Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Home Theater installing M60's UP-SIDE-DOWN ? in-cabinet style

In my apartment I had my M80 center speaker upside-down above my TV. I found that pulled the center of soundstage up some but not as much as having it right-side-up. I didn’t notice any change in tone or balance just that when using multi-channel audio or Dolby PLIIx the center of the front soundstage seemed a little like it was on a dais.

I did find two things. First that having the tweeters at ear level wasn’t as important as having the tweeters and midrange drivers of the mains (sitting right-side-up on the ground) closer to the tweeter and midrange drivers of the center (above the TV). Having the smaller drivers nearer each other vertically prevented side-to-side pans from moving up and down as tehy crossed center. So to accomidated this I also raised my M80 mains so they were a foot or so off the ground.

This lead me to the second finding, that I felt my whole front soundstage sounded better with the speakers raised a couple feet. There was more of a wall-of-sound but w/o loosing any of the stereo imaging. Also the overall ambience was better even when using 2 channel music. I’m not sure why but surmise that elevating the speakers placed me closer middle of the driver array vertically which evens out where the sound is coming from in the vertical plane (more wall of sound) and also got the tweeters and midrange drivers above the level of my furniture allowing for better dispersion and reflection of their sound waves (better ambience). Just guessing though.

I liked having the speakers elevated so much I seriously considered using an AT screen and putting the M80s on stands behind it, but this would have pushed the screen to far out into the room. The compromise I found is that now for 2 channel music is sit on the ground in front of my main seating which puts the tweeters about a foot over my head.

Personally I think having your speakers above the screen as you plan will sound great, even better than having them on the ground. I also don’t think you will have any problem with placing them up-side-down, but I imagine the speakers are symmetrical so you could possibly try both orientations and let us know what you think of each.

Cheers,
Dean

Hi Dean,

Thanks for your thoughtful post. Like you, I also prefer a somewhat elevated soundstage, which is why I mostly use my M22s on stands for home theater because they are at the same level as my large screen display, whereas the M80s stand on the floor.

I wanted to be cautious in my recommendations re Axiomoholic, because while in theory there shouldn't be a dramatic difference in performance inverting floorstanding speakers, I've frankly never done any controlled listening tests to inverted speakers. Our tests at Axiom of the in-cabinet models were performed blind with non-inverted speakers, so that is the performance I rated and know.

It's certainly something that can be put to experimentation before any major installation work is done, although it would be awkward. It might be worthwhile doing the tests in mono, with one speaker inverted and the other floorstanding, just to see what differences in tonal balance might result, if any.

Regards,
Alan

I very much do appreciate all the feedback. I did some closer measurements and I think that the bottom of the speaker (with top at high edge of LCD panel) would be a little above knee level. That strikes me as way too low for the tweeter and mid (where they'd be if unit was inverted) so I think I'm going the scrap the idea of flipping them.

I will let everyone know how it works out.

Hi Alan,

No doubt you need to be careful about what you say since many might make invalid assumptions about it. It would be interesting to see the results of a controlled test since all my experience in the mater is anecdotal.

I’ve been planning to test a couple new configurations I haven’t tried yet and might also have to try the test you suggest to see what inverting one speaker does. I have a switch that would all me to play both simultaneously and also A/B/C compare them individually and in tandem.

Cheers,
Dean

I have always mounted "bookshelf" speakers upside-down when they were actually installed on a shelf to get them better aligned with ear level. The speakers generally had "early" dome tweeters which probably didn't have as wide dispersion as the ones Axiom uses today.

Note that the definition of "bookshelf" back then included some fairly large speakers

My recollection was that the sound started to degrade when my ears were maybe 15-20 degrees below the tweeter centerline. These were all two-way speakers so I can't comment on Alan's statement re: the midrange actually being more important than the tweeter, but based on the range of frequencies that seemed to be improved by inverting the speakers "back in the day" that statement (worry about the midrange) makes sense to me.

Ok I have a homework assignment for all M60/80 owners tonight. We shall go home, sit upside down on the couch (ala Mork), and study the effects of listening to inverted speakers and note any percieved changes in the tonal dynamics of such a configuration.

Axiomoholic, I'm afraid you're going to have to test your speakers upside down at least initially as we're all on the edges of our seats now in anticipation of this experiment. Don't be a tease, you can't just come on here, wet our curiosities about such an interesting proposition, and then leave us all high and dry for God sakes!

Hell you even have Alan's full attention on this one, he's posted 3 times already in a 15 reply thread... I'd say his curiosity is peaked! And while he can't recommend this unproven idea, he's obviously curious as to the outcome of the experiment. As are the rest of us. Don't let us all down old boy, you know you want to know if your idea was revolutionary or not.

I trust you'll do the right thing!

ok guys, I will test upside down when I get them!

thanks again for all the interest and assistance.

Lol, don't take me too seriously now... I don't actually expect you to go through all that trouble if you truely doubt you'll wind up keeping them upside down. Haha, I was just protesting for the fun of it.

Not that I wouldn't love to hear your impressions if you did try it mind you! But certainly don't let me pressure you into anything, I was only teasin ya buddy.

Geez, now he tells us. I was gettin' a headache standing on my head.

Oh... that was no joke. Back on your head young man!