How To Add A Sub To B&W N802's

The simplest may be to get a Y adaptor to take your preamp outs to the sub and your mains.

Since you have large floorstanders then I would run them full range and use the sub to fill in just the bottom octave.

The issue you will face is room modes....large peaks and nulls in the bass response below 100 Hz due to the room....in most rooms you end up with boomy bass and two or three peaks that need an EQ notch filter to bring then down and lots of acoustic treatment to try to keep the bass even above 100 Hz. Look up Rives PARC on their website for info.

It would be a big mistake to get a $3500 sub and not check your setup for room modes and try to EQ it a bit to get something a bit smoother....

yes this is confusing but I appreciate the replies :(

that does sound sensible to me about the sub just filling in the bottom.

To answer your quesiton, it is a good idea to add a sub if you are looking for more slam. They give it. Before you go and spend $3500 on one, it might also be a good idea to do a little investigating. There are some great companys out there who do nothing but build subwoofers and may beat out the B&W for much less. Some have already been mentioned, such as JL and Rel. Some others to read up on are Hsu, SVS, and Epik lines. Hooking them up will not be difficult as they have numerous connections. If you have a subwoofer out on your preamp, that would be the easiest. You can also add a second pair of speaker wires from the left or right channel posts of your amp to the sub. The Rels have their own dedicated cable just for that. Good luck

I use a B&W ASW 850 sub with the Velodyne SMS-1 sub controller. I have B&W 800's with this setup and run them full range. I cross the sub at 40hz and have experimented with al the options on the sub EQ to arrive to where I am at right now. The bass at the sitting position is just right and not boomy. It will take some time to dial in a sub. I have used several subs and to me it seems that you can get almost any sub over 12" to blend fairly easy, especially the sealed design subs. I chose the B&W ASW 85o sub for it's deep bass response, 14hz and it fits well into my listening space.
Ciao,
Audioquest4life