B & W CC6 CENTER DIALOG CHANNEL
Written: Oct 14 '03
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Pros: Value in B & W tradition,detail,Bi-wiring, Exotic materials and design for $$$.
Cons: forward midrange to mid treble at times. Dynamics limited due to small size.
The Bottom Line: For $350.00 a more detailed sound,easy to place, and exotic materials build parts wise, great B & W quality and reputation make this a winner.
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| vincedog3's Full Review: B&W CC6 S2 Center Speaker |
B & W is a company for over 40 years and still going strong has built many cutting edge design speakers of which greatest note,would be their Nautilus Speaker of over $85,000.00. Their acclaim for flat accurate response and wide dynamic range become the hallmark of the Nautilus 801 and 802 speakers. The speakers of choice for recording studios and Movie editing studios. So with all that going for B & W, can speaker of such modest price, that is $350.00 uphold the virtues of B & Ws higher priced brethren. For the most part yes, but still partially no.
The build is more like any conventional box speaker with a Vinyl computer generated wood grain in a off cherry look, or just plain black. B & W calls it "Black Ash".
This is a small Center Dialog speaker and is very easily placed on many T.V. viewing devices. A depth of less than 9 inches is a big help. The CC6 is comprised of a Kevlar woofer, and Mid-woofer and isolated Nautilus inspired plastic tube chambered Aluminum tweeter. Binding posts on rear are gold plated, and will accept a multitude of Banana, Spade, or just bare wire thank you. Bi-wiring is an option since there are 4 posts and one merely has to remove the gold plated shorting plates to take advantage of the Bi-wiring feature. B & W claims better detail and resolution using this configuration. ( More on that later).
So all in all in appearance wise, the CC6 looks like just any other Center speaker with exception to the yellow/orange tinge color of the Kevlar drivers.
The system involved for use here is: a Rotel RMB-1095 power amplifier of 200 watts per channel into 8 ohms, a Sony TAE-9000es pre/processor,a Sony DVD-7700 DVD player, B and W 603 speakers and some homebuilt speakers for the surrounds. An HSU Subwoofer, and Audioquest hosts all the wiring duties here. Panamax 1000+ manages the low draw components like the DVD Player and Pre/processor..etc.
The sound well quite simply is very detailed overall with some midrange to mid-treble forwardness that while is terrific with my movies, hurts my music concert discs.
The midrange while inviting, could also be richer in tonality as well. At times sounding a bit thin to be totally convincing.
I am concerned with the forwardness because it could place the performers for example closer to me than they really should be.
The bass response is quite good for such a small Center speaker but,no way is the CC6 going to be much good below 80hz at least in my room. This speaker definitely stays in the "Small" category of speaker setup. Let the Subwoofer take up the low frequency content that the Center cannot play. Dynamics wise, the CC6 is quite good, but I found its limits rather soon in my room. Room size is 13x20 feet or so, and I sensed when the speaker was near its limit, it sounded compressed and lacked tonal delineation. However, just before that limit, the CC6 does very well considering its size.
Imaging wise, the left to right sound stage is very good. Verifying my tests using the "Video Essentials" Calibration DVD, the CC6 passed the test with ease. The test involves placing a white noise tone exactly between the adjacent left or right speaker image wise. The CC6 did a very convincing job acoustically being where it needed to be.
So after all my listening with the CC6, the things that impressed me was its detail, good wide sound stage, reasonably good dynamics, and the bi-wire option. The Kevlar drivers and Nautilus inspired tube for the Tweeter driver is a nice unexpected bonus in a speaker with such thrifty price placement.
Lack of clarity when the limits were approached, its shallow sounding bass, and a bit forward sounding midrange and treble being the only detractors to an otherwise well designed and built Center channel that any theater buff or multi-channel audio person can enjoy with proper matching of components with this speaker.
All in all at the end, B & W clearly can build a winner in the low price, high value arena. Recommended. Note: the CC-6 has been replaced by the B & W LCR-60 which to my ears and eyes is a much more satisfying product. Best news, it is the same price as the CC-6 was. Now that is music to my ears. V.C.
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 350.00
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Epinions.com ID:
vincedog3
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Location: Los Angeles,Ca.,USA
Reviews written: 55
Trusted by: 3 members
About Me:
Experiencing Technology, and helping others, with my experience to enhance their experience.
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