B&W 684 best match amp/rec for music and video

[admin_exported]

Hello!

I have a pair of b&w 684, htm 62 as center, planning to buy b&w m1 for surround. Cant decide what to choose for receiver. I want to have a nice stereo, but at the same time I watch movies 70 and only 30 (20) percent remains for music. Video and audio come from ps3.

One Yamaha RX-V863 is enough? Or should I add to Yamaha extra amp for better stereo (and which comes well with 684)? Or Yamaha 863 is not enough at all even for movies?

Thank you in advance.

 

[Anonymous]

From what I've gathered from doing some serious looking around for an amp for my B&W 685's the same name comes up over and over; ROTEL.

Apparently the 684's, as with most B&W speakers need a lot of quality power to get the best out of them and this is something Rotel are one of the best (probably even THE best) at for their money. And they do quite a few multi channel power amps if you look at their website.

Also, B&W and Rotel are the same company and use each others components while developing their stuff (the amps built into B&W subs are Rotel for example) which explains why so many say they're a perfect match and they're always pictured with each others stuff on the websites.

That's my advice and the route I'm definatley going anyway!

 

[Anonymous]

Thank you, ARW77! Rotel is good for B&W, I now that, but which Rotel am I suppose to choose. RA-06 enough to power 684?

 

[Anonymous]

It all depends how much you want to spend?

Personally for the same money as the RA-06 I would rather go for the RB-1070 power amp and hook that up to your present receiver untill I could up-grade that later on when funds allow.

The reason being that although the RA-06 would probably be ok for some smaller 2 way speakers, with the 684's you're going to be sharing it's 70 WPC output between the 3 driver units of each speaker. And this just wouldn't really be enough in my opinion.

With the much more powerful RB-1070 power amp not only do you get 130 WPC but it also has a very high "damping factor" of 500 compared to the RA-06's 180 (check the spec sheets) This figure means that the amp will deliver a big slug of power to the speakers as soon as it's called upon and will allow the amp to keep a very firm grip on controlling the movement of your speakers drive units (namely the bass) when you need to crank the volume up, which is something the B&W's love to do! And when an amp has this kind of iron- fisted control over the speakers it not only sounds so much better and cleaner but will help prevent blowing your speakers and over heating an amp that is struggling to cope.

A struggling amp = distortion and over heated voice coils in the speakers as they're just flapping around without the control.

The power rating on the 684's is 150 WPC so the 130 WPC power amp would be a far better and natural partner for each other.

Don't forget to use good BiWire speaker cable! You've got to allow that power signal to freely reach where it needs to go and that also means happy 684's = good sound!

 

[Anonymous]

Either this or you could get the RA-06 and then get the matching RB-06 power amp when funds allow? This would also be a brilliant match as you could not just BI-Wire but Bi-amp the speakers. Giving a total of 140 WPC.

Doing this would use the RA-06's 70 WPC to power the tweeters and mid-range and then the RB-06's 70 WPC (and it higher damping factor of 500) to power the bass. Rotel do really good multi channel AV receivers too (I really don't understand why What Hi-fi don't seem to review much Rotel these days, it's ridiculous though) so there loads of options.

Not sure how much the RB-06 power amp sells for (around £350 maybe) but doing this would be worth it in the long run and I would imagine sound (and look) absolutley awsome! Easily what the 684's deserve and very hard to beat.

I'm going for the RB-1070 to run my B&W 685's and buy a pair of ASW610 subs purely for music. Effortless power sounds damn good!

Hope this helps.

 

[Anonymous]

Thank you!

Still remains unclear the possibility of connection Yamaha 863 with Rotel RA 6 and RB 1070 using preamp outs of Yamaha receiver. RA-6 gives 70 WPC, RB 1070 - 130WPC, Yamaha gives 105WPC. As I understand it, 105WPC coming from Yamaha will be added by the power of RA-6 or RB-1070 and then go to the speakers, but in this case total amount of power will be more than 150WPC (maximum of B&W 684).

Yamaha+(RA-6)=175WPC

Yamaha+(RB-1070)=235WPC

Probably, I missunderstand something... But if the signal from Yamaha preamp outs comes already amplified with its 105WPC, it looks like 684 will be overpowered. Am I right?

 

[Anonymous]

The signal from the preamp outputs is NOT amplified. It is attenuated, ie at a lower level than the signal from a CD player, depending on the setting of the volume knob.

 

[Anonymous]

If you hooked up a power amp to the Yamaha then the Yamaha would just act as a pre- amp to control the volume output of the power amp.

The RA-06 is a 70 WPC "integrated" amp which means the seperate PRE and POWER parts of the amp are in the same box. So hooking one of these up to the Yamaha wouldn't make any sense.

With reguards to over-powering the 684's (or any other speaker) it's always better to have a little too much power than not enough. The reason for this is what I was talking about the amp having firm control of the moving parts of the speakers.

The amp not only has to send the signals to make the speakers driver push out to move the air, but also has to pull it back in and make it stop (thousands of times a second). The more power and the higher damping factor number the amp has, the more control it has over this movement. This gives a whole raft of benefits such as better detail, stereo imaging, much tighter bass and so on. Really opens everything up.

When a lower powered amp starts to be pushed and starts to struggle, it starts to lose it's grip on this movement. This is called "clipping" and you can clearly hear it as distortion and this is where things heat up very quickly and end up blowing up!

Personaly If I had the 684's I would be looking at having a 200 WPC power amplifier. My 685's are rated at 100 WPC but I'm going for the 130 WPC RB-1070. It's not just me giving you risky, crazy advice I promise you!

It's like having a fast, powerful car; It has all that power and you'll rarely use it but it's nice to know that the power's there when you want or need it!

Again it's just a case of deciding how much you want to spend. Unless you're planning on just using them for music or having 2 channel movies and games etc. then forget the RA-06.

This leaves you with deciding whether you go for just adding the power amp or a different receiver.

 

[Anonymous]

P.S. sorry if this last post kind of contradicted the advice I gave before!

I kind of got carried away and forgot the fact you said it was more for movies and games and not music which is why I sugested the RA-06/power combo!

 

[Anonymous]

Thank you, ARW77!

Now it becomes more clear for me. What do you think about Yamaha RX-V663 with Rotel 1070. Will I get what I want from 684? I mean movies for 70/30 for music (but nice music). Generally, I want a receiver with the ability to decode most modern HD formats, at the same time I realise that one 95 WPC receiver (like Yamaha 663) is not enough for my front b&w 684 and i will not get excellent response in music.

I can use Yamaha as preamp for 1070 and get better sound from my fronts. Is that correct?

 

[Anonymous]

Absolutley correct!

Glad the advice helped.

The RB-1070 would do a brilliant job of giving the 684's all the juice they need. That high damping figure of 500 will help (just to compare; the award winning 125 WPC Roksan Kandy K2 integrated amp has a damping figure of "only" 200!).

Just be sure to use some good quality Bi Wire speaker cable (and a good interconnect to the receiver) to let the amp do it's thing as just using single runs of "regular" speaker cable will strangle the signal somewhat. I'm going for Chord Co. Carnival Silverscreen Bi Wire for mine as it's the right level for the other kit (ie, not to expensive but not too cheap) and it's the best in it's class.

It probably goes without saying but just keep the speaker cable lengths as short as they possibly need to be (but equal lengths each side) and you can't go wrong!

 

[Anonymous]

Hi,

I am looking at getting some M1 speakers for rears to macth my B&W 684 in front.

Can you tell me if you are happy with the M1's and do they sound good with the 684's?

I have a Yamaha RX-V1900 running the 684's.

Regards,

Oliver