Oops missed that…
Some room treatment experiments may help your A2 speakers work in that room. Otherwise, it may not be that you want a speaker with less bass or smaller to start with, but a different design of speaker. The rear firing port may not be helping, and a speaker that has a closed box or front firing port or indeed a downward firing port, may give you the solution.
No , in UK.
Hi @ryder , unfortunately the very confident statement that you make re speakers and room simply does not stand up to rigorous analysis and also my experience.
Even a small loudspeaker, not placed close to a wall, can stimulate a problematic room mode. The original OP talks about the ceiling being vaulted. That can help, but won’t solve some fundamental facts and physics.
I once helped some HiFi contacts dial out the problem resonances in a room which was quite a bit larger than the OPs and these contacts had small loudspeakers (Linn 119s) in good positions, not against the wall.
The solution:- properly calibrated Space Optimisation.
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I quit floor standers in my office this year - it’s an awkward shape with pitched roof as it’s the roof of a garage. Anyway, stand mounts are working much better and don’t seem to react with the room - I should have done it ages ago but was worried about the bass.
6 inches is quite close. The Linn Tukan can go that close but they have very little bass. Even front firing Linn 109s need more space unless it’s just a plasterboard rear wall. There’s the infamous Linn Kan of course which is designed to go against a solid rear wall, but it’s coloured sound and lack of bass might be a bit drastic for you. If you don’t mind an omnidirectional speaker then the Shahinian Larc is a very flexible solution that usually works well with Naim. It’s attractive too and they even sound good on the floor.
Sounds like that PMC you’re looking at can go quite close though.
EDIT: just remembered that a friend has Totem Bison Monitor speakers working very nicely in a room that size and they are not far from the rear wall. They are about £2.5k new I think. He’s used them with a Nait 50, 32.5/160, and is getting a Supernait shortly.
Hi, appreciate the response. Small speakers may not completely resolve the issue predominantly caused by small or ‘bad’ rooms but will ameliorate the undesirable effects.
Could you expand on calibrated space optimisation? This is something new to me. Is it the employment of some DSP or something like that. For me, if the room is somewhat poor sounding, usually smallish or awkward shape with limited speaker placement options contributed by other furniture in the room that could not be relocated, I’ll just find another spot to place the system/speakers.
FWIW I tried to set up a bedroom system about 5 years ago but gave up as the system sounded poor in the available space no matter how much I tried. They are medium to large speakers though (Harbeth SHL5+ and Marten Duke 2).
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I don’t believe the speakers are too big for the room. I think they might simply be a poor match. So while another speaker might be a reasonable solution, I wouldn’t automatically go smaller. A different floorstander will behave differently and there may even be much larger speakers that work well.
If space is also an issue, you might consider dedicated on-wall speakers. Some are extremely good and just like regular speakers, come in all budgets.
Generally high ceilings are a good thing. Though it depends how reflective they are. Most rooms are 240cm high with the ceiling a mostly unbroken reflective expanse which is a major problem so your high ceiling, far from being a problem, should help there.
Agree…most small speakers can go down to around 60hz and with that size room you are likely to have some sort of mode in that region. Possibly a Linn Kan Mk1 might work as they roll of at around 70hz… The A2’s might work pulled into the room firing down the long length…but seating location might not be good from a family point of view. Another approach is using a speaker with dsp like the Meridian DSP3100…
I have a difficult small room…and had to use room treatment and a touch of dsp via roon…and the result is surprisingly good.
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Unfortunately there remains a lot of misunderstanding in the HiFi industry about what happens in room acoustics. There are some gross simplifications that are taken as shortcuts that barely work in practice and simply do not work once things start to get a bit difficult.
In the case of the OPs Spendor A2s, the quoted specification of ‘46Hz’ at the low frequency end is defined as “typical in room response”. This number says nothing about the roll off rate - I.e. dB per octave (or decade) reduction as the frequency goes lower. Nevertheless, as it is a rear ported design, the idea is to get more bass out of a small footprint box. Furthermore the other idea is that you can move the speaker forwards and backwards from the wall to ‘control’ the amount of bass perceived.
Using this method has hardly any effect on the problem - which is room resonance. I took the liberty of entering the stated OPs room dimensions in the AMROC room mode calculator, making the assumption that it is a rectangular box room design with a ceiling between 2.4m and 2.8 m in height.
The result:- the room has its main axial modes at ~40Hz (long dimension) and ~56Hz (short dimension). Depending on ceiling height the tangential mode at ~69Hz almost coincides with the floor to ceiling axial mode.
So, in summary, looking at the value of the corner low frequency for a loudspeaker tells you very little about how it will sound in a room.
The method to obtain good sound (measured at the listening position) is to have the amplitude vs frequency response approximately flat across the pass band, with as linear phase vs frequency as possible, whist in the time domain all frequencies decay equally in a similar timeframe to a similar level. Low frequency room resonances prevent this situation from occurring as the low frequencies can hang around for almost one whole second, whilst the other stuff decays within less than half a second (without some form of acoustic treatment).
