Nicknace, my 685s are in about a 8 foot triangle with my listening position, so I am much more near-field than you are. I am also now running a pure 2-channel set up in my listening room, 685s fed by a Parasound Halo pre, a Rotel RB-1080 (at 200 watts per channel), and an ancient yami changer (will upgrade this soon I hope). The sound quality is leaps and bounds better compared to my Denon AVR 3310 or my old Yami receiver, imaging is decent, yet I find that only certain CDs will produce a sound stage that truly escapes the confines between and around the speakers' placement. Even so, I am happy with the sound for the money spent, I got these open box for about $550. I plan to replace these with Quad 22L2s when I have the $$$, the 685s will return to home theater duty upstairs.
Your Rotel 1056 is rated at 75 wpc. My humble opinion is that for 2-channel sound, the 685s must be run with a powerful amp or integrated amp. When I added the 200 wpc Rotel to the Denon AVR, the 685s really opened up. These B&W speakers present a fairly difficult load to amps, they are rated nominal at 8 ohms, but you'll notice in the specs, they have a minimum rating of 3.7 ohms! This presents a difficult power curve for an amplifier. I expect your MB Quart 220s are more efficient than the B&Ws; and would work better with a receiver like your Rotel, which is a damn nice unit by the way.
Your Rotel 1056 is rated at 75 wpc. My humble opinion is that for 2-channel sound, the 685s must be run with a powerful amp or integrated amp. When I added the 200 wpc Rotel to the Denon AVR, the 685s really opened up. These B&W speakers present a fairly difficult load to amps, they are rated nominal at 8 ohms, but you'll notice in the specs, they have a minimum rating of 3.7 ohms! This presents a difficult power curve for an amplifier. I expect your MB Quart 220s are more efficient than the B&Ws; and would work better with a receiver like your Rotel, which is a damn nice unit by the way.