Musicaddict, my first Martin Logan Electrostats were the SL3's that I bought from Sound Advice many years ago. Following that I've had the Prodigy's, Odyssey's, Ethos, CLS2 X 2, as fronts and many other of their products when doing surround. On these forum posts I've read many opinions regarding the need for large distances from the front and side walls as well as the critical positioning of the listening "sweet spot". Within the restrictions of my listening rooms I've found from my own observation that neither of these placement rules are as critical as many argue. I keep a distance from the front wall to the panel at a bit over 3 feet and the side wall distance is pretty much dictated by the width of the room which is 18 feet. Some claim the sweet listening spot is very narrow claiming a location only 1 to 2 feet wide. The distance from one's speakers to their listening spot would dictate the width of that latitude but, in any case, it's not as microscopically narrow as many like to claim. This is only my opinion which based on a well furnished living room so even though I've been consistently happy with my various ESL based setups, I appreciate others' experiences and knowledge on the subject.