B&W 804 diamond or previous 803D?

As a second opinion Elizabeth is absolutely correct. You will be getting a better speaker for much less money with almost all of the "immediate" depreciation taken out of it already. It is not a trick question trust your instincts on this.

I also agree, and wanted to ask about your room size? If too small, maybe consider the 804D. Otherwise go for the 803D for sure. You will want a larger amp with it too.

Thank you all for your responses. Elizabeth, you explained so clearly about better investment in 803D. That made me decide to buy these speakers. After that I will ask you about a good matching amplifier for them. My current one is Onkyo A-933 obviously being too weak to drive 803D well as I understood from other sources. By the way, my room is 50m2.

Hi Papalam,

I am not sure whether the quoted price difference is for a single speaker or
for a pair of speakers. But either way, the amount does not sound right to me.
In the following, I will assume the difference is for a pair of speakers.

In the Netherlands the retail price of a pair of 803 diamond is 9000 euros.
Which means you would pay only 10-15% less for a 2nd hand speaker from
the previous generation. This is just not right.

Firstly, when buying 9k euros speaker that are new you should have no
problem to get 10-15% off the retail price. If you can not get such a discount
then just go to another dealer.

Secondly, when buying (from a private person) 2nd hand speakers that also
happened to be from the previous generation you should not pay more than
60% of the retail price of the equivalent new model. If you buy a demo model
from a dealer who also offers some significant warranty (1,2,3 years NOT 3
months) then you should not pay more than 65-70% of the retail prices of the
equivalent new model. This is especially the case when considering very
popular brands like B&W.

However, since you do not mind buying 2nd hand speakers (I do not mind
either) my advice would be to look for some Wilson Sophia 2 or Focal Alto Be
speakers. Both are much better than the 803 diamond or 802 diamond for
that matter. The Wilson should cost you about as much as a new pair of 803
diamonds, the Focals are cheeper (around 7k euros). Of course, there are
many other options.

Finally, I should say that if you plan to keep the speakers for a long time than,
given the price point, 1150 euros is not that significant.

Good luck and keep us posted!
Paul

I can't comment on the Euro speaker costs.
I will say that the Onkyo might actually have enough power to get the speakers playing, but is it the right kind of power?? There are so many options these days for power amps it is hard to recommend just one, from my perspective. All I can say is don't underpower them, you will be doing yourself a diservice.
What kind of sound do you like? I understand the B and W sound is precise and clean . You may want to balance that with a relatively warm power chain. A Cary tubed pre (I love 6SN7 tubes) into either a large and expensive tube power amp AtmaSphere?Manley?VTL etc.etc. or just a very powerful amp like the Sanders Sound amps which are made for Planar speakers but are applicable for other types as well. Good luck on your purchase I think you did fine.

I like the 803S if you can find them. Great speaker.

Hi Paul,

I appriciate your detailed answer. Today I bought 803D. This is upgrade for me so I am going to keep them for a long time. Very impressed with sound even with my current amplifier, so difficult to stop listening to them. But anyway I would like to upgrade my amplifier to use their whole potential. I am going to open a new topic for that. Hopefully see you and all others again there!

Dear All, based on all your responses, today I bought 803D. Thank you very much for making me this decision, since I really happy to get such divine sound improvement! Now I am going to ask you again about my next amplifier upgrade. I will do in another topic not to confuse you. Hope to see you all again there!

There is some misunderstanding about what 804's can do - regardless of the vintage, they are small speakers that don't move the kind of air that 803's do. Put another way, the 803's are borderline full-range speakers, while the 804's are not - they're really not comparable.

Hi Papalam,

I have just reread this thread and realized that I made an error, i.e. instead of 804 diamond I read 803 diamond. My previous post was about 803 diamond vs. 803 D. Sorry for the lengthy and useless "advise". :)

Buying the 803 D was a good decision!