My room is 22’W X 24.3’ L. Speakers are 5.5’ off side walls, 5’ off rear wall. Seating is 10’ away. Subs sorta corner loaded, 5.5’ off corners, with bass traps.
I’m 10.5 feet away from my 20.7’s. The speakers are 6.5 feet from the front wall and 2.5 feet from the side walls. The dipoles are more immune to sidewall interaction and floor/ceiling interaction than traditional cone speakers. They also tend to go louder in perception the further you are away to a point. Bass becomes deeper as well as a general rule however this is still room dependent. Maggie’s of all sizes tend to want minimum 3 feet away from front wall, but more is better.
When I auditioned the 30.7’s, I needed to be 12.5 feet away in order for the panels to blend and for the bass response to energize the space. That was Amazing!
The 30.7 were astonishing! I was at one of the Magnepan tour demo stops. I was blown away!
I will be trading in my Maggie 3.7i for 20.7 in Sept.
Along the 20 ’ wall. Put refractive materials on the wall such as books and crap.
Peace
Bruce in Philly
If you want great sounding resistors, try Duelund…
Can I get away with 5W resistors? Magnepan supplies 10W resistors. I’m sure 12W would be ok, but is 5 pushing it?
Ok, I have pairs of 1.2 Ohm, 1.5 Ohm, 1.75 Ohm, and 2 Ohm Mills resistors on their way. All matched between 0.25% of eachother.
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Alright. I’m in my new room as depicted above.
I’ve found out that 3.7i just not not sound right with the tweeters on the outside, no matter what the room. They just don’t integrate well with the rest of the speaker. The tweeters sound shrill and separated. I stumbled upon a review that actually confirmed this, as they had the exact same observation. With the 1.7i, this wasn’t the case, as I preferred the tweeters on the outside with those.
I need some room treatment. There is carpet, but there is still a fast echo (not sure what it’s called–high pitched, quickly decaying) in the room.
The speakers already sound much better.
Could be “slap echo” or could be comb filtering. The usual Rx is to treat the first reflection points but planars don’t radiate significantly to the sides due to rear wave cancellation, so often is less effective with bipole radiators.
The solution for my electrostats was extensive diffusion treatment on the wall behind the speakers.
Hang a couple old thick blankets on the wall behind the speakers as a quick test. I would be careful not to over damp the room, a little at a time in the right spots will work magic.
I run my 3.7i wide open without any resistors at all. Not harsh in anyway. I love my 3.7i so much I am ordering the 20.7 next month. Sell my 3.7i if anyone is interested. PM me
To be clear, I just put the tweeters on the inside and everything is fine. 
I was just going to recommend that!! very cool. The 3.7 is a great speaker. Maggies are easily the most room impacted speaker I have ever owned. Get out the tape - mark the floor and continue to fiddle. Also I found the 20.7 to need break in - and I’m not a break in guy. Have fun.
Old thread, new reply, mea culpa.
Perhaps 5 years ago no one in my town had Magnepan in stock so I could listen to them. Nearest stocking dealer was 2-3 hours away in the next state. I was shopping for a pair of 1.7i speakers and I had $2,000 cash in my wallet and I intended to come home with a pair.
The sales people were nice. I had a private listening room for 2+ hours. The small maggies were powered by a wonderful Classe’ preamp and power amp, they sounded OK.
On a whim I asked to demo the 3.7i pair before I purchased the 1.7s. I cued up Laura Nyro’s “Met Him On A Sunday” (1971 Gonna Take A Miracle) intro which features very complex acappela harmonies and after far less than one minute I realized that I would forever regret purchasing the lesser maggies.
I made my apologies. I told them that I would return when I could purchase the pair of 3.7i for cash.
In a year or so I did exactly that.
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Congrats on the 3.7i.
What electronics are before the maggies?
When the Maggies were new I had a Yamaha M2 power amp and a Yamaha C4 preamp. That did not work because the C4 preamp has no remote for volume control, and the Yamaha M2 power amp did not like the 2ohm loads from the maggies.
At my age not having a remote is not an option.
I can read the Synology NAS (where 4200 CDs live) using my Oppo 105D disk player or my Panasonic UB9000 disk player however that still never gave me the detail, clarity, and imaging like the Classe’ amps did.
At the time, budget limited, I purchased a Rotel 1590 preamp which gave me remote volume control but otherwise did not improve the sound quality.
After replacing the capacitors and otherwise rebuilding the Yamaha M2 power amp I purchased a Sanders magtech amplifier for my system which has plenty of power but did not help the sound quality.
Classe’ the company has a convoluted recent history of ownership. I don’t know if I feel comfortable investing a fortune in their brand right now. I worry about warranty and parts availability, otherwise owning an expensive orphan product. They do sound great.
Last month, December 2004, for Christmas, Santa brought a Roon, add in a 8TB SSD drive, cables, a USB 2TB music drive and misc. accessories and I had $1,600 invested. People suggested that the Roon would be a big improvement. Functionally for my needs it was a downgrade. I returned it yesterday. Roon will even refund my $148 membership fee. They do have a 15% restocking fee on $550. 
The speakers, and 75”TV are placed on the long wall in front of (speakers 5.5’ from rear wall) a huge picture window. What did help a lot sonically was I now use vertical blinds and removed the window curtains.
The next step going forward is to purchase a PS Audio Directstream DAC MK2 next time I can find one selling below MSRP because I suspect that only a tube preamp will give me the tube sound I am looking for. Half measures are wearing me out and making me broke. By all reports this preamp is supposed to be “that good” and that much better than all other preamps. I pray that is true. Then if I win the power ball I intend to replace the Sanders with a pair of BHK Monoblock 300M amps.
If any audiophiles live near Pittsburgh, PA; and would like to help audition, set up, or critique my system; I’ll buy lunch, dinner or what ever. I can use another pair of younger ears and their experienced input.
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I have Mag 1.7i I bought 3 years ago new. My profile pic is my living room.
It’s 14 feet wide, carpeted. I have no acoustic treatment.
Wiggle room to move speakers is very limited, several inches in any direction.
Pre/DSP McIntosh MX121 , Amps : 3 Van Alstein MVA225 monoblocks.
The Mags are nice but they don’t thrill me. My perception is I am missing depth.
Paul’s video of Maggies , he states they are not dynamic.
I don’t think he is referring to dynamic range, so I don’t understand
what he means by dynamic.
Am thinking of splurging on the FR10 & selling the Maggies.
What difference can I expect to hear FR10 vs Mag 1.7i ?
Thanks
I can describe the differences between the LRS+ and the FR20, as I have both.
I do like both speakers. The LRS+ is great with female vocals, nice imaging, open sounding, totally over-the-top impressive for only $1000. The FR20’s are sooooooo much better, cleaner, way more open, imaging is better, more dynamic, more bass (but ridiculously clean bass), and grain free. The LRS+ does have some grain to its sound that is easily audible next to the super-clean FR20’s. While there might be less of an improvement from the 1.7i to the FR10, you can expect the differences to be along those same lines.
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