Paradigm Monitor 5 for rears? (1 Viewer)

[Gary TP]

Are Paradigm Monitor 5's too much for rear speakers? Or should I just get the 3's/mini's

The difference in price is maybe 75 bucks...

Is it worth it?

 

[John Garcia]

I was going to mention in your other post about no sub, that I thought 5s are a bit of overkill for surrounds. Minis can handle surround duty just fine. 3s will give you more bass, but I have always felt they were a bit "sloppy". I have not had a chance to spend any time with the v3 3s, though. That is not to say the the 5s are a bad choice as surrounds, they just may be more than is really needed. That determination is up to you.

The 5s have marginally better bass, though the extension is not much lower. The 5s have cleaner lower midrange, which is why I am using them as mains.

Unless you are getting a great deal on the 5s, the Minis are $200 difference (MSRP).

 

[Gary TP]

The thing is...if the sub (that I get eventually) takes care of 100mhz and below - will the mini's, 3's, 5's sound much different in multi-channel & HT application?

 

[Marty M]

I have mini's for surround and am very pleased with their sound.

 

[Alan Pummill]

I have the Monitor 3's for my rear speakers. They have always done their job well, but I have often thought that the mini's would have been enough.

 

[John Garcia]

The thing is...if the sub (that I get eventually) takes care of 100mhz and below - will the mini's, 3's, 5's sound much different in multi-channel & HT application?

If you mean your system has a 100Hz x-over, then yes, they have sufficient low end to be crossed over at 100Hz. I used to have Minis as surrounds, but found that Titans did well enough as surrounds, and I moved the Minis to another system as mains for mostly music.

As surrounds, each of them will sound only marginally different, as their low end extension is not that different. If you will listen to a lot of multichannel music, you might want to opt for the 5s, if not, the Minis should do just fine. Of minor note, the 3s are +1dB more efficient than the Minis, and the 5s are +2dB, which means slightly better SPL for your amplification. I can verify this, as I had to adjust both my mains exactly -2db when switching from Minis to 5s up front. 2dB doesn't seem like a lot, but consider that a 3dB difference equates to roughly doubling your power.

 

[Gary TP]

Well if the 5s won't perform much better than the mini's as surrounds....the thing is- I may not have a sub for a while so I might need the five's to handle it.

I don't want to not utilize my 11's for all they provide as mains if all the speakers are on and I am killing the 5s....

In other words, since the 11s are a lot of speaker as mains, I am concerned about damaging the surrounds if I play the 11s and the surrounds with enough oomph to utilize the 11s.....

 

[John Garcia]

You won't be killing the 5s or the Minis as surrounds. I would recommend setting both of them to small, so they will NOT have a problem at all. That bass will be redirected to the mains with the surrounds set to small.
I listen to my 5s set to large (source direct) for music sometimes, and occasionally I will watch movies at night with them large and the sub off. They have no problem handling bass, they just don't go that low. Both the Minis and the 5s have a surprising amount of bass, though not nearly rumbling .

 

[Gary TP]

So which would you recommend overall?

 

[John Garcia]

Since we are talking about surrounds, I'd recommend the Minis.

 

[Gary TP]

I am starting to agree with you that more than mini's for surround won't mean much....

If I set the surrounds to small, they won't take much advantage of the extra bass of the 5s much anyway right??

The main concern I have is maxing out my 3802 to +10 and the mini's keeping up with the Monitor 11s up front....
if I set them to small, the mini's shouldn't distort at all and keep up rather nicely-correct?

 

[John Garcia]

After proper level calibration with an SPL meter and setting them to small, the Minis should have no problem keeping up.