Rotel 1091 500 watt monos ok for B&W 802ds?


Right now I have The Rotel 1091s driving my B&W 804s's (1 mono per speaker). At 500 watts apiece, the 1091s seem to have plenty of power for the 804s, but I'm considering buying a set of the newly released 802Ds and am wondering if the Rotels will be sufficient. I'm guessing they'll have enough raw power, but I'm not certain they'll bring the full musical potential out of the 802Ds. The 802Ds I listened to were being driven by a Classe amp (not sure which model, but not monos) at I believe the guy said either 200 or 250 watts per channel, with no sub, and they were simply phenomenal. They were so phenomenal that I instantly wanted to buy a pair but thought I'd better do my due diligence first as to whether my system could reproduce what I heard in the showroom, and, if not, what would be needed to get that sound. On the one hand, I'm pushing the limits of budgetary reason in springing for the speakers alone, so being able to use what I already have would of course be a plus. On the other hand, I love the speakers and want to do right by them, so, as the saying goes, in for a dime, in for a few grand. Any advice would be greatly appreciated.
Ag insider logo xs@2xbuckdog
What you heard was the superb synergy of the Classe / B&W
combo that is not an accident but is a result of these two legendary companies working together towards the best reproduced sound that can be had today. That's not to say there is not other companies out there doing the same, just that this pairing is certainly one of the best at it today.
The Classe amps are smooth, dynamic and appear to be nearly
perfectly matched with those speakers so you should trust your ears and think that in the future you may want to move up from the Rotel (which is very good in their own right) to
something from Classe. The new 800 series is amazingly good and would be a fantastic choice to start building an superb, high performance music system. I'd bet they would sound mighty darn good with your Rotels until you could move on up to the wonderful Classe line. Buy em.
The RB-1091 will be just fine with the 802Di. I am using a RB-1092 with my N804 and have plenty of reserve power left on tap. When I purchased my 1092 my dealer really pished me into buying the 1091 monos but at the time I did not have the extra room. For the monies today the RB-1091/1092 are a tough cookie to beat. The RB-1092 is in my general listenig room for everday music. In my analogue room I am using McIntosh.
Shouldn't be any problem. I have driven the 800s to bursting with a 100W/ channel.