[ljunk]

Hi all,

My name is Kim and I'm a new member. I'm seriously looking to buy a used pair of M3 Sapphires. I have a fairly large living area that's over 700 sq ft. Our sofa is about 16 feet back. I've heard that the X5s are better suited for large rooms. Anyone have experience with M3s in large rooms? Am I better off getting the Xs? The Ms are more in my price range.

[jpm]

I have X3's in a room that's approximately 450 sf, listening position about 14' from the speakers, and they don't even break a sweat at high SPLs. Though I don't have experience of other Spatial speakers in my room it's hard to imagine any of them having any trouble filling a room the size of yours. If you have concerns about bass quantity and want to be able to dial it in to match your setting then you'll want to look for X3s or X5s.

[jnschneyer]

Hi all,

My name is Kim and I'm a new member. I'm seriously looking to buy a used pair of M3 Sapphires. I have a fairly large living area that's over 700 sq ft. Our sofa is about 16 feet back. I've heard that the X5s are better suited for large rooms. Anyone have experience with M3s in large rooms? Am I better off getting the Xs? The Ms are more in my price range.

In the great hifi forum tradition of not quite answering what you asked, I have a pair of X5s powered by a 33wpc Don Sachs Valhalla tube amp amp in a room of 450 sq ft and 4,050 cu ft and they far more than fill the room. I sit about 10 feet from the speakers and never listen to them at max volume - not because I don’t occasionally like to crank my music, but because playing anything at top volume is too much for the room and my ears - and, when I turn the bass on the plate amp too high, it vastly overloads the room. It’s hard for me to imagine the X5s getting lost in a room even the size of yours, but, if you wanted to be certain, the X3s I’m sure would more than do the job. Regarding the M3’s capacity to fill such a space, I only heard them once in Spatial’s comparatively small room at their shop, but the bass was impressive - far more than their room could hold - so I don’t doubt they’d fill your room as well. Some of it is physics, some taste dependent. If you’re like the guy in the old Maxwell ad and need your hair blown streaming out behind you when you listen, you’ll probably be more happy with the X5. If you’re content to be comfortably immersed and still get a solid dose of visceral bass impact, I bet the M3 would suit you just fine.

[RonN5]

My room is 1200 square feet open concept and I have M3 Sapphires. They easily fill the room with great sound including bass with impact… and if you are a bassaholic… add one 15” sealed sub and now you can handle movies as well.

Another great thing about the Sapphires is they have really wide dispersion which helps in big rooms.

[Daryl Zero]

I'm in a garage/office with a half wall. I'm generally at my computer (like now) a good 10 - 12 feet away and my X5s sound great but they also sound great at a seat about 3 feet from them too.

[Mr. Big]

My Shappires M3s without even pushing too hard can fill not only my loft area which is open below to the 15 x 20 family room. and the bass sounds better down there than up there due to the long throw the woofers see, from the front wall of the loft to the back wall which in this case is the family room below.  We also sit outside on the patio off the family room and they sound great. So can they handle a larger room yes they can with no sweat and the bass will only be better than in a smaller room though due to the open baffle design, they work very well in smaller rooms. 
The X series would do just fine also, I went with the M3s due to in the loft area how close I have to sit to the speaker, Clayton felt, in that case, the M3s would be better, if I sat further back than the X series he might have suggested.