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Spendor S3/5R sound compared with S3/5R2 and HLP-3ESR

MikeMA said:
I'd be interested to hear a pair of S3/5Rs and S3/5R2s alongside my Rogers LS3/5As and Harbeth HLP3ESRs. Ive a feeling the Spendors are underrated.

I recently picked up z pair of Harbeth HLP3ES2s in perfect condition for £300. They are very good and I can barely tell them apart from the ESRs. Another sleeper?
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Yup, I think so.

I lived with P3ESRs for ages so I'm very familiar with their sound. I now have a pair of P3ES2s and I think they're at least as good (if anything I prefer them).

You did extremely well to snag a pair for £300. If I ever sell mine there's no way I'd let them go for that kind of money.
 
My S3/5R2s arrived and for a bit of fun I compared them with my HLP3ESRs since my S3/5Rs are at a different location. Turned out to be a very interesting and in some ways surprising experience. Here’s the room I tried them in-

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I placed them about 14ft from my listening position and tried them with a Devialet D200. Both did what I expected for such small monitors with limited loudness, power handling and dynamic headroom. They threw a big soundstage with good imaging but both sounded congested at higher levels. Having said that, these are very different speakers!
The Harbeths are bigger, heavier and better built and that showed in the sound-I could have pulled that old trick and asked someone which speaker they thought the sound was coming from and someone with no interest in hifi would have pointed at the Discoveries. The Harbeths definitely demonstrate the LS3/5a hump to my ears and they have an appealing HF on top of that, so an immediately attractive voicing. Switching to the Spendors, my immediate thought was that the Harbeths would slaughter them in an AB dem at a dealers and most people would take the Harbeths home with them. They are a more complete speaker and fool you into thinking theyre bigger than they are.
Pulled to a more near field position, about 7ft away ( as in the photo) and both performed better. The Spendors sounded anaemic straight after the Harbeths- they wouldn’t fool any one about their size- grand piano wasn’t grand in size, since most of the lower register was missing apart from the upper harmonics. They did throw a good sized sound stage, disappearing themselves and providing pin point imaging.

When I’d got acclimatised to their voicing, what struck me about them was their sheer insight and it didn’t come from jacked up HF/ leading edge emphasis- they are very revealing about layers in a mix, positioning and inflections in voice, instruments. They sound incredibly natural. As someone said up thread, your attention is drawn to voices and individual instruments- in the same way they would for me at a live performance.
Van Morrison sounded great- I heard inflections in his voice I hadn’t noticed before, same with a guitar solo on Santa Fe- strings bent over frets, picking style etc. Moondance was very natural and enjoyable. If anything the Spendors delivered this with greater purity and naturalness than the Harbeths, there was no artifice- timbre and harmonics were preserved, so I think this is a low distortion, clean speaker but still sweet sounding.

In a big room they’d be dynamite with a good sub. Next stop is the smaller room they’re intended for, even more near field and wall reinforced where I can try them against the 3/5Rs. They had the same effect on me as Hl-K6SEs when I heard them- that they are a beautiful example of real world speaker engineering.

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Had the Spendors a couple of days now, but they're too small for my listening room. I can appreciate their qualities, especially with vocals, and excellent control of higher freqs, but to me they're not much use, was gonna put them in the bedroom, but can't be bothered getting another amp/source set up for that.
 
Here’s one from the past- small KEF sealed box, the C25 which I bought for a bedroom system in 1991(!) then used briefly against wall as home theatre rears-

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Not as big as the pic makes them look - slightly taller and wider but shallower than the Harbeths and easier to drive. Hung a nice big image in space, timed well and appealing voicing but just lacked the refinement of the Harbeths and Spendors - alas, no undiscovered giant killer moment. They made baroque violins sound like they were steel strung and didn’t separate instruments out with pin point accuaracy like the S3/5R2s, however baroque trumpet sounded great - maybe the KEFs were ‘singing along’. I’ve no doubt if the bloody awful NP electrolytics in the crossover were replaced with polypropylenes they’d improve dramatically in refinement. From memory, these work against a wall like their bigger brothers the C45s. Nevertheless an enjoyable listen- Aladdin Sane and Elton John’s Somebody Saved My Life Tonight were great. The more I listened and forgot about the other two, the more I enjoyed them.
 
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Dec, that's really interesting, thanks. I have to say, given my situation, room size etc, your comments have rather put me off going out of the way to try the Spendors! I was surprised to see how much smaller they are compared with the Harbeths. I'd assumed they were about the same size.
 
