Amps for Paradigm Persona 3f

Gnason & jafant- thanks for the Anthem 225 recommendation. It would free up a good portion of my budget for power conditioning and cable upgrades.

Returntomusic: PLEASE spend that money on a better amp. First off, the 225 is discontinued. The new Anthem STR integrated is what you should be looking at (around double the price) as it is leaps and bounds better than the 225.

Also, some of the 225s had an issue where the volume would continue to ramp up rapidly after just tapping “volume up” on the remote once. Nothing scarier than having the run across your room to grab the volume knob to keep it from ramping up past what the speakers can handle and into distortion only to realize that doesn’t work, the power button doesn’t work, and you actually have to UNPLUG the unit to get it to stop. This happened on many units. Not worth the risk.

Either way, spend the extra money on a better amp (or a sub or pair of subs) rather than cables. You obviously believe in cables, and I know many people on here (especially the retailers and disguised industry folk) will disagree. A basic understanding of the way the human brain psychology works will make you realize you don’t need to waste money on them.

Regarding the I225, for your guidance, Anthem has a firmware update for what they call "Volumn Ramping". They can email any I225 owners a PDF file and it is easily updated through a Windows PC program.

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returntomusic
i may be blessed with either great ears, a high level of auditory discernment or just confirmation-bias/delusion. Regardless, nothing I have heard bests my LTA ZOTL40 amp. They can be purchased 'used' but you want the MKII ...and you can upgrade them to the newer spec tubes and capacitors. Without transformers in the design they are pure magic.

Anyhow ...i had about 90 minutes with the 3F’s and then similar time with the 5F’s. They were so different (the 5F’s being so much more ’open’ and revealing). I was surprised to learn that the two models share the exact same tweeter and mid (both fully enclosed BTW) and the only difference was the different woofer crossover freq /design/cabinet volume.
Similarly the stunning 9H has the exact same tweeter/mid configuration as the 3F/5F but sounds so much better still due to the improved woofer resolution below 500 hz. And I mean much so much better that having heard the 9H, i am now just saving my pennies to purchase a pair this spring. I’m 58 and this is an end-game setup for me.

If cost is your limitation - there is a great deal on a Persona-B bookshelf on ’canuckaudiomart’. With the cheap CDN$ you can probably drive to Toronto and acquire 90% of the 3F for a great deal.

Anyone has tried the Personas with Ayre Amps?