Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Stereo Off axis sound - help?

As much as I really love my M22ti's, my only issue with them is that unless you're in the "sweet seat", off axis listening suffers a great deal. Is there anything I can do to help with this? The M22's are about 9' apart and the couch is about 8-10' from the speakers.

Thanks!

Looking at the third-party NRC measurements, the M22 is no inferior than other Axiom models or speaker brands with respect to horizontal treble dispersion. In fact, it shows one of the best dispersion characteristics. That said, I have several questions:

(1) How exactly does your off-axis listening "suffer"? Is it the treble rolling off too much? Is it a collapsed soundstage?

(2) What are the distance from the back wall and side walls to the M22's? How high are they placed? Are they stand-mounted or on a shelves? How much are the M22's "toed-in"? Have you experimented by subtly changing the speaker placement?

(3) What are the surface materials of the walls and the floor near the speakers?

Off axis, the soundstage really falls apart. The sound becomes much more directional.

They are about 2' from the back wall, and are stand mounted about 2' high. (I originally bought the 16" stands recommended by Axiom, but they were too low. They sound much better a bit higher.)

My room is a bit odd shaped and leaves me very few options for speaker placement. I think my problem stems from my skewed placement. My couch needs to be a bit off-center from my speakers. If I were to place my couch directly in front of my speakers, the couch and dining table would be on top of eachother.

Here's a quick drawing of my layout. "X" marks the sweet spot. Even sitting just a little to the right of here, dramatically changes the sound. (and not for the better!)

www.funnyfarmcomics.net/living_room_layout2.jpg

One thing i would try is swapping your Hsu sub with that one M22 and shrink the distance between them a bit. See what kind of a change it makes (for better or worse).
Beyond that, it looks like you need some more room to tinker with speaker toeing and couch placement.

In addition to what chess says, I would try moving the M22's forward towards the couch, even only a few inches. Also, the "collapse" of the soundstage when listening outside the sweetspot is somewhat normal in the 2-channel stereo. Do you hear the same promlems when you listen to music using the matrix surround mode such as DPL II Music, engaging the center channel? You might well like it better than the streight "pure" stereo -- in fact I do.

I have compared straight 2-ch stereo with Pro-Logic II, and must say that overall, I really prefer the sound of good old fashioned stereo. Whether or not the soundstage is more stable is irrelevent, straight stereo simply sounds better.

As far as off-axis sound goes, the problem is most evident with stereo music. When I pop my DVD-A copy of Fleetwood Mac's "Rumours" (5.1 surround) it's not as bad. It's still noticable, but not nearly as severe. I guess that's to be expected though.

I'll play around with things a bit more and see what happens.

If you haven't yet, definitely try what Chess suggested, moving the speakers closer together. I've tried many different positions and found that the 22's sound better in all respects with a distance between them that's about 2/3-3/4 the distance from you and each of the speakers. My guess would be that the distance between the speakers is the most important aspect when dealing with a collapsed soundstage.

Any thoughts on what to do if this 2/3 to 3/4 is not possible because of the room? My 22's are about 6 ft apart in the front, but the couch is about 12 ft back from them. I don't really have room to spread them out more and things would not look right in the room if I tried to move up the couch. Perhaps the amount of toe in can help?

Zarak, at that distance I personally wouldn't use any toe-in, well maybe just a tad, but you're probably already doing this. At the 50% ratio you're at right now, and with no toe-in you're sound should still be great. That's not too far from the 2/3-3/4 with toe-in setup.

You mention that you can't move the couch, can you move the speakers up a little more? A foot will probably be the least amount to make a difference, but it's still possible that even a few inches could help. If you really can't move anything, then I don't see any other options. Just try to do as much experimenting with distances and toe in as you can...maybe others here have some ideas.

I have the speaker on the right toed in some, but only because it is back towards the corner and I want it pointing out into the room. The one on the left is not toed at all. The sound seems good overall, but there is a definite sweet spot in the middle of the couch (right on the cushion crack where it isn't comfortable to sit of course).