A recent change to room layout has sparked my interest into room acoustics, speaker and listening position. It is a complicated subject and I am still learning the basics. I realise that most listening rooms are significantly compromised and to get the best listening experience speaker and listening position are critical particularly before adding some room treatment.
Setting up a listening chair in the optimum position can be tricky particularly if we don’t have dedicated rooms and domestic harmony is to be maintained.
I wondered how many people have a didicated chair which they move to optimum listening position for serious listening and then replace. It seems quite a simple solution rather than fighting with or putting up with the major compromises the room brings.
I realise this does not fix all the problems but can make a significant improvement.
The didicated chair doesn’t have to come from Knotty Ash!
But comes with a feather duster to keep it all clean?
I’m all for a compromise… my chair is slightly off centre to make sure that the significant other can enjoy the music as well.
What size is your room ? A large one can take a designated area with a dedicated position.
I have a smallish room. If I took to having the speakers positioned like most do, and often recommended - as sitting along the back wall equally, I would have seating problems.
The sitting position itself was considered first that’s naturally in the flow. Then the speakers positioned towards that spot. A bit of fine tuning to get them not too close to walls and corners. Maybe lucky in that I can fit the whole system plus a big screen within a corner with no ill effects.
I have a sofa facing the speakers and the middle seat of the sofa is in the middle of the speakers. But I am one of those people who doesn’t find soundstaging at all important for being immersed by the music, so I’m more likely to be found lying across the sofa with my head on the armrest.
I have two speaker/listening positions for mine, one optimised, and one normal room use, compatible with other things. The optimised position needs no room correction, the other has a far less even response, which I tame somewhat I with DSP to make tolerabke. My tool for that is my active crossover (tri-amping), which is digital, and has some spare DSP capacity which I use to reduce significant peaks in the response, and boost minor dips. The XO has presets, making for easy switching in/out of the DSP on room change. Sound is best in the optimised position, which is how I set up for “serious listening”, but the other set up is how the system spends 90% of the time because the room has other uses, including a 12ft wide projector screen - but it would have been unacceptable without the DSP correction.
In optimum position, as measured by REW and giving best (flattest) response for critical listening, speakers are about 9 feet apart (baffle centre to baffle centre), and ears about 8 feet from the centre of the plane of the front baffles. Room is max 24ft x 24 ft, but not not a simple square. Nearest reflection points are floor/ceiling. Floor has thisck carpet+underlay on timber, so ceiling is probably most significant, about 3 ft longer than direct path (side walls about 10ft longer than direct).
In more family oriented daily listening position speakers are about 14 ft between baffle centres, and ears 10.5 feet from then plane of the baffles. Nearest reflection points are still ceiling and floor, path now only about 2.4 feet longer than direct, with side reflections about 9ft longer than direct. With such a relatively wide spacing of speakers they are fully toed in, which balances the sound, though with some music the soundstage seems a bit stretched.
Overall the dual positioning solves the room problem - but it is a bit of a hassle changing, primarily because of the need to ‘walk’ and correctly position a pair of 48kg monoliths. The listening position itself is a simple matter of moving an easy chair in front of the 3-seater sofa that is the focal listening point in the family-oriented room.
recent photo of “the captains chair” in the music room (system has changed SC in place of HCDR and radikal in place of Lingo 4
speaker are 9ft from chair, slightly towed in, took some time to “get it right” but very pleased
moved the room around a couple of times but this is final position for system and chair
Thanks for the replies. It is something I will definitely be trying once the room is furnished. Fortunately there is a small two seater sofa which can be easily moved around the room.
I always seem to have had a compromised listening position in varouse different houses and probably never realised the consequences. I feel I have just about spent enough on hardware to get a very good sound and now need to optimise the listening position and room treatments relative to this to get the best of it.
As is always the case. Be prepared to think outside the box and make your own rules up.
The idea of a precisely placed single chair for listening is anathema to me. Listening to music is fundamentally a sociable thing on many occasions, so a sofa is obligatory, and there’s no way I’m going to accurately position my head in the exact position required. I’m just going to relax, sit where I want to sit, and enjoy it.
Good heavens, what a palaver! When I want a ‘me time’ listening session, the last thing I want to do is spend half of it getting the room ready, then replacing things afterwards. It strikes me good music listening and sex have a lot in common, inasmuch as spontaneity is all. Set the room up properly in the first place, and don’t stress about the 1% you think might be squeezed out by shifting chairs or speakers around.
Thanks TOBYJUG my room is 16’x12’ narrowing to 10’ so placing the speaker diagonally is difficult with room asymmetry. My main issue is some bass resonance on certain albums but moving the listening position slightly improves this. I will however wait until my sofas arrive before making final decision as this is likely to change room acoustics slightly. I may also try a couple of tritrap a or soffit traps in two corners.
Setting up speakers in the room is a lot trickier especially when the speakers are designed to be placed away from the walls. Try moving the speakers if you experience bass resonance in the room from your listening position. I don’t have much issue with the position of the listening chair. Bass issues in my room are usually resolved by optimising the placement of speakers without the use of bass traps. My room is moderate to large and there is a lot of space behind the listening chair.
On the other hand, sometimes the room, and its uses, can make a very large difference between sound in the optimum position and sound in positions where things have to be to accommodate other needs (far more than 1%, more like 20% and upwards (not that it can be measured quantitatively) - and there is little point spending huge sums of money trying to get a good system if positioning prevents it ‘singing’ properly.
My point exactly
I struggle to imagine a room that is so difficult to extract acceptable sound from without the need to shift furniture and speakers around. I accept some may feel the need to do so, in the same way many feel driven to constant tweakery, cable dressing, contact cleaning etc. etc. There are clearly different camps of hifi owners. Long may we continue to benignly co-exist (a little like Prog and Smiths’ fans!).
Unfortunately, there are… many! (most?)
And this is quite simple to demonstrate:
- a $65 calibrated microphone
- a laptop with REW plugged into you preamp.
And that’s it.
It’s sometimes better not to know…
Any recommendations for microphone choice?
I made the decision a long time ago never to listen to a ‘better’ system or enter my dealer’s demo room again in this lifetime. I’m totally satisfied with my system and the musical reproduction it gives me. How lucky am I? 