Fair enough lol, most amps tend to freak out when you get to 3, going down to 1 made those brutal loads lol
Is the original 15 ohm really that much easier to work with though? They both seem like a bit of a pain but people are obviously willing to deal with it
Not really, they are demanding speakers overall for their size, the sound is worthwhile lol. Nearfield you can get away with tube amps and class a that are around 20 ish watts, but in a room you do tend to want more on deck (depends on the amp though)
Interesting. Iām usually 6 ft from my speakers with 6 ft between them. So maybe they are option for me 
Iām pretty okay with near field. The room I have is only 150 ish sq ft.
Honestly thatās close enough where you should be fine with most semi powerful amps (but again donāt ignore synergy here). The amps you have should give you no issues with the speakers imo
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I can easily shrink that triangle as well. Thatās awesome. I think Iāll look for some 3/5ās on the used market.
What would some of those issues be? And are they mitigated by having lots of power and or being able to drive low ohm loads? Iāve heard of these issues before but I wouldnāt know what to look for as an symptom.
Like bad synergy or just like impedance load issues? I canāt really tell you too much from an electronics perspective, but there are some amps that sound pretty piss poor with the ls3/5as lol.
I would say no, itās moreso the overall quality of the amp, but sometimes with lower power amps you might find yourself starved for power in a larger room, but you canāt push the speakers too much either, they tend to not have the highest spl handling while sounding coherent imo
Poor sound quality or issues at higher volumes perhaps lol?
In a near field setup you can probably get away with anything power-wise.
As for synergy, the LS3/5a (all of them from any manufacturer) are designed to be vocal centric so you tend to get more in the midrange area. Keep that in mind when choosing amplification. You may prefer even more of that or want to balance it out with a slightly V shaped amp.
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For the 3/5a I tend to gravitate towards amps that have lots of depth, natural timbre, and arenāt overly colored as to not upset the balance (but I do like something with a bit more body with them to make up for their size), the 3/5a are all about that midrange lol, also they tend to sound pretty dang open for their size
Any brands in particular I should look for or avoid?
I mean I would first suggest you try out the speakers and see what you think lol, once you do that, you can see what you like and what you might want to change and go from there. Regarding what to avoid I would say avoid cheaper more lean brighter amps, so like a pa3 isnāt going to work well, nor will a modern crown for the most part, honestly it could boil down to avoid cheap or/and bad amps lol, you donāt really want to skimp on source gear for these
Oh jeez sorry man I meant for the ls3/5a speakers lol my bad
I will still agree in getting a trial or listening session with the 3/5a you have in mind. They have similar signatures, but still sound different and most of them are similarly priced.
I will also +1 on the electronics though. Iāve had some bad pairings that I disliked, but the fortunate part is my Harbeth feel like they scale almost forever. They certainly perform much better with quality stuff, so donāt skimp out on that.
Ah ok lol my bad, I mean most of the established models are pretty solid, the og rodgers gold tag and graham chartwell are really great, as were spendor models. I canāt say I liked the kef models as much though along with harbeth ls3/5a as well actually (but this is not the p3esr to be clear) so personally I wouldnāt suggest those. The modern falcons are pretty faithful to the first designs and are solid, as are the stirling models (but those are closer to the older kef but without the issues iirc). There are also a ton of modern designs that take inspiration from the ls3/5a, so traces of the 3/5a are pretty everywhere lol
Unfortunately this isnāt really an option for me as I live in a pretty remote area of northern Canada but to me they seem very similar to how people describe a Sennheiser 600 series headphone which I know I love. Iām okay with the risk. Iāve dealt with it this long lol.
I see a p3esr and a Stirling ls3/5a V2 on CAM. Also a Rogers but not the gold tag. Iāll keep an eye out for sure.
Yeah keep an eye out for pretty much all of em lol
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this doesnāt have to be a rabbit hole, this doesnāt have to be a rabbit hole, this doesnāt have to be a rabbit hole
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There seems to be a LS3/5A inspired speaker from warfdale on sale on Amazon right now https://www.amazon.ca/Wharfedale-Denton-85th-Anniversary-Walnut/dp/B011TZFQOY/ref=sr_1_2?dchild=1&keywords=wharfedale+denton+85th&qid=1600628899&sr=8-2
Itās ported!? Blasphemy!!
J/k. Appreciate it. Thereās a few decent options on CAM Iām inquiring about atm.
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