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Hi @ryder , thanks for asking. Yes, calibrated Space Optimisation is a Digital Signal Processing technique to correct the in room response.
Linn streaming products incorporate something called Space Optimisation which needs a physical model of the target room to construct the corrections applied to the music signal at run time.
I have included a link to a response from 10 days ago where I was explaining its workings and performance to another forum member.
The link is here:
If you read that thread and onwards you should find some graphs that demonstrate the concept.
Alternatively, have a read of my own thread (English Premier or International (HiFi) - ‘Strength in Depth’ - #123 by Edmund-of-Essex) where I will continue to post about ‘optimising’ my room, which uses room treatment in conjunction with Linn Space Optimisation.
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Hi @Richieroo , thanks for replying. I am glad that you achieved sufficiently good sound using Roon in your own arrangement and the suggestion of the Meridian DSP3100 might interest the OP?
Although, for me, having heard Meridian equipment quite a few times in different locations, I do not trust the brand as some of their marketing imagery is simply beyond belief………
Take a look at the advert image on the Meridian website for the top of the range DSP8000 XE, and think “glass, all that ………. glaasss”.
My room is 12x8.5ft…with an attic style roof. I even fire the speakers cross ways…it works pretty well…I use an active sub Velodyne DD10+ which gives me a response way down. The only issue I find is if you turn up the volume and give it beans…you can kind of pressurise the room…which is not ideal…its simply physics…
The acoustics generally are pretty good but only in the sweet spot…which is small 2 seat sofa. However, it is not optimal…and I am sure my system would deliver more in a larger room. You have to work with what you have…room treatment for me was a game changer… I know my room is pretty good…I went to a B&0 dealer who kindly gave me a good demo with the 90k top of the range speakers…it was different but actually not better…interesting.
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My room at 12’ x 10’ is not too different from yours, and I manage to get very good sound with basic room treatment and meticulous speaker placement. I don’t think the speakers are too much for the room, it seems to me the problem is likely caused the self imposed 6" from the wall limitation.
I’ve had my system in a larger room and a smaller room. I much prefer my system in a smaller room. The room is well damped and there is enough room reflection to still have enough of that live sound. Large space recordings sound large and intimidate recordings are an absolute treat to listen to.
it’s a lot easier to get a smaller room to sound good
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Small rooms mean bigger changes to the bass performance for tiny adjustments. Start with the speakers right up the front wall and move them out step by step. Putting them closer to the wall might very well give you a better bass presentation than further out so don’t follow any rules and play around.
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Hi @Edmund-of-Essex , thanks for the post, appreciated. So it is advanced alteration or correction of the music signal with Linn devices combined with room treatment products. This is something that I wouldn’t embark on unless there isn’t any other option ie. no other better rooms to place the system. I presume people will still need to purchase the Linn streamer/amp to apply the Digital Signal Processing to the music signal.
For me, I do things differently and fortunately all the rooms that I have had were not problematic except the bedroom where speaker placement options and seating position were severely limited causing a poor sound, and there are other big bulky furniture in the room. Since it’s supposed to be a secondary system for surplus gear and speakers, it’s not to be taken seriously so I’ve left the bedroom as it is without any hifi. The main system remains in the living room.
Calibrated Optimisation with DSP is still something worth exploring if there are no other options left for the user. Useful to know.
ps. ditto to room treatments as I’ve mentioned earlier room treatments are not for me.
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Just out of curiosity, which Linn streaming product is able to perform the Calibrated Optimisation and how much is the price?
My understanding is that ALL current ranges of Linn digital streaming products (DSMs) have the Linn Space Optimisation feature included at no additional cost.
My simple and very quick assessment via the web suggests that either:-
The ‘entry level’ Linn Majik DSM range as new (all in one, inc amplifiers) can be obtained with an investment of around GBP (£) 4,500.
The source modular/options source/inc amps version of Linn Selekt DSM (at ex demo or pre owned values) can be obtained with a (starting) investment of around GBP (£) 5,500.
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My room curve is pretty good…but far from perfect. I tried full dsp correction across the speakers and the curve was great…but it seemed to kill somthing in the music…so all I do is just adjust a slight bass hump..and thats it.
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Yes, what you describe seems a good way of optimising the musical experience (sound).
The full audio bandwidth corrections systems introduce some ‘unnatural’ aspect to the sound. The way I think about this is that the room response (particularly above about 100Hz) has many peaks and troughs in the amplitude response, caused by the various reflections from the room boundaries.
Human hearing has evolved to EXPECT these characteristics. The full audio bandwidth correction systems (currently) attempt to linearise the phase at the low end (a good thing) and reduce the peaks (doing nothing about the troughs) in the rest of the audio bandwidth. Thus as a whole, the correction is perceived as slightly unnatural.
PS: I suspect this is why Linn Space Optimisation limits its corrective effects to below 100 Hz.
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