Sometimes Hard to Drive Speakers are a Gimmick

There is no evidence that these harder to drive speakers were designed with this intention. In fact nothing you have provided shows anything other than hard to drive speakers exist. 

Notice how every response does not take your premise seriously. As in a definitive "makes no sense". 

I think the reason behind low impedance speakers is the false belief that more power is always better. I learned a great deal from Ralph at Atma-sphere regarding this and other topics. Also have yet to talk with an amp designer (S.S. and tube) that didnt feel their amps sounded better driving higher impedance loads and more benign curves.

You are not going to make any headway on this issue because you are wrong.

I like large amps with high wattage because they do loaf along and are not pushed to clip as they are not being driven hard.big klipsch,michi m8, hegel h30a,big mcintosh all work well for me. I also like electronic  cossovers. Enjoy the music and the design. I also like ribbon planar speakers.

I like the original sterophile review that talked to the designer of the saloon one revel.the platform moved the speaker around to test the soundfield of the speaker. I can't began to keep up to money and technology like that.

@audition__audio  - Gonna sit here and wait for you to provide anything amounting to evidence before I address that you are ignoring mine.  Selectively counting retorts ain't it.  

Please, all, keep replying to this thread to keep it active and get as many eyeballs as possible. 

@atmasphere 

Many amps can drive difficult loads but that isn’t the same as saying they are sounding their best while doing so. For one thing, distortion is higher. It may not seem like much, but since our ears are tuned to using higher ordered harmonics to sense sound pressure the slight increase in distortion is heard as a less relaxed, less authoritative and less detailed presentation. 

Put another way, if you want the most out of your amplifier dollar investment, it will be best served by using a speaker that is easy to drive and more efficient. Amps sound best when they loaf for a living rather than working hard. 

I don’t think speaker designers make speakers harder to drive on purpose so much as they just don’t know any better because they don’t also design amps. 

I agree with everything Ralph (atmasphere) said here.  The one thing to keep in mind is the first word of my post: "Sometimes."  

I agree some speakers are just.. unfortunately poor crossover choices.  Some speakers, by nature of the  physics of their construction are never going to be an easy load.  I’m also not going to whine about speakers that squeeze in a 3rd woofer in a small cabinet to get a little more bass out of a small footprint speaker.  Balancing out sensitivity and size requires tough engineering decisions and not what I'm trying to point out here. 

My article, and frustration, is about a third and very rare situation, of which in my years of looking at speakers I’ve found only 3 possible candidates.