The B&W 802Ds for sure. The Vandersteen 3A Signature is good for its price, but comes nowhere close to the B&W 800 series, particular with the Diamond tweeter models.
You'll notice quickly on this board there are a lot of anti-B&W posters, which is fine. They are a well-known and successful speaker company, and no doubt you have those that resent them for that reason (sure, they might really not like their speakers, but most people don't like most speakers, and yet these people are mostly focused on B&W). So you should take with a grain of salt people saying, "easy choice, the "not B&W" is WAY better!". These people probably have never even heard either speaker, but are just criticizing B&W for whatever their reason is.
Anyway, I've heard both speakers and I think your doubts about the Vandersteen are correct. Not a bad speaker by any means, but the 802D is a rare speaker indeed. It's almost not fair to compare these two. For those that love its type of sound, it's nearly the perfect speaker (with perfection being unattainable).
You'll notice quickly on this board there are a lot of anti-B&W posters, which is fine. They are a well-known and successful speaker company, and no doubt you have those that resent them for that reason (sure, they might really not like their speakers, but most people don't like most speakers, and yet these people are mostly focused on B&W). So you should take with a grain of salt people saying, "easy choice, the "not B&W" is WAY better!". These people probably have never even heard either speaker, but are just criticizing B&W for whatever their reason is.
Anyway, I've heard both speakers and I think your doubts about the Vandersteen are correct. Not a bad speaker by any means, but the 802D is a rare speaker indeed. It's almost not fair to compare these two. For those that love its type of sound, it's nearly the perfect speaker (with perfection being unattainable).