I'd been looking for a good pair of small monitor speakers for six years now, without much success (the latest reject being the B&W Nautilis 805's). Based on the highly favorable review in a recent issue of The Absolute Sound, I tried out the Spendor S3/5's (the replacement for the time-honored but aged LS3/5A's) and found that, somewhat to my surprise (based on generally unpromising past experience with reviewers' recommendations), that in this case the reviewer's judgement was absolutely sound. This is a wonderful sounding speaker, with a warm, palpable midrange, smooth but crystal clear highs, a tight detailed bass, and a wide soundstage. Tonally, the speaker seems amazingly accurate. While it has bass limitations that might be expected given its size, it has no intrinsic objectionable characteristics that I can discern, which sets it apart from almost all of the other speakers I have auditioned over the years, regardless of price. Congratulations to the Spendor engineers - they have a winner with this one! Quite reasonably priced too. (Note: replacing the stock jumper between the treble and bass speaker jacks with a short length of high quality cable further enhances the sound).

transparent, open, musical, articulate, highly resolve, and bewithchingly addictive

none so far, but limited base extension due to its diminutive size

Out of the box, the Spendor S 3/5 will immediately tell you about their utmost level of musicality and accuracy. Play anything. It will simply captivate you to the music. These are the first most natural sounding speakers I've heard in my life. Honest to goodness, you won't go wrong with these beautiful speakers. They look gorgeously clad in real wood, but it's the sound that what makes them so captivating and worth listening to. A real rare treat to music lovers.

Acoustical instruments are rendered naturally, and accurately so by these Spendors. If you love chamber music, vocals, overly concern and listen intently for natural timbres of acoustical instruments, these are the speakers that will keep you listening for hours on end, without tiring. If you sonic "realness" and accuracy of musical instrument in the highest order, these are one of the musically involving and believable speakers to listen to, that's closest to or "real" vis-a-vis live music!

Similar Products Used:

Tangent, Paradigm Atoms, Phase Technology in size but not in sound.

The Spendor S3/5 is indeed a bit pricey for a subcompact minimonitor, but the sheer musical satisfaction you will derive from these speakers more than justifies their cost.

Like all Spendor speakers, the S3/5 has a warm, accurate, beautiful midrange. It is too small to fill a large room, and too small to provide deep bass. Thus, the S3/5 will not be suitable for everyone's needs. But when used in a small room with a sympathetic amplifier, the presence and musicality of these little boxes is extraordinary. For the reproduction of vocalists and chamber ensembles, they approach the uncanny in their realism and tonal accuracy.

One word of warning: the S3/5s, with a sensitivity of 84 dB, are quite power-hungry. I'd recommend giving 'em a good 80 watts or so. The guy below who panned these speakers compared them to the Totem Rokk and ProAc 1se, both speakers with ratings of 87 or 88 dB (the ProAc also costs $2100, as compared to $895 for the Spendor). Played on the same amplifier, the Spendors would need twice as much gain as the Totems or ProAcs. His description of the Spendors as "veiled, with restricted dynamics, lacking life," suggests to me that he might not have been giving them enough power.

I'll knock one star off the value rating because $895 will clearly buy you some speakers with greater versatility and range. But used for the purpose for which they were designed -- as nearfield minimonitors -- the S3/5s are as good as it gets.

Timbrel accuracy, sweet tone, non-fatiging

My sound references for choosing speakers are of live acoustic music-orchestra, chamber (mostly string quartets), solo instruments (classical), and guitar and vocals (traditional folk mostly, but also songs in the spirit of Victor Herbert, Sigmond Romberg, and Oscar Hammerstein). So, when I was auditioning speakers, I was looking for timbrel accuracy. And I found it in the Spendor S3/5! When listening, you can close your eyes and believe the violinist or vocalist is in the room with you. They sound that good!

I auditioned just about every speaker in the $300-800 range I could hear (B&W, Paradigm, NHT, Tannoy, etc.). Some were "good for the money", but I wanted GOOD speakers. I auditioned a few more expensive speakers (in the $1000-1200 range)-Totom, B&W, and some others. Actually, I didn't like the more expensive speakers. I also listened to Vandersteens side by side the Spendors and they were worth considering, but I liked the Spendors better--not quite so bright. I heard and bought the Spendors before The Absolute Sound's wonderful review came out, so I wasn't swayed by that.

Music I used to audition speakers were Golden Days, Jerry Hadley (tenor); An Old Song Resung, Thomas Hampson (bass); Songs that Got Away, Sarah Brightman (soprano); In the Falling Dark, Dave Mallet (folk singer with guitar and piano); Dvorsak's New World Symphony; Bruch's Scottish Symphony; Pagannini quartets and quintets; and other classical pieces, including violin and piano. I listen at a low to medium volume. With the S3/5s, all music sounded wonderfully REAL and not bright, which was a problem with many of the speakers, especially with Sarah Brightman and the piano pieces! Dave Mallet has a song with an overdone drum track that I used to test the "boominess" of speakers. The Spendors passed (the NHTs did ok) and sounded great.

At home, I tested the speakers with an audiophile friend. We put on a test organ piece to test the clarity and lowness the speakers could handle. He's listened to dozens of speakers and said that most speakers failed this test piece; not the Spendors--the music was clear, not muddied. Another piece had a triangle part--crystal clear!!! They were amazingly good. We didn't notice any "loud" or "quiet" spots in our frequency tests--volume was fairly consistent. The birds on the test CD were flying all around the room and sounded REAL. I listened to pieces I was very familiar with and heard music from the Spendors I had never heard before. These speakers were not a little better than the other speakers I heard (at any price), but MUCH better.

In short, these are FANTASTIC speakers. The sound is real and accurate and non-fatiguing. You will forget you are listening to speakers and will be enveloped in the MUSIC. Unless you want to FEEL the "thump, thump, thump" of a bass drum and electric guitar or listen to a lot of music that goes very very low, I cannot find any deficiencies in these speakers.

I have mid-fi equipment-Technics receiver, Sony CD player. They are single wired; haven't tried bi-wiring them yet.