B&W 804's Vs. Vienna Acoustic Beethoven


Has anyone compared the B&W 804's and the Vienna Acoustic Beethoven speakers?

I have a Denon AVR4802, and want speakers that will be good for all types of Music (Clasical, Blues, Rock, etc.), and Home Theater.

I listened to both speakers, but not at the same store. The Beethovens seemed to have more Bass, and better Imaging.

What do you think?
scottaramb423
Look, the 804 and 803 differ VASTLY in their spectral tilts.
The 803N can work in a large room in free space, and perhaps quite nicely. Its splashy tweeter is anathema for HT, though....
The 804N is REALLY anemic by comparison, and again, an afterthought at B&W, produced after marketing pressure to do so. They were the last to land here because B&W wouldn't give up 803N production line space to the 804N until the 803N pipeline was filled, if that tells ya anything....
I could see where the 804N works in a small room if some boundary support is used, but then the soundstage is foreshortened, of course. But they DO need lots of help at the bottom, but even then you end up with a west-coast sway-back freq resp, not a bad thing for rock/elec jazz, but anathema for classical or acoustic jazz....
Sorry to upset N804 owners with my impressions. I even found
lowly Paradigm Ref 20s to sound better balanced, or the sublime new Thiel 1.6 as another $2k giant-killer....
Thanks for the HT/2ch radiation patter/room-interface reminder, foreverhifi.
Cdc, your original tongue-in-cheek hit too many nails on their heads, as I keep running into musician after musician who, after stepping into mi-to-highend waters ALL complain about how UNnatural the Naulius' sound to them! Again, I WANTED to like the 803, especially as my wife said it was tolerably attractive (you should have heard her swearing about the Revel F30 and Aeriel 8) but in a nearfield setup couldn't get them to cohere...nor tame those bright tweets. If only they had padded them a bit more to allow that decent midrange driver to come forward a bit. I'm not alone on this. B&W IS a large manufacturer...and so is Bose.
I'm not a real big B&W fan. But what matters is what you like. The Viennas and the B&Ws are very different sounding speakers. If I had to pick, I'd definittely go with the Viennas. Also consider Aerial.
I just auditioned the Aerial 7B's. I thought these also sounded better than the B&W 804's (Hard to compare to the Vienna's, as they were not in the same store). But, they didn't have the 803's, only the 804's and 802's. The 802's are way out of my price range, and now I am certain that the 804's lack any real bottom end.

So, I have three questions:

1)Do the 803's have the full sound I am looking for, or should I move on to the Vienna's or Aeriels (My room is 14 x 18, with a standard ceiling.?

2) Which are better, the Vienna's or Aeriels?

3) Is my Denon VER4802 really so bad?