[fajimr]

well I have my system finally up and running and it is now in a nice rectangular room (don’t have the exact measurements yet… something like 12 x 20 and 9’ ceilings with hardwood floors and plaster walls)- I have the speakers pointed down the length of the room.  No room treatments….yet.   here is my query:

Is there a general approach for compensating for the fact that there is a closet door, built in mirror and lights on the wall behind the speakers which creates a “visual” space (read wife friendly) where the speakers are not evenly spaced from the side walls (i.e. from one wall the speaker is about 2 feet away and the other about 4 feet away).  Of course when I place each speaker evenly from the wall, the soundstage opens up nicely.  Anything I can do treatment wise to compensate for this?

[JLM]

The whole purpose for absorption/diffusion is to mask the impact of walls, so adding absorption (can be more effective across a wide frequency range than diffusion) around the speaker closer to the wall/corner should help.  Realtraps and GIK make some of the best absorption panels.

[bpape]

I'd agree.  The idea with the panels is to minimize the wall interaction AND to make both sides respond more equally.

Refleciton panels on the side walls will help - though with the speakers in different relationships, they'll not be directly across from each other as the reflection points will move accordingly.

The other thing that different spacing causes is different SBIR (boundary reinforcement) in the bottom end.  You may also find it beneficial to have an additional panel on the side nearer the wall to assist in minimizing this and making it more similar to the other side.

Bryan

[fajimr]

thanbks JLM and Bryan... sounds like I won't have to rip the light fixtures out of the wall after all  

I'll play around with some panels and see what I can come up with.