I'm glad I planned ahead and grabbed a roll of XD material.My towers ended up just inside the frame, had I build the frame as per THX specs the towers would gave been right in the mid line of the frame. I built it +/- a foot smaller (from both walls) than the room width and all three are behind and it works great.
I think I will place the speakers first and go from there wrt the basement system. I'll buy the screen stuff once audio positions are set.
Here is a great podcast going over the basics to understand the importance of loudspeaker positioning in 2ch and multichannel. Fresh off the press right when most useful. . He doesn't give away the methods he uses though. $2500 a class.
But he is considered a real deal guru and teaches for CEDIA and trains installers worldwide.
Here is a great podcast going over the basics to understand the importance of loudspeaker positioning in 2ch and multichannel. Fresh off the press right when most useful. . He doesn't give away the methods he uses though. $2500 a class. But he is considered a real deal guru and teaches for CEDIA and trains installers worldwide.
It really is over the top and unecessary. Understand some basics and then just play around with it yourself. People will know when they hear a stereo system in good stereo and when the surround setup is doing its job. The point is that the speakers should blend together such that one speaker doesn't become obvious over any other. The reproduced sound should seem realistic like having the band in front of you or having bullets whizzing around you.
Start with some easy reading, lots online, but i try to stop short of obsession. You can spend stupid amounts of time on this subject yet never have a true a/b comparison to know if all the small tweaks are improvements or not. Bridgman's posts on his trials demonstrate the insanity nicely.
Don't over simplify it either. My speakers blend nicely, but, given the constraints of my living room, I could never get a good sound stage out of my speakers. The only reason I know this is because of what I was exposed to during my listening sessions at Axiom pre-purchase.
I'm hoping that the new layout with unimpeded speakers will allow me to finally get the best out of my system.
Fred
------- Blujays1: Spending Fred's money one bottle at a time, no two... Oh crap!
I gotta ask - when you are listening in your MLP, is your head clamped in some kind of device to stop any ear movement that might (probably) degrade the sound stage?
It seems that with these painstaking minute adjustments that are made to speaker location will largely be negated by any movement of one's head. Half the time that I'm listening I end up being horizontal with my head being at 1 end of the couch or the other.
I remember reading a post from another manufacturer that placing the speaker (with a ribbon type tweeter) was critical & that sometimes a difference as little as 1 degree could make a large change in the sound stage. How could someone listen optimally with that kind of accuracy & restriction? How would that work in a HT where people are often spread across a listening area?
Not saying that one shouldn't try for the best placement; however, I limit my tweaking to the very basics because I'm lazy & I know that I won't be listening rigidly in the same spot...
I can only shake my head at the lengths some people seem to want to do to get what they are saying gives the perfect sound. What TAM has said rings a certain amount of truth, but look at it from a more scientific stance.
You have 'x' number of speakers, and in most cases a room with 6 reflective surfaces. Sound travels out in a ripple effect (like dropping a stone in a pond). When it hits another reflective surface, it changes direction and looses energy. The more distance it travels, it also looses energy.
You as the listener are going to be in some x,y,z offset from each of those sources. As you move around in your room, the sound that you hear will change as your relative position to the sound source and reflective surfaces also change.
If you change the location of the speakers from any of the reflective surfaces, the effect on the sound will also change.
If you change the composition of the room to modify the reflective properties +/- of the surfaces, the effect on the sound will also change.
What you find pleasing may not be what someone else will find pleasing. Everybody has there own taste.
To clarify, this saga is for my 2ch rig. The chair is a recliner. I am pretty much in the sweet spot unless I drop dead and slump over. So far so good.
However, the setup in the basement will follow 2ch protocols. Ie. The LCR soundstage will be perfectly aligned and symmetrical within a lasers width.
Today I broke down after setting up the audiophile speakers again (have to wean myself off the others) and taped out a line perpendicular to the speakers at each one. I set them up 651/2 inches from side walls and 92.75 inches apart. No toe in yet. I moved them forward and back at 1 inch increments over a 12" range. All measurenents from top center of front baffle. To my surprise at 24" off the wall the bass was weak. At 21" the bass was best and the soundstage literally opened up as drums became extremely well defined. There was a dip in bass output from 20" to about 16". At 14" to 12" the bass was strongest, but sounded misformed and without detail.
As Matt said purely unscientific. So I purchased an RTA and FFT analyser program and repeated the procedure with a 20hz-20khz mono pink noise track being fed into the stereo from the program. It verified my listening tests to within a 1/2". I was a little smug with myself.
The FFT revealed a huge bass valley in the soundstage between the woofers output and the port output. From 63hz-90hz. Must investigate and rule out the room first. If the room not much I can do. What a cool tool to have!
Bridgman's posts on his trials demonstrate the insanity nicely.
Hey, wait a minute... ok, yeah, I guess so...
Originally Posted By: exlabdriver
I gotta ask - when you are listening in your MLP, is your head clamped in some kind of device to stop any ear movement that might (probably) degrade the sound stage?
Surprisingly enough that wasn't the case. What I found was that the sweet spot actually got a bit bigger as I started getting the reflections under control, to the point where the sweet spot was at least a foot in any direction. Too little damping and there's basically no sweet spot, too much and it's really small...
... but there is a "just right" (or close enough anyways) in between.
Originally Posted By: oakvillematt
I can only shake my head at the lengths some people seem to want to do to get what they are saying gives the perfect sound. What TAM has said rings a certain amount of truth, but look at it from a more scientific stance.
I hate to say it, but I went through all that to make the sound not suck. Once it got pretty good, I stopped. Really.
I actually think placing the speakers with symmetry and perfect alignment in mind increases the size of the sweet spot. I can move my head freely in my mlp and the images stay stable. Probably depends on many factors though re: ribbion tweeters. I really enjoy doing this. Should have done it for a living.
Matt, the "its a crapshoot" philosophy rings true in some cases. I try to employ a scientific approach where possible. I make detailed notes and my process is methodical- if not entirely experimental as I learn more.
Fwiw, all "good" ht setups I've experienced were set up employing the basic rules set out by dolby et al. But in none of them (my own prior attempts included) was there an "aha!" moment where everything was perfect. Great for sure, but not goosebump inducing.
My metric for perfection has nothing to do with preference. I want it to sound as real as possible. Not to sound like I'm removed from the movie or music recording. I am the closest I've ever been in a 2ch system. The new HT will be a whole other animal!