The Bowers & Wilkins (B&W) CM 602 Series 3 Review!
Great speaker, one of my personal collection for a long time. I used these mostly as surround speakers. But they truly can stand on their own. They have a great deal of range, and really drop low when they go boom (though I always recommend Sub Woofers). I love them, and am only selling them after about 8 years of ownership. I'll be upgrading (or side grading) to the Matrix series, which is only a tad bit more expensive on the used market.
The Story of These Speakers
Around 2014, I bought these Bowers & Wilkins 602 speakers with a pair of 604s in Buffalo NY. I paid about $850 for the four speakers. They were in near perfect condition, but one of the drivers had a slight cat scratch on one of the foam surrounds. I repaired it, and enjoyed the speakers for many years.
Eight years later, I sold the B&W 604's alone for $850 and am now selling these speakers. I was able to enjoy these speakers for 8 years, and make a slight profit.
These experiences have inspired my channel, and I want to continue to support the used speaker market as it provides a truly amazing value to people.
Tips with Speakers and Cats!
- Keep cats off speakers
- Reward cats for using scratching posts
- Rub catnip onto scratching posts
- Used sleeping bags, or blankets can work as a great (cheap) cover for most speakers and provide partial protection.
- A lint roller is great to remove cat hair from speaker grills, but be careful about the tweeters!
Bowers & Wilkins
Pros
- Kevlar lasts forever, and is a great material to invest in a used speaker.
- Large speaker with a great bass response
- British Made
- Love the Looks
- Great Value on Used Market
- A huge availability of them on the used market.
- Some parts still available, with generic replacements available.
- Resell Value! After 8 years of ownership, I will sell them for slightly more then I bought them for. AMAZING! (Past results do not guarantee future results)
Cons
- Cheaper Cabinet Materials.
- Requires a stand to fully enjoy.
- The foam can get hard and needs to be replaced.
- Steel tweeters are a bit harsh.
- Cat hair on speaker grills suck! /s
Images
Transcript
Hello everybody. Welcome to my channel NewsBoy Audio Speaker Reviews and Audio Review's. I've got a new blog out, check that out. We're going to come out with more and more speaker reviews. More and more amplifier reviews. We've got other equipment as well. I just want to really encourage everybody to be a part, and you know if we can get more likes and subscribes maybe we can make a little money on these, from the ad revenue or whatnot. We could go professional right now, we have like 30 amazing subscribers. We love doing these so we'll keep doing them even if we only have 30 people. But, if we could get more we'll do more editing and more scripting and really try to make these a little bit more refined. Maybe be a little bit more accurate. Anyways, I'm just here cleaning these things up. I've got a cloth here that's got a little dampness to it. We've got a kitty that likes to climb on speakers. Speakers are a favorite object of kitties, they love climbing on top of them. Got to be careful they like to use them as scratching posts. Cost you a lot of money. If they do so, make sure you, you know, yell at your kitty if they start scratching your speakers up. I don't allow my cats on my speakers. If they sit on them they get yelled at. We spray them with a water bottle to discourage them and keep them away. Speakers are no go for the kitty and so we don't have much problems with the scratching. But we do get quite a bit of hair and these, you know… These are forbidden. So kitties love the forbidden and love to get on what they're not supposed to get onto. So there's no keeping them away, but at least they're not scratching up my stuff! We also give them scratch posts and other things. If you've got cats. The dogs they're a little clumsy. You got to keep the balls away from them and things the speakers but other than that they're pretty easy. Kids are another problem. The kids are a huge problem with these dome tweeters seeing them all the time on the used market dented they come down in price you could pop them out if they get dented you really shouldn't hear the difference if you do take a back some people recommend backing some say double tape put it on pull it out and you pop out the dome tweeter you know you get it mostly back to the original condition but you'll have a little dent in there for the rest of your listening speakers you know would you hear it probably not but us audiophiles are a peculiar bunch and some of us believe we are super human that can hear things that we can't so just having a damaged speaker doesn't give your next buyers when you sell those speakers a nice warm feeling that you want so try to keep them up to condition here we got the Bowers and Wilkins 602 series threes you could tell the series threes I've mentioned this in my other videos by the silver cone in the center of the woofer the yellow Kevlar co woofer mid-range and a silver tweeter up on top it's also got the port down here front port which is really cool they don't have a port on the back so they're not dipole they're just in the front works in most rooms very nice but is a little directional these do come with stands we've got the stands on the vocals you can buy the stands for a couple hundred bucks even today on the open market they look pretty good they have the bound looking labels on it and you could throw them up on it they're not really if you can't tell they're not really a bookshelf speaker they're giant look at this thing I mean the woofer is rather large the tweeter's very large too so when you do put them on the stand you're not really saving much room and they do sound the best on stands so you know is it better to get bookshelf speakers versus a tower while the tower does produce more bass can hold more bass drivers so you'll get more bass from tower speakers typically speaking but they take up more room and is it even ideal or necessary to have the low below 100 hertz on a speaker this thing will dip down to 60 hertz 40 hertz maybe but it will you know you'll see the curve and it will really drop off with a subwoofer a subwoofer can pick that curve back up and give you the extra bass when you're pumping your you know most of your wattage through the base of the subwoofer you're going to hit a you're going to be providing most of your power down low so a subwoofer will come with a d-class amp that costs a couple hundred bucks maybe at most and it will be able to power those speakers very efficiently very adequately and you won't even know that they're d-class amp you could save your treats and your minutes for your ab amps