New Member Checking In
- Thread starter stringer
- Start date
Help Support MartinLogan Audio Owners Forum:
Lightloopy
Well-known member
Wonderful speaker...give them lots of quality juice to make them sing! Had them 20 yrs till the 11's came along. Buddy enjoying them now...and they sound great
Russr
Well-known member
Hi! Fellow SL-3 user here, tho' they're currently mothballed as my life settles down a bit.
What amp(s) are you running them with?
What amp(s) are you running them with?
I am the second owner. I inherited then from a friend who passed. Originally he had an Arcam integrated amp. I don't remember the model number. It went kaput in 2016 or so. Then I made a huge mistake and bought an Anthem MRX520. It was ok when I was living in a small apartment and I didn't really know any better at first. But the AV receiver wasn't the right choice. My partner and I do use the speakers as our primary home theater audio. But I had both the esl's and woofers running off the LR channels. Which was fine for music but required lots of fiddling to make movies and tv sound good (especially dialog) with the lost center channel data. And we have since moved into a single family house with a huge open floor plan living room. The AV receiver was just no longer powerful to suit our needs.
So I did a lot of research and made some notes. And when the Anthem stopped powering up one day I went straight to the local hifi store and told them what I wanted:
2 channel integrated amp with 2 pairs of speaker posts so I can run the ESLs off one and the woofers off the other. At least 100 watts per channel and enough power to be able to push some current to drive the panels in high frequency ranges with very low impedance and a lot of volume, which is something the Anthem could never really do. (In fact I was sure for awhile after lurking here that my panels were kaput due to the muted high notes.)
The sales guy recommended a Rotel RA1572 MkII in black. Told me before I replaced the panels, see how they respond to an adequate powered amp. He was right. I'm super happy with it. Much better for our music and home theater needs. I've also bought a cheap turntable (U-Turn Orbit) and a matching vintage Rotel AM/FM receiver. Been having a blast hitting the local used record stores. And now I never have to mess with any of the tone settings. And at 28 years old the panels have never sounded better.
Russr
Well-known member
Small world...
Prior to mothballing my system (Anthem AVM Pre/Pro, Bryston 4B ST/9B ST and the SL3's), I had replaced the Anthem Pre-Pro with an MRX 500. My center was a Cinema, rears Aerius i's and an Earthquake Supernova 12 on LFE. The MRX500 did OK... the listening area is a combo living room, open to the kitchen on one end and staircase on the other. All this coincided withe the arrival of my kid, 8 years ago (jeez... so much for "temporary reconfiguration!), so I never really got to push the 500 in HT listening much. It seemed to do the job OK, and on the occasion when I was alone at home and wanted to rock out to my 80's collecction, it seemed to handle the SL3 quite authoritatively. Funnily enough, the MRX 500 had a powering up-related issue quite early on (right after warranty expired)... sent it in, got it turned around really quickly, and it's been functioning just fine since then. Currently my bedroom receiver, driving KEF RDM-based system.
Prior to mothballing my system (Anthem AVM Pre/Pro, Bryston 4B ST/9B ST and the SL3's), I had replaced the Anthem Pre-Pro with an MRX 500. My center was a Cinema, rears Aerius i's and an Earthquake Supernova 12 on LFE. The MRX500 did OK... the listening area is a combo living room, open to the kitchen on one end and staircase on the other. All this coincided withe the arrival of my kid, 8 years ago (jeez... so much for "temporary reconfiguration!), so I never really got to push the 500 in HT listening much. It seemed to do the job OK, and on the occasion when I was alone at home and wanted to rock out to my 80's collecction, it seemed to handle the SL3 quite authoritatively. Funnily enough, the MRX 500 had a powering up-related issue quite early on (right after warranty expired)... sent it in, got it turned around really quickly, and it's been functioning just fine since then. Currently my bedroom receiver, driving KEF RDM-based system.
