100W, 200W, or 300W?

Sensitivity Can be way over rated. I have 86 dB Vandersteen’s being driven by 40 watts of class a power. They will play loud enough to to shake the neighbors walls. Bottom line is watts per channel can become the main focus but you also have to consider the other aspects of the amp. If I had listened to all the threads I read on my amp and that it needed minimum 92 sensitivity I would have never bought the vandy’s. Everyone that has heard my system is more than satisfied if not impressed. I am very happy I rolled the dice and just went with my gut.

hi they recommend 50-120 watt amp@8 ohms that means thy don't have a power rating sensitivity 88Db @ 2' not 8' 8' will be about 82 Db if it had a power rating say 100 watts@ 8 ohms then your power amp should be 3Db higher will 200 watts @8 ohms remember the 805d-3 are good to 96Db spl and thd will be high

Thanks all:

In general it sounds like there is no significant danger by going big (just don’t crank the dial) - I’m more concerned with having enough headroom. Given the size of my room and the sitting distance, I have a feeling that I’ll blow my ear drums out or have the police visit before I blow the speakers.

@chilli42 Based on what I’m seeing Pass looks to be a bit more than I’d like to be spending right now!

@fbgbill thanks! I’ll likely take you up on that PM offer later on as I gather more info!

@twoleftears No one is pushing me in that direction, but it’s the combination of aesthetics and quality - I do understand that I can do better for the dollars but there’s always a trade to be done. The B&Ws fall in the same boat - can do better for the dollars - but they’re still really nice speakers and I really really like the way they look. Don’t want all looks and no bite, likewise, not after all bite and no looks - aiming for a sweet spot in the trade-offs! :)

@almarg that’s assuming you crank the dial, then you’ll likely blow the thing. I’m more interested in head room. Even if we assume that the speaker will blow after 120W, I’m concerned the 5300 will start to sound bad way before that because it’s pushed to the max. To use a car analogy, I’d rather be in a car with a 120 MPH top speed going 60 MPH than a car that’s rated for 60 MPH going 60 MPH... did it in high school, you’d think the thing was going to fall apart on the highway!

@avanti1960 yeah, I’m leaning towards the 7200/302 for those reasons. There is a case to be made for the 302 in that I can play around with different pre-amps afterwards to upgrade without having to change out everything. In the immediate term, I don’t even need a pre-amp... I can pipe my streamer directly into the amp.

@auxinput curious, what amps were those? What are you using now with your 805D3s?

@ditusa Yeah, that makes sense - with more distance, you’re going to need more DB. What would you recommend as a power range given the 805D3 specs? I’m currently giving it 100 wpc using a nothing-special amp (the Harman) and while it sounds really good, it feels like the speakers can be sounding much better. Don’t know how to verbalize it, but it feels like there is more to be had out of these speakers.

sgreg is correct, speaker sensitivity is not the most important spec when it comes to judging an amplifier and its power output. Also provided you dont clip your amps (especially if they are S.S.) you can never have too much power. In my experience, higher powered amps either S.S. or tube, sometimes dont sound as good as their lower powered brethren. 

Power specification is very vague.  Average music power delivered to speakers (dissipated heat) is very low, unless one listens to sinewaves (then it is 50%).  When music sounds about half as loud as the music peak it is 10% of the peak power, not to mention gaps in music or soft parts.  I would speculate it is only a few percent of the peak power - more for heavy orchestral pieces and less for Jazz trio.   Perhaps 100W amp can deliver as much of the peak power as 200W amp, but is specified at 100W only because of the, for instance,  smaller heatsinks.   Both might sound the same with some types of music, like mentioned Jazz trio.  According to FTC power should be measured as sinewave RMS voltage at specified frequency range and rated THD, over specified impedance for period of 5 minutes, when amplifier was preheated at 1/8 of rated power with 1kHz signal for one hour.  It would imply that amplifier rated 200W has to supply this power for only 5 minutes and after that can overheat.  Does it make a sense to test an amp at full power at 20kHz? This will never happen in real life.
I don't often see power specified as FTC power, so power specification can be very flexible (often much worse).  I found in the specification of Icepower module continuous power (40W) and FTC rated power for 0-3kHz (150W).
So we have continuous, FTC and momentary powers and anything in-between.   Perhaps for linear power supply amps weight can be a better specification than power? 

As for the listening distance - Benchmark claims that in average room distance doesn't play role.  6dB loss for double distance applies to open space only.  

Rule 13: In a home environment, the SPL at the listening position is about the same as the 1m response of the speaker in an anechoic chamber.

If a speaker has a measured output of 90 dB SPL at 1 meter when fed with one watt, you can expect about 90 dB SPL at your listening position when driving your speaker with one watt. Room reflections supplement the output of the speakers and compensate for the fact that you are more than 1 meter from your speakers. If you are outdoors, this rule does not apply. But, in a typical home listening room, the rule works reasonably well for a quick approximation.