high end Radio Shack,thats ok too...I just call it like it is. I completely agree with Bishopwill,and Brandon blair is as right as it get's. I also owned the HTM 1 myself,don't waist your hard earned money,they will just use it to send a Stereophile editor to Hawaii! Kenan
