We have built a snug on the side of the house he issue is that the entrance to the snug is where the speaker used to be in my lounge…… pain. So I was wondering if I can move my kit into the snug…. 3.75m x 7m. The sofa faces across the room and when moving the speakers in I realised they are really close to the wall. The space between the speakers is 2.5m the listening position is 3.2m which is closer than I have ever been.
The speakers cant sit more than 20cm from the wall. One bonus is that the walls are wood slats on felt.
The issue is my current speaker cable doesnt reach the speaker to test yet and replacing the Sarum T is £££ if the set up is flawed. I am worried time is up on my 500 set up with the Bowers. Any one have any thoughts as I try to source some cable to borrow?
The only things you will definitely have to change is speaker cable’s, due to lenght.
Other than that it will be the speakers if they don’t work in the new positions. The rest will be fine
They look a bit far apart for where you are going to sit.
But finding speakers that work in your room is the hardest bit to get right. But once you do it will all come together, but as i found out, trying to make speakers work in positions they don’t like, never works and all you end up doing is wasting time and effort, plus money sometimes trying to get them to work
Yes indeed this space might work very well when the speakers can be moved closer together. Looking at the materials I guess it’s a hyper dry sound and one can notice the smallest changes to the setup and in the music. Perhaps it works, perhaps not and speakers with a wider dispersion are needed.
It may be worth observing that in UK terms that is not a small room, just an average through-longe size, so size-wise there should be be no reason for limitation of th syste.
In my experience, the issue you will have with this layout is not the speaker distance (Diamonds do quite well far apart) but the fact that your listening position is against the back wall. You typically need quite a bit of empty space behind your head for proper imaging/soundstage. I would try to add absorbers on that wall - there’s acoustic art that you can buy these days that will look good as well. It has to be large.
As Dunc has said, listening position against the wall is not ideal (often more of an issue than speakers against the wall), however I note from your photo that one soeaker is in a corner, which could cause problems. Don’t worry about listening distance, as there is nothing wrong with even just 2m if all else is balanced. As for electronics, I don’t see why they shouldn’t perform perfectly fine in the new room.
But 2.5m apart and 3.2 m from listening position sounds fine to me. Photos can be misleading.
I’d be more worried about excessive bass reinforcement from proximity to the rear wall. I’m often surprised how many systems pictured here involve big speakers close to rear walls. But folk get much pleasure from them, so it might work here as well. Worth experimenting with, I’d have thought.
Whether there is excessive bass reinforcement will depend so much on the rest of the room (size, shape, construction, furnishing etc), as well as on the speaker, that it is impossible to generalise. Whilst it can cause issues it is also quite possible for even large speakers to work well very close to the front wall. More problematic in my experience, yet surprisingly common, is a listening position very close to an untreated back wall, with early reflections muddying the sound.
It might be sub-optimal, at least in theory, but absolutely not a complete waste of resources if it sounds good to the user, especially if they find it sounds better than other gear!
I’ve been to Abbey Road for an album playback (during my time in the music industry ) and was no more than 2M away from whatever version of the version of the 800’s they were in the early naughtiest and they sounded mind blowing (driven by classè amps ).
So much so I went home to my very first little Monitor audio 5.1 set up and through - my god they’re tiny, and so began the ongoing upgrade- itis many of us on this forum suffer from. Granted obviously the room had full studio room treatment. So….the issue with them being so close to the wall and your seating position being so close to the wall does need some attention to get the best out of what are spectacular speakers. I’ve never owned B&W speakers as I never liked the sound of the mid range and could never afford the 800 series. Enjoy the general fettling we all quite enjoy on this forum. You’ll get there and they still probably sound awesome ever where they are .
You could send a pic to GIK Acoustics and they offer you free advice as to how to treat your room. Granted it’s a service that does point to buying their gear. But at least you’ll get a full run down of how to get the best of your set in the room you have.
Thanks for stating the obvious. However, I wasn’t making a general point. My post was about a specific known speakers in a specific room with known dimensions and even some construction details. And although my own experience is that placing larger speakers close to the wall behind them often results in unrealistically emphasised bass, many on here do opt for such a placement and enjoy the results, so it would be worthwhile to experiment.
Well, your comment “I’m often surprised how many systems pictured here involve big speakers close to rear walls” sounded to me that you expanded from the specific room and speakers to make a general comment, But no matter, in the case of the OP he/she will determine, possibly taking account of some people’s comments, and those who have found their speakers work well close to the wall are presumably satisfied. (In my case I did measurements using REW with my PMC EB1i speakers - fairly large full range floorstanders - in my last room, and found the optimum speaker position had the speaker baffles about 50 cm from front wall. That meant the backs were just 10 cm from the wall, though 30cm more to the glass in the window behind the upper part of the speakers.).
