My listening room is 3.4M X 6M, is this regarded as small, medium or large? I ask this question as I’m considering ATC SCM100 speakers, are they going to be an issue as they are large and produce a huge amount of base?
at very low volume, not an issue . If someone responds that it will be fine, i would be very surprised ! Even atc40 can be problematic.
I have the same size of room, around 4X5 m.
I’m no expert, but I got huge (to me) speakers because I have a 10x13 meter room. If I had a smaller room, I’d have saved a fortune by getting muuuuuch smaller speakers that would have been more than adequate. Why buy speakers that “produce a huge amount of base” for a small room?
What speakers?
David
I don’t recall any definition of room sizes in this context. What any individual considers to be a large or small room is subjective, and depends, amongst other things, where you live. In the UK an average size lounge, typically the room used as a listening room, would be something around maybe 13-18m2, so I consider anything smaller than that range to be small. As for large, to me the minimum width comes into it as well, and as you can (and in new houses often do) get corridor-like long rooms only 3m or so wide, which I cannot think of as large, however long they may be. So I think of large as probably greater than 20m2+ with width greater than 3.6m.
It would be interesting to hear others’ views, but useful to annotate with the country concerned to see how much difference that may make.
Focal Sopra IIs.
Our open plan lounge/dining/kitchen is 18m by 5m. Main system (Nova and Totem Forest Signatures) are in a listening zone in the lounge portion, playing across the narrow. The media room is 3.5m by 5m and has a Uniti2 and a Totem Hawk, playing across the narrow. The Hawks are fine in the media room, but the Signatures are too big I find, they need more air to breath. I think care is needed with big speakers in a smaller space.
Our listening room is small at 3.5m x 3.5m. I recently home demoed ATC SCM40s. I really liked them but they pushed out way too much bass for the room. I now have ATC SCM 19s which work much better (although I miss the mid driver in the SCM40). As always, home demo is essential when auditioning speakers to test room dynamics
My room is 2.8m by 5.8m, slightly smaller than yours. With a Nait XS amp I have had - Spendor S5e, PMC DB1i, PMC GB1i, PMC 20.21 and now Proac Tablette 10s. The later are fine for me although I sometimes feel that I would like a bit more bass. I also auditioned Russell K Red 50, Neat Motive 2 and ATC SCM 11.
I liked the Neat but they did not seem right, didn’t like the Red 50 but the ATC were great, the factor here was my wife wanting oak to match other things in the room. So after another six months went for the Proacs and have been happy with these ever since. The recurring problem I had with floor standing speakers and to some extent the 20.21s was “boomy” bass, the only speakers to resolve this were the Neat, SCM 11 and Proac Tablette.
Hope this helps you in some way.
My lounge (aka listening room!) measures 5m². I certainly wouldn’t describe this as ‘large’, perhaps medium side of small?
Interestingly, my previous speakers, ProAc D20r, had a distinct tendency towards bass boominess on certain tracks. Upgrading to a bigger speaker, ProAc K6, has eliminated this completely. I suspect it’s almost impossible to predict room/hardware/speaker synergy. I have friends who use small stand mounted speakers in rooms considerably bigger than mine which sound terrific. I’ve also heard the same size rooms completely overwhelmed by moderately sized floor standers.
The moral of the story? Home demos, where feasible, every time. I do feel for those who are physically unable to achieve this, and I guess their only course of action is to find a good dealer or hifi afficionado as per this forum! Risky business.
Only from listening to a room as a room, without anything hifi related - just that spatial relative aweness - will a room reveal what size it thinks it is.
If you think you have a large room, but the room just keeps on telling you it’s small, then its small.
Likewise a small room might just think it’s a barn, and try its hardest to convince all that sets feet and ears within.
Room whispering is THE dark art of knowing what’s suitable.
You are 100% right Timmo. However, Atc 100 in 20 m2 is another story…
I would say that definitely counts as small, or very small: there can’t be many lounges as small as that, at least not in UK.
probably a typo error. 5 m2 is like water closets.
Hi Cat 1965, your room is the same foot print as mine, I have ATC SCM 40’s and I find them a bit much for my room, fine at low levels but they can be a bit boisterous at enthusiastic listening levels >55% with a NAP300DR
These are massive speakers by most peoples standards. At least the active amps should keep the bass under some sort of control. The room interface is the hardest part to get right in any hi-fi system. BUT, on a lot of CD/VINYL etc you will probably be OK. There will always be some recordings with too much bass as that’s how the recording team wanted it. Could have been monitored or cut using small stand mount speakers perhaps? You will have some of these in your library I am sure.On first hearing will probably sound impressive. And then you will probably get to hate them.
Not only big but expensive and your dealer should assist you in your choice. He wont want you sending them back after a month! If buying privately be even more careful if you don’t like them.
ATC are more “tailored” to a studio monitor sound than a domestic one. Another factor in the equation.
I don’t think they will work but you will have some fun in coming to a decision. Douglas.
My room is about 7.2m x 3.6m. I use Kudos 707s firing across the short dimension. Sounds great to me.
I would regard my room as quite large for a UK living room.
ATC SCM 40s are far from massive - I would call them average sized. The passive 40 is, after all, ATC’s smallest floorstander, and the 40A, which is along with the same size as the 19A, is only slightly deeper but doesn’t require any external power amps or crossover.
(N.B most people use standmounts on stands take up the same space as a floorstander of the samewidth, depth and overall height.
not the 19 the smallest floorstander? 2 dealers selling them in Paris said to me that 25 m2 is a minimum size room for them. ( for the atc40).
I have ATC scm 40’s being driven by NAP200,200,250 awesome sound but the bass can be over blown especially at high listening levels and also the quality of the recording.