[Bill O'Connell]

Had the pleasure of visiting Audiojerry a couple of weekends ago. Besides being just a wonderful host, his system made me run home and experiment with speaker position.
  Jerry listens at what I believe you would call nearfield. Maybe 5 or 6 foot away from the speakers with his wonderful Dyneaudio 25th anniversary edition monitors. With the speakers toed in just to the outside of the ears at the sweet spot the speakers just disappeared.The room which I now understand what people mean when they say is a crucial component.
 The depth from the rear wall ( just guessing here ) was probably 14 feet or so. simply incredible. Deep deep soundstage. musicians in space and pinpoint accurate. I was floored at just how music was coming from way back in the room. Jaw dropping revelation.
   Couldn't wait to go home and try something similar in my own room even though I lack the depth of room.
 I was listening to my system with the speakers located on the long wall about 9.5 feet away with my speakers about a 18 inches away from rear wall. Needless to say this congested everything without me even knowing it.
 Took those speakers and positioned them about 7.5 feet from the rear wall now set out using the rooms length instead of width. Positioned my listening chair about 5 feet away and Audio ECSTASY.
 My speakers opened up so much and the sounds filled the room with such a delightful smoothness and deep bass I couldn't believe they were the same speakers.
 OK ,test was over . There was absolutely NO WAY I could ever listen to my speakers set up any other way. While the wife slept I thought I would surprise her with some furniture readjustment and change the whole room around. Well, she thought it looked a bit weird but we were both tired of having the room the way it was so she didn't complain. After a day or so because of space I was sitting a little to far back now and kind of lost my nearfield listening position. I knew the little woman would never go for the couch in the 3/4 position  of the room so I had to make a compromise, at least the speakers were now breathing.
 Then my little blessing says "why don't you move the couch out and we can bring the curved part over here also. So what if it sticks out in the room". Bless her soul !!! Now I have my nearfield listening position, speakers sounding the best they ever have and complete WAF.
  Just a word of Thanks to Audiojerry for his hospitality and also for changing the way I listen to music forever.
 Maybe a suggestion for others who have not taken the free plunge into moving those speakers out into the room. If you need a change in your room or are tired of the same setup in your home . Go ahead take a chance and move things around where you think it might sound the best,use the room to its full potential. At the least just try throwing the speakers out into the room for an experiment and pull up a chair close and hear the difference. Heck, its free and worth a try. I will never go back.
 Later,
 Bill

[Carlman]

Well... this made me re-think my room a bit and do something I've been meaning to try... I'll preface this by saying I have a small room, only 11x13' including the protrusion of a bay window behind my speakers.

To make a long story short, I pulled my speakers 2 feet into the room and have a nearfield listening environment that is indeed a dramatic improvement over what I had.  I kept thinking I needed to get the speakers farther back but, no.  Bill/Audiojerry's trick was just the ticket to get a better soundstage and a little better palpability.

Thanks for reporting your findings.  I've enjoyed playing with this setup.  I may move the speaker in (away from sidewalls) and a little closer to see how far I can go to keep improving the stage.

Thanks again!!!

-Carl

P.S. BTW, I owe Bill a review of his most excellent Minimax amp.  I've been enamored with its ability as well as Bill's level of custom service.

[byteme]

Bill,

My visit to Jerry's had a similar effect.  I hope he played Jesse Cook's Bahgdad for you.  I had never heard the song before and it was the first thing he played for me on his system - it was, as you attest to, as though Mr. Cook was sitting on the counter in the back of the room playing for us.  That image is still burned in my mind and is to this point the best example I have ever hear of speakers dissapearing.  That will forever be my reference!

Thanks Jerry, and thanks Bill for reminding me about it!  I'll have to see if I can sneak my speakers out a bit further...

[cjr888]

Completely understand.  Have heard it in much larger rooms, but my typical listening setup would be something like the top half of the image below.  Realistically I sit farther back though.  I would go with long wall placement, but to do that and have the speakers away from the wall would put them in the path of .... everything, and dominate the room.

But while we were moving things around in between rennovations, the room was filled with items temporarily between listening position and the speakers.   Needed to hear some music though, so flipped the speakers around, completely haphazard placement, and pointed them where the rack usually is, and made that my seating position, and hit play.

Holy depth.  

Put in Tori Amos's "Way Down".  A quick tune, but with a number of backup singers that also briefly solo.  Tori was up front, the backup singers spread against the back wall, way back, and just plain eerie when the one backup singer has a line, all by her self, coming from the farthest corner of my room.

Being forced to go back to the old configuration just plain isn't the same.  

[Val]

I understand Bill's fascination with the newfound improvement. In a reasonably good-sounding room, placing speakers well out into the room unleashes their soundstaging and imaging capabilities; and listening nearfield maximizes the sound coming directly from the speakers, before reflections. The rule of thirds has worked well for me, but it has a low-WAF for those with other halves.

Val

[JLM]

cjr888, your first image is close to the Cardas recomended setup:

http://www.cardas.com/cgi-bin/main_content.cgi?area=Insights&content_id=27&pagestring=Room+Setup


cjr888, your second image is close to what Pierre Spear from Mapleshade Records recommends.

http://www.mapleshaderecords.com/index.php

[Paul L]

It is very interesting.  For most conventional speakers, the speaker positioning and listening position is very important.  However, I discover a full range speaker design is pretty inert to speaker repostitioning.  I can position the Konus Essence speaker anywhere convenient and still get the disappearing feeling of my system in my room.  But when I set up the Reference 3a De Capos, I spent about 3 months to get it bring the best out of them.

Paul Lam
P.L.C.Lam Consulting Inc.

[JLM]

Paul,

I wonder if your experience with the Konus vs. the DeCapos could be from either of the following differences:

1. The Konus is has less deep bass response;

2. At higher frequencies the Konus performs more like an infinite baffle.

Ronny from Carolina Audio builds speakers that are nearly identical to the Konus, but also offers somewhat larger two-way versions that have more bass.  He's told me in the past that the two act/sound very similar.

[Saviour_Machine_Fan]

I recently bought some new gear, and have the speakers set up along the short wall in my rectangular room (12 x 19).  I'd like to bring the speakers out more, but (besides the WAF), I can think of two impediments.
1. Pulling out the speakers usually increases the length (cost) of speaker wire.
2. Running speaker wire from amp to speakers creates a tripping hazard, especially if you subscribe to lifters.

Anyone have remedies to these two problems that I haven't thought of?

[Paul L]

JLM,
Despite the spec of the Essence is only down to 50 vs De Capos down to 44, the presentation are very different.  The transmission line in the Konus actually has more extended bass than the ported De Capos.  When playing orchestra music, the Essence is more real.  When playing percussion or music, the Essence does not have the impact of the De Capos.  The Essence sounds like a non-dipole electrostatics and the De Capos still has a trace of the box sound.  For technical listening, the De Capos is more all round.  However, if someone who does not like sitting down in the sweet spot to listen, the Essence is the choice.

[nathanm]

Bill - did you listen to familiar or unfamiliar music?  The reason I ask is that Jerry's system is the best I've heard with one caveat - it was the best I've heard playing music I never heard before!    Kind of a paradox...