50 years in business is a milestone that any company would love to achieve. 50 years in business for a high-end loudspeaker company is rare indeed. And that's just what British speaker maker Bowers & Wilkins is celebrating this year. In honor of their first half century, the company has unveiled a new flagship speaker in their Diamond Series with the 800 D3 loudspeakers ($30,000/pair). We checked out the rest of the line at a press event in New York last fall and were impressed with what we saw (and heard). And earlier this week we were among the first in the U.S. to listen to the brand new 800 D3 speakers. On Tuesday, the company unveiled the new 800 D3 speakers at an event at their U.S. Headquarters outside of Boston, Massachusetts. And it looks like B&W is going to have another winner on their hands.
The 800 series speakers represent an entirely new design over their predecessors with improvements to the cabinets, driver housings and driver materials across the board. Even that signature Kevlar midrange driver that the company has used since 1974 has been replaced with an upgraded woven composite material that is said to be even stiffer and more linear than Kevlar. This affords lower distortion levels and truer harmonic reproduction. This "Continuum Cone" is used throughout the Diamond D3 line to reproduce those critical frequencies that the human ear is most attuned to.
The bass drivers are made of a new Aerofoil material, with varying degrees of thickness in order to reduce unwanted driver resonance and lower distortion. The top three models in the series (800, 802 and 803) all use a newly designed "Turbine Head" to house the midrange and tweeter drivers, milled from solid blocks of aluminum. During the company's presentation, Senior Product Manager Andy Kerr lifted up one of the raw "turbine head" units and cradled it like a baby. I wondered why he was holding it like that until he passed it around. This thing is heavy: easily over 30 pounds of inert, non-resonant metal. This increased mass reduces unwanted resonances in the cabinet and ensures that we're hearing the sound coming from the speaker driver, not from its enclosure.
About the only thing the company has kept the same since the last version of the 800 series is the diamond tweeter. Apparently they simply couldn't find a better material or design than what they were already using. But it wasn't for lack of trying. According to a company rep, the 800 D3 includes "868 changes over the model it replaces." This is not just a few simple tweaks to the cabinetry, or a beefed up crossover and driver design; it's a bottom up reimagining of what can be done to advance the state of the art in sound reproduction.
When it came time for listening, we first listened to a pair of Bowers and Wilkins' current top of the line speakers, the Nautilus ($60,000/pair) as a reference. These speakers are impressive, not just in looks but also in sound quality: deep bass, effortless liquid midrange, crisp highs and precise imaging. They represent the state of the art from the early 1990s when they were designed.
Moving on to listen to the 800 D3 Diamond Series speakers, I have to say these new speakers may not be as striking in looks compared to the Nautilus, but they provide an even more immersive and full-bodied listening experience. Bass is deep, tight and extended (no subwoofers required here), voices are reproduced seamlessly without a hint of boominess or color, and high frequency sounds like cymbal crashes are presented with excellent attack and dynamics. With choral pieces, you can nearly pick out each individual voice in space as they float disembodied in the general area between and around the speakers.
We listened to a few cuts in stereo, then moved over to the "home theater" room where five of the 800 D3 speakers were set up for surround sound. A variety of classical, rock and blues cuts were played, each more impressive sounding than the last. But it was on the final cut, "Brain Damage" from the 30th Anniversary 5.1 remix of Pink Floyd's "Dark Side of the Moon" (on SACD) that I actually got goosebumps. Details that I've always missed from previous listening sessions revealed themselves in all their glory. The song reached its crescendo at what had to be unsafe decibel levels without any hint of congestion or strain. As the creepy mad laughter echoed throughout the room, I was reminded of just how fun this audio hobby can be; just how amazing a home audio system can sound when done right.
And yeah, we're talking about $75,000 worth of speakers in the surround sound demo, and a few thousand more for the source components and amplification. But if you've got the means, the 800 D3 speakers are definitely worth a listen. Happy 50th Birthday, Bowers and Wilkins. You've given your customers an impressive gift with the 800 D3 Diamond Series loudspeakers.
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