Any Paradigm Persona 3f and GoldenEar Reference comparisons?

I have owned Paradigm speakers before but not the Persona 3F Unless they changed their house sound, I always found them to be very bright with too much detail. They were certainly not for me. I do own the Triton References, and they are a perfectly blended speaker with staggering bass, pinpoint imaging, very deep and wide sound stage and smooth mids and highs. They are the kind of speakers you can listen to all day long without fatigue.  The Triton Reference speakers are 93.5 db efficient and the woofers are powered by a 1800 watt amp.  The rest of the speaker is a pretty easy load but you should have an amp that does well into 4 ohms.  They are quite easy to place within the room as the level control for the woofer gives you plenty of leeway to make sure you don't get a thin sound or excessive bloat.

I haven't heard the reference, but did demo the Triton Ones.  Other than the extremely powerful bass output I wasn't very impressed - harsh treble and recessed midrange, it was all overly aggressive highs and bass.   The Paradigm Prestige 95Fs I demoed at the same store were heads and tails better in every way except for bass, and that's easy to fix with a sub.  

The Persona series just takes it up another level.  I've only heard the Persona Bs, but wow, they're absolutely amazing, best speakers I've ever heard hands down - detailed and open with absolutely no harshness, a wide and deep sound stage, and never showed any strain.  

The Personas are in a completely different league and are well underpriced.  Not a fair comparison.

the 3f is super detailed, but I felt would get bright listening at louder volumes.  The 3f in my opinion needs a subwoofer for sure.  It's the more accurate speaker in terms of detail, air etc.

The reference is what it is.  It lacks a little detail, but can pound all day, will work with less expensive electronics really well (even a receiver) as it's not going to ever be too bright and doesn't needs gobs of power as the subs are powered.  

I would want a very detailed DAC and something like a very nice class A amp to drive the top of the reference if I owned them.  

When I compared the DynAudio Contour 60's to the reference, I prefered the Dyn's  - plenty of bass also, but tighter and more defined.  More detail on the top end, but not bright.  

That said, the reference is a rare speaker you could do Home Theater with and probably be just fine without subs.

The 3f lacks low end oomph for sure.  Two very, very different speakers.

It sounds like you heard a very poorly set up pair of 3F's.

That's one disadvantage of them -- they are not a set it and forget it speaker.   You have to be able to really place them in the room properly which takes time -- and obviously you can't have a horrible acoustic environment.

It's also one advantage of the Triton Reference.  Much more user friendly speaker, but there is no question the Persona is leagues ahead in every aspect except bass extension only.  The persona bass QUALITY is considerably better however.