Can you tell me why I didn't like the Reference 3a MM's?

You know jbrrp, between you and almarg, I think you have both nailed it.  Lower sensitivity and speaker placement.  Makes sense.

geof3, I would love to put my speakers in a better position.  But if I do I will always be unhappy with where they are.  

So I am taking some advice and seeing if Omega and possibly Fritz can come up with a solution to my speaker placement.  See what they say.  Thanks all!

I use my de Capos with a 4 watt Decware Mini Torii in a 12 x 22 with the speakers at the back of the 22ft

plenty loud not concert loud but good full rich sound detailed life like sound with voices

I am getting excellent results driving my Bache Audio Tribeca speakers with both my Pass XA25 and my First Watt SIT-3. Very smooth midrange with detail and no fatigue, huge soundstage, and tight bass. 

Here is the conundrum. Many of us (myself included) believe that source and electronics and cabling are more important than choice of loudspeakers.

While Eric builds speakers, I manufacturer DAC, Phono, Preamp and Power Amps.  I do agree with the statement above to some degree.  I use an old pair of AR 510 model speakers.  The source to me has an impact on the tone, dimension of sound stage, clarity, etc.  The AR speakers are and old box design that are typical old speakers, nice mids, more of a muddy sounding booming bass and the tweeter in them is really a piece of crap with the typical box sound.  Inserting the new hybrid amp we built changed the sound of the speakers completely.  The sound was way out of the box.  I never heard that change before so that steers em down one path of thinking.  But then hearing the Vandersteen model Seven speakers makes me realize how much better those speakers are compared to my Vandersteen 5As.  Much more relaxed sounding, better clarity, better spacing of instruments and vocals, dimension, etc.  But the amp is a lot less that $68K speakers.

Foe monitor speakers I recently heard the Vandersteen monitors with the new sub and they sounded excellent compared to the ProAc monitors.

Happy Listening.

   

mapman and I were at the same show.  Call Fritz up and ask about minimum recommended wattage.  Printed specs tell only a fraction of the whole story.  For years I drove ProAc Response 2.5's with a 14watt Cary 300b, and those speakers were never listed in the usual places as SET-friendly, but they definitely were.