We will soon be moving house and I will be setting the HiFi in a dedicated room. The dimensions aren’t ideal but I think will work.
Equipment to squeeze in
Double width rack with Linn DSM, Exaktbox and 6 channels of amplification.
Kudos Titan 808’s (active).
Record storage unit.
2 armchairs or 2 seat sofa.
Sideboard/drinks cabinet.
The record storage will go on the short wall behind the door and the sideboard in a suitable space once everything else is set.
My initial thought is to set the speakers up either side of the Bay Window. It would be tight on width but would allow a nice placement for the seating with open space behind.
The alternative is to have the speakers on the long wall to have better width but that does leave the seating up against the opposite wall.
We move in about 4 weeks (fingers crossed the Solicitor gets a move on) so plenty of time to think and plan.
I know the best thing to do is set things up and move it abound, but I wanted to start off with at least some kind of well informed plan
My room is 490 x 360. In terms of sound I find symmetry helps and some light acoustic treatment.
Makes sense to place speakers where you suggest, firing down the room so you can take advantage of the window and a view. You can also search speaker placement tools as they can give you a good starting point.
I found when moving house my old speakers didn’t work in the new one - it was really night and day.
The smallest room I’ve had hifi in was some 2ft wider than that, slightly longer, but similar shape. Speakers (IMF RSPMs) worked well positioned with rearmost/outermost corners same distance apart as the bay opening, but about 1ft further away from start of the opening. Room had thick carpet and heavy curtains
Hi Silverback, they are walled off so the room is completely closed off to itself. Looking towards the bay, the left hand wall is external and the right hand partition. Concrete floors throughout the ground floor.
Looks lovely and plenty of space around those speakers. Fortunately the 808’s are quite forgiving of placement, so despite their size they can work close to rear and side walls.
Thanks for the reply IB. I have been given free rein to furnish how I like. Blinds will come with the house but I can get curtains up without issue. Floor is carpet over concrete.
I’ve a similar sized room and have only tried firing across the room. I’d be a little concerned that the speakers will be too close to the side walls and each other. Though with the Linn you can use room correction.
Maybe it’s best to try both layouts before a final setup?
Thanks Mike, I think it will be one of those situations where I need to set it all up and get used to it while the rest of the house is sorted, then revisit and see if a change around helps. I know the 808s are quite tolerant and @Dunc makes them work in a similarly tight space.
I will solicit the advice of my venerable dealer too.
They work really well, plus i now have a few people to back up that statement.
Dan, obviously, from here has heard it.
Also, 2 review guys, and you can read up what they thought on the Maverick site.
After a house extension and the kids leaving home, what was the ‘play room’ became my dedicated music room of approx. similar dimensions to yours. It’s smaller than I’d have liked but now I don’t get a listening session interrupted by someone wanting to watch the TV. So that’s a good move. Before you move in, and with the house empty why not try to get an electrician to look at fixing up a dedicated mains spur for you? You don’t know what the quality of the wiring will be like in the new place in terms of noise and my spur definitely gave an improvement in sound quality but most importantly stopped the loud clicks and buzzes from the refrigerator and central heating firing up intermittently. I thought that having the speakers fire down the length of the room would be best , but the sound and imaging was awful probably due to the reasons Mike_S cited. The speakers now fire across the shorter width of the room delivering excellent ‘out of the speaker boxes’ imaging. I had the same results in another house, albeit in a much larger room, where firing across the width sounded better than down the (narrower but longer) length. Good luck.
Many thanks for the reply @DaveSpart it is very helpful.
It was a serious consideration to fire across the room as i think the extra width will pay dividends for soundstage and overall emersion in the music. Perhaps i will start there and see how i get on. I think from my planning it will make the room layout easier as firing down a narrow room means that any furniture at the sides gets in the way. My concern was being a little close to the speakers, but i should be able to get just over 2M away without having my head pressed against the back wall. As i need to buy new seating for that room, I can find chairs that aren’t too deep.
As for the dedicated supply, my Dad is an electrician, so once the location is decided i can get a new consumer unit and suitable sockets without much hassle.
Just need to keep the Solicitors motivated now, which is easier said than done!
Iain, glad that helped. I’ve just measured the distance from the speaker grilles to the seat back of the sofa and assuming that’s roughly where my ears are positioned (!) it’s a distance of about 2.8-2.9 metres. I can confirm the sound stage width and depth is excellent and the closeness makes it a for me a more immersive listening experience. However there’s one minor negative as I perceive it. Occasionally if I play a track noted for its bass and if I happen to leave the music room and go into the adjoining kitchen area, I always think there’s a bit more depth to the bass in the kitchen. I can’t make a measurement of this to justify my perception and I may be deliberately looking for a fault to justify my one worry about the size of the room which is the wavelength of the bass notes requires a bit more width to develop and 3m doesn’t permit this. I trust someone with a better knowledge of physics and the typical length of say, a 100hz bass note will tell me the wavelength is probably less than 1 cm so my ‘theory’ is rubbish. Great news about your father being able to fit the spur. Good luck.
The bass in particular will vary wherever you are in the room, and in some cases it is possible to walk around and have some points where particular notes completely disappear through cancellation, and in other places very excessive. If you are concerned get a copy of REW (free software) and a measuring microphond and measure the response at your chosen or possible listening positions, then you will know if you are hearing as recorded or with some frequencies either reduced or boosted, and then tweak speaker and listening positions to suit - or just play around till you’re happy with what you hear.
