I agree with what Jim said. B&W is a very large and well-known speaker company. They've made a wide variety of speakers over the years, so most of my comments are general because there have been so many different B&W models over the years.
Some of B&W's speakers are very good, such as much of their 800 series speakers. They're well designed, well built, and very expensive. Other speakers, especially the B&W 600 series speakers, have had problems. I believe B&W consciously decides what prices and how many audible flaws get corrected in each of it's speaker lines. I am familiar with two of these audible problems: 1) Low frequency muddiness in the 2-way 600 series speakers, and 2) high frequency harshness, especially when playing at higher volumes. I believe Pam jost's issues with her 602 is due to #1.
1) The low frequency muddiness is more than likely due to a cabinet volume not suitable for the 6½" mid woofer's electro-mechanical properties (called Theile/Small parameters). Speaker designers choose what cabinet volume they will use, not simply for appearance reasons, but for bass performance. In technical terms, this can be summarized as total system Q, where a low Q design keeps the bass driver's motions well damped, and tends to result in lower overall bass volume and a "dry" or restrained, but more accurate sound. In contrast, a high Q designs produce louder bass, but come at the expense of poor damping of the driver. It's sound can be described as louder, "fat" or even sloppy. When a single bass note is played over a poorly damped woofer, it plays that note, but stops slowly. It tends to ring on and on. A well damped woofer or mid-woofer stops readily after a single note, keeping the driver cone under better control. Playing most popular rock music tends to mask this flaw, as the bass in the music often plays more or less continuously. Other types of music reveal this flaw more readily.
I don't know what type of music Pam jost likes, but I do know that lower volumes are preferred. Years ago when I heard a B&W 602 s2 speaker, I readily noticed this flaw. I've heard other speakers that did this much worse, but I easily recognized it in these speakers. In my opinion, this feature of 602 speakers, plus the confined space where they are placed, contribute to the muddy bass sound that Pam jost described.
I think B&W consciously decided to build these speakers this way, as an effort at appealing to a particular set of buyers. It didn't hurt that high Q bass cabinets & drivers tend to cost less than well damped designs. Please note that B&W doesn't reveal critical details of its drivers, cabinets, or what the designers and marketing people intended. B&W carefully guards all this as proprietary information.
2) A high frequency harshness is caused by a highly resonant (noisy) Kevlar fiber mid woofer, combined with a crossover frequency, 4,000 Hz, that is much too high. Listeners easily hear the harsh sounding noise made by the Kevlar driver when it goes into break-up mode at roughly 4 to 5 kHz. I think the crossover should be much lower, perhaps 2 to 2.5 kHz. This harshness is easily heard only if the music stimulates it, and not all music does this. It also can be better heard at higher volumes. When listeners complain that a speaker causes "listener's fatigue", this is the cause. I don't think this appears to be a problem with Pam jost, so I won't go any further with it. I do know that I find this high frequency harshness particularly unpleasant sounding. Once I learned to recognize it, I could never unlearn it. Not everyone reacts that way.
There is a well known
review of B&W 602 s2 speakers that published a number of years ago. The author, a well respected speaker designer named Joseph D'Appolito. This review honestly shows all its data, but unfortunately the author clearly knows how to walk around the two worst flaws of this speaker without calling them to the reader's attention. This problem is not uncommon in audio publishing.
These problems were more than likely brought on by efforts to keep the prices lower, while maintaining the brand and it's image. I can imagine the battles between the speaker designers and product engineers on one side and the marketing department on the other side.
That is a very long winded way of saying I agree with Jim Salk. Small companies, like his, make use of any good sounding driver commercially available. They emphasize good design principles. Large companies, such as B&W, seem to prefer to emphasize brand identity over good design. B&W certainly isn't the only speaker manufacturer that does this.