MikeMA said:
Dec, that's really interesting, thanks. I have to say, given my situation, room size etc, your comments have rather put me off going out of the way to try the Spendors! I was surprised to see how much smaller they are compared with the Harbeths. I'd assumed they were about the same size.
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I didn’t want to damn the Spendors- they do things the Harbeths can’t:they are better resolved and lacking in artifice, but they have a smaller placement footprint ie near field, smaller room unless you are going to reinforce them in the LF.
The room I have the original S3/5Rs in makes them ideal for me.
 
TheDecameron said:
I didn’t want to damn the Spendors- they do things the Harbeths can’t:they are better resolved and lacking in artifice, but they have a smaller placement footprint ie near field, smaller room unless you are going to reinforce them in the LF.
The room I have the original S3/5Rs in makes them ideal for me.
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No, I wasn't suggesting you were damning the Spendors, it's just that I've a feeling I might find them a bit underwhelming in my largish listening room and, in truth, I'm looking for excuses not to buy any more small monitors. Having said that, I can see that without the bass 'hump' they might work very well with a decent sub. So...
 
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Got the S3/5Rs and the R2s in the same room. Early comparison points to R2s having the edge...but..I think they are a whisker more efficient because they sounded louder on first swap over. This’ll take some time till I get used to them in this room.
 
Probably the most useful comparison I've read on this subject. I think the comment you made further up the thread about Spendors not wowing in head to head demo is true, their strengths are revealed through extended use. Partly the reason I wanted to hear them, thought it unfair the general impression you get on forums they weren't detailed. Also liked the fact they were keenly priced. There were opinions I read elsewhere saying not as detailed as Harbeths etc basically damning them with faint praise.

Having heard small jazz groups and violin duos up close I can say with some confidence the live sound isn't in your face, its gentle and smooth and not ear splitting loud IMO. You cant hear fingers strumming across strings, or close mic'd lips blowing flutes. It was all to me how the small Spendor speakers sounded together with my old Quad transistor amps.
 
It’s remarkable when you consider the 3/5 is not their ‘statement’ mini- that was the SA1 and D1 more recently, priced accordingly. The S3/5R(2) demonstrates what I’d also attributed to Mr.Shaw’s designs- the art of working a bit of magic with simple ingredients, well thought out and executed.
 
I've owned SA1s too. They were quite beguiling in some ways - super holographic imaging, and great clarity for example. But they had almost no bass worth speaking of. Not in my room, anyway.
 
Some comparative pics of the S3/5R and S3/5R2 respectively-

Crossover board on the R. Bolt through terminals
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R2, double deck plastic tray with recessed terminals-
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Woofer R. Basket is plastic material-
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Woofer R2. Basket is alloy and the unit felt much heavier in the hand than that of the R. The extra weight was coming from a bigger magnet. Which probably partly explains the greater sensitivity of the R2. I had to take the preamp back by 2dB to match volume with the R.

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Both speakers do sound different, best described by others up thread. They are far closer to each other than either one is to the HLP3-ESR though. The R2 might be more technically correct with better controlled bass but the R is lovely sounding. There was no evidence of cost cutting on the R2- it looked like an enhancement in terms of components.

Finally, here’s the crossover board from the Harbeth. It takes up almost all the back wall-
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I counted a dozen caps in there- far greater complexity than the Spendor and a materially higher spec’d product than the Spendor- of course reflected in the significantly higher price.
If you’re after a mini, I don’t think you’d be dissappointed with any one of the three.
 
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Interesting pics. You've been busy with your screwdrivers! I've had a look look inside some of my old speakers over the years, but not had the courage to dismantle any of the Harbeths yet.
 
TheDecameron said:
To check out my theory that the tiny Spendors might work well with a sub, I’ve bought a BK XXLS400 to try them with. It’s a closed box design, so should integrate nicely with them. Will report back when I’ve set it up.
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Be very interested to hear how you get on, hopefully be buying an ‘XLS 200 soon, to go with my S3/5r2’s, will look out for your thoughts, cheers.
 
PhilofCas said:
Be very interested to hear how you get on, hopefully be buying an ‘XLS 200 soon, to go with my S3/5r2’s, will look out for your thoughts, cheers.
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Picking the sub up from the courier’s depot on Wednesday. I’m clueless about setting them up- particularly continuous phase adjustment.
 
PhilofCas said:
Cheers, be interested to compare our experiences, mine will be here within a week or 2, what size is your room out of interest? mine's about 13 x 12.
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Going to try in two rooms- don’t have dimensions to hand but one has a high ceiling and maybe 12’x16’. Too small for big speakers but the s3/5Rs work well about 6’ away. The other place is a. Bigger kitchen/sitting area with stone wall/ lots of glass and a tiled floor where we watch TV and films. That has wall mounted s3/5R2s about 12’ from the listening position and will be the first try-out.
 
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