B&W 'New' 800 Series

German magazine Stereo did the review of the 800D3 in Nov 2016:

"Such a sound experience is a scarce commodity even for a staunch STEREO editor with 40 years of his own hi-fi story. She has grown to my heart, this B & W. I took them out of the foyer with my pallet, unloaded their 2 x 116 kilograms, took part in mea- surement and photo-shooting, kept them carefully and carefully set up in the listening room,
Long with changing electronics and to enjoy. She is not an annoying diva, plays at a high level, but lets you know whether the cable or the component is spontaneous.
To call the new 800s a further top loudspeaker, would probably fall short, it is much more an absolute dream and thus the currently most favorable STEREO top reference at all!

I did listen to a non broken in 802 D3 yesterday for 20 minutes at the Magnolia, Long Island. Even with the mediocre solid Macintosh gear and Audioquest cables, the sound was really something special, effortless (given high power amp). Little 2D ish but speakers were not properly positioned, just couple of feet from the back wall, toed-in, which I hate, bit they had just 20 hours of play time on them, so it was obvious they sound had plenty of room for further refinement. Me and my lady friend who is classical pianist just sat mesmerized, and I thought nothing would "WOW" me at this stage of the game..... Something special indeed. I can’t even imagine what the sound will be like after 500 hours of the break in and with reference class EL 34, or 845 based tube amps and proper wire !!!!

@kot, what mediocre McIntosh amps BB paired 802D3's with?

I don’t know which particular model those were , I d think those were pretty in top of the line range monoblocks 500 watts per channel, judging by the needles, but I could be mistaken....to me all those Mac amps sound bland, flat and lifeless. Of course your experience may vary... But even with those amps you could tell the sound  of the new 802 D3s is  something exceptional, and I don’t throw epithets like that easily..

Reviewing the videos on the B&W website the ultra refined construction
techniques appear extremely well thought out and executed. I find it impressive.