OK thought I'd give an update on how the Momentum 3Is are shaping up. They duly arrived on Thursday at 17:15 (I was going spare by then thinking they wouldn't arrive and that I'd have to wait until the weekend and then be running around to couriers depots at the @rse end of no-where), but on reflection it was no bad thing because if they had arrived before that I think my concentration on work might have slipped somewhat!
I have to say that I was very impressed by the chaps at Neat - from the word go I was speaking to the 2 main guys and they were very informative and always called when they said they would and even gave me a courtesy call on Thu to update me on what was delaying the courier. They asked me what kit I was using and gave me some clues as to running in time (200 hours +!) and advice on how much to fill my speaker stands for best results. So a great service all in all.
When I first unpacked them I gave them a close inspection - I've basically got 1/3 off the full price because they are cosmetically imperfect - and I was delighted to find that the supposed cosmetic imperfection is so minor that even now I'm not sure whether i've really found it or if there has been some kind of mistake! Fantastic - not that it would count for much if they didn't sound the business.
So on day 1 hooked up to the SuperNait with my MacBook Pro plugged in via SPDIF and playing a range of stuff stored as Apple Lossless or AIFF files and immediately they are better than my PMCs - brighter balance, more detail, better clarity and sounding much more 3 dimensional. However my worst fears about the bass being excessive for my room look like they are coming true - the bass, whilst amazingly deep, sounds very thuddy and oppressive and somewhat disconnected from the rest of the frequency range....So I repositioned them slightly just moving them away from the sides and rear by about 3cm (they are now about as far out into the room as I can reasonably get them) and it's time to let them run in...
About 50 hours of running in later and things have changed quite a lot. The mid-range has really come out and now voices have an lovely pure tactility and the amount of detail on offer has also grown - I'm hearing new things on practically every track I play - but best of all the bass has stayed deep and powerful but is now much smoother and is integrating perfectly into the mid-range. The dynamics and the imaging are also improved (from an already better starting point). The ability of these speakers in conjunction with my amp to just render every sound with crystal clarity and rock solid consistency no matter how busy the soundstage gets and no matter how loud certain instruments are being played in the mix is just beautiful - Really sounding great now....Can't wait to hear what they sound like after 200 hours, but I'm beginning to think the gamble paid off big time!
Edit - actually in the interests of being balanced I should just say that on some tracks the overall character does still seem to be defined very much by the bass which can seem slightly out of proportion. not unpleasant, but perhaps slightly unrealistic and (slightly neighbour-unfriendly as the Mrs has reminded me...) I guess we'll see what a bit more running-in does. Other than that no negatives really.