or your more expensive amps you can position the subs around the room how you want you can use one or two subs many people say two sub sound best because it gives a more balanced bass disturb distribution I've seen people with four subs one in each corner of the room another great option you need to play with the options but it does leave these bookshelf speakers available and very well for those types of environments I used to use this as a surround sound speaker I had the 604s which are a floor standing speaker but these have been so dominating that I've used them on my desk I've used them in other situations as well they sound just as good as the 604s they just don't dip down as low as the towers so you may be able to avoid a subwoofer with a tower but it will never be ideal and the best situation is to always use the subwoofer anyways and that's my general recommendation as far as how this sounds this sounds like the Bowers and Wilkins 600 series it's got the tweeter and the mid-range that they're famous for and they all pretty much sound pretty similar except for that bass end you can find the bookshelf speaker the 601s or the 600s even in the series threes and the 600s I've got a pair in the other room is even smaller than this doesn't have the port in it and it's a really true more baked bush bookshelf speaker this one will dip below the 80 hertz the bookshelf speakers the 600s and possibly the 600 ones won't dip as low so subwoofers definitely needed in those situations a little bit more than this one does this is a full range speaker as we said it's got the Kevlar drivers and one of the reasons I recommend the Kevlar drivers is they are tough in the used markets they're the number one reason I recommend Bowers and Wilkins you get a great valued speaker that will last for the rest of your life I've had paper cone tweeters or paper cone woofers dry out crumble and fall apart and the only way to rescue them is to re-cone them literally put new paper on it on the woofer which is a big process I've never done it and I'm extremely intimidated by it these Kevlar cones will last 100 years won't dry out won't get damaged the only issue I've ever seen is they get in the sunlight they change color they get more light if they've been kept out in the summer also these these shrouds I believe they're rubber they call them shrouds or rubber foam some of them are foam but I believe the 602s are rubber one of my commenters I said foam but I'm at rubber anyways I don't know if they're either foam or rubber just get the right material you scratch this off if they get hard they become brittle and they'll break you could scratch them off with a blade the Kevlar is so tough that it makes the process easy most people can do it you can get these new inserts and put them on there put some glue on there there's youtube videos on how to do it I've never come out with a video on how to do it I've never done the replacements of these but they're easy to do the other damage that you'll see is that the bent tweeters Bowers and Wilkins no longer supports these speakers they support speakers for about 20 years before they discontinue them they will have parts on a little bit older some parts here and there you have to contact your local distributor to know but Bowers & Wilkins will not provide new domes on here that does not mean new domes are not available tweeter domes on the used market there is aftermarket tweeter domes available from china some of them are blue in color some of them are silver and color I recommend the silver color ones and if you look on Ebay you can find them they're not as good as the originals they might not be perfect but I can't tell the difference between them a aftermarket tweeter cover and a official bow and looking tweeter cover sounds the same these are new I got these in power and wilk or in buffalo when I bought them they've never been replaced they've never been damaged and they sound great I'm selling them after eight years in the marketplace I bought them for about 800 I bought them with the 604s for 800. I just sold the 604s for 900. so I have these in my profit and I use them for six years or six to eight years around eight years and enjoyed them for eight years which is just incredible that I've been able to enjoy a speaker for so long and then sell them for the exact same or a little bit more than what I got them for and that's the wonderful world of the used market and that's why I'm making these videos in here guys because when you're buying a new speaker the day you take it home you lose twenty percent thirty percent on the value of your speaker the next couple of years they will drop down to forty fifty sixty percent a ten year old speaker will see almost no depreciation you'll be able to keep it and enjoy it and it really does just does not make much big of a difference the more expensive older speakers sound better but are cheaper now and so it balances out and you don't have that depreciation which is why we shop and sell and buy and do everything in the used market in fact when I'm buying a speakers I don't see it as even a purchase it's an investment I keep that speaker and as long as I don't damage it I can get my money back from that speaker if something goes wrong I can sell that speaker easily and get cash back for it and I'm buying it from someone just like me who's selling it just like I am so I can buy it and then turn around and usually sell it for the same price that I'm buying it as long as I'm making sure I'm checking the price getting a good deal and watching the auctions I can come away with profits often now how do we do this hi-fi shark is a great website go on it if you don't know what it is search that google that up hi-fi shark type in your speaker and you can see the sales history throughout time audio gone also has histories and speaker histories for those in the us and they also can be you know you can go through and you can look at them all but that's what they are so the six or two Bowers & Wilkins series six great speaker very very nice I've since upgraded to the 800 series about the same time another great speaker to check out a little bit more money very comparable in performance one speaker was based off the other and depending on the generation that you want to get you know you'll be golden anyways great for home theater systems great for hi-fi great for music enjoy
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Revisions
February 23rd, 2023—Added Link to YouTube Video
July 27th 2022—Added External Links, and More
It’s written Wilkins, not Wilkens.
Thanks, I’ve corrected it. Let me know if you see any more typos. We work to try and make these as perfect as possible. And thanks for visiting the website!