Great high & midrange, build quality, sexy kevlar cones

there is a break in period, hold out!

After spending countless hours listening to many different speakers the 601s2 & 602s2 stood miles ahead of anything else in my price range. Unbeleivable clarity and outstanding midrange. Making the Yamaha and Sony floor standers really sound like crap. Then after comparing the 601s2 & 602s2 more closely, the extra dosh was worth paying for the 602s2's far superior low end, which I have to say for a bookshelf is outstanding in my opinion. Even though bass was not huge in my buying decision as I own a good sub-woofer, I have these speakers in a smallish room and usually don't need to use the sub-woofer for music. They really don't give the kind of low end needed for a good movie theater experiance though.
One point to note is that the speakers I listened to in the HiFi shop did not sound the same as the ones I took home, at first. Before the break in period (50-100 hours) they sounded much harsher, epecially when listening to female vocals. But thanks to this review page I stuck it out and waited and now I am very very satisfied.
You simply will not find a better speaker for the price.
Take the grills off, boy those kevlar cones look cool.

Similar Products Used:

601s2, Sony, Boston, Yamaha

Everything about these speakers is strong

after nearly a year, I'm still looking....

I am a recent adventurer into the world of relatively high end audio. I've worked in radio for the past decade and music is my passion. I've wanted to get a "real" HT/audio set-up for the last several years.

I went shopping this past spring. I spent a lot of time checking out the high end shops in Anchorage and did a load of listening. After long hours with many speakers, I decided on two brand names...Snell and B&W. At home I still owned a Kenwood receiver (VR-357) with the Sam's club speaker selection of the month. I was able to demo both models at home and Wow, I found out my receiver was a decent machine! There wasn't a lot of difference to me between Snell and B&W....they both sound stellar. The big difference was in the price. Same size speaks for $400 more on the Snell line. I brought the B&W's home and they sound better everyday. For $600, you can't beat these speakers....

Over the course of the past 6 months, I have upgraded my receiver to a Denon 3300, put the 602's in the rear, 603 S2's up front, and an LCR6 S2 in the center. I run a Klipsch KSW-15 for a sub. This is not a good system. This is a world-class system! I have friends with $10k plus invested and the sound is inferior to my system. Again, I love music (60%) but DVD's are awesome! (40%) of the time we're using it as a home theater system and it never disappoints. I have yet to hear the speakers stress themselves at any volume. 5 year warranty to boot, can't beat that!

The whole set up was under $4000. If you're in the market for home theater, consider this set-up. Don't waste $300 or $400 on speakers you know you'll want to replace. Save the extra hundred or two and go with B&W, they're flawless!

Similar Products Used:

Snell, Paradigm, Klipsch