Would like to get more bass out of my B&W 801 series 2 speakers

I think the stands are made by Arcici.    

@chessie I would like to second much of what

@livinon2wheels and others have stated above.

As you may be aware, the Series 2 was originally brought to market with an optional equalizer. The designer, as I understand it, considered the EQ essential to the speaker’s performance, because without it the ‘6th order Butterworth crossover’ was not implemented, and the 6th order Butterworth is advertised on the box the speaker came in. I suppose marketing thought the speaker on its own without the crossover was ‘good enough.’ Evidently, many customers thought so too.
All of which is to say that implementing a DSP is one way to augment the bass. As a Series 2 owner, I can attest to the rather anemic performance in the bass register, it just doesn’t seem to have much extension. What bass there is sounds good, but there just doesn’t seem to be as much as there should be.
For my part, I can que up my 70E Warfedales, with their 15” drivers, to get that next level of bass, although they lack the ‘punch’ of the 801’s.
Another thing I do is add a subwoofer in a corner of the room, even my mini-Velodyne works wonders.
The other thing I’ve often thought would improve their sound in my room was to get them up off the floor a bit so that the midrange and tweeter were closer to ear level. The original designer is on record as saying it wasn’t necessary to raise them, and that the only reason they offered the stands was for use in studios where the added height was needed for the sound to clear the mixing desk.
Anyway, those are my thoughts on the B&W 801 Matrix Series 2. I would still love to hear my McIntosh XRT-20’s in your space. They sound wonderful in my biggest room, which is much smaller than the room occupied by your 801’s.

The bass alignment filter is the solution. The speaker was designed to be used with it for the proper alignment. If you cant find a set of JPS golden flutes, the simply get a good parametric eq and duplicate the filters that the stock B&W filter implements. A web search will give you the exact parameters. If you want to go custom contact Marchand electronics to build one for you. Of course you can add a sub or get different speakers or amps but that doesn't solve the issue of the bass alignment. You can also bi amp and run the filter only on the bass amp leaving the kids and high school untouched. I had those speakers for 30 years so Im speaking from experience with my recommended solutions. Good Luck

"mids and highs"  LOL

Just and update, I founds some Arcici stands and am ordering some herbie’s dots and gliders before installing. The stands are about 45# (shipping was more than the stands) and I think the speakers are over 100#, so I am waiting on the dots to assemble/raise/move. I don’t know if I am going to put any weights in the stands, they are designed to hold a good amount of sand. Hopefully with the gliders I will be able to move them around without too much trouble. I am going to reposition the speakers away from the wall, with wider spacing.

These aren’t mine, but the stands look like these:

@amtprod wrote:

I see 555’s in perfect order for $400. For another $400 you have a nearly totally new amp that sounds incredible and reliable for another 2 decades. https://hoppesbrain.com/product/adcom-gfa-555-mk2-input-board/

I decided to go this route and try out the 555’s with new boards installed. There is a person out west who was highly recommended, and he has been a pleasure to work with. He seems to work with Adcom exclusively. I am waiting for their return, they should be here this week.

I don’t plan to bridge, but rather bi-amp with one 2 channel amp per speaker (vertical).

For the time being, I am hoping that the NAD streaming DAC will be pleasing. I realize that since moving the system to this big room I have not implemented the Dirac room correction, so I will also try that.

If the sound is pleasing, my next step may well be to get a turntable.

Thanks for all the feedback, good listening to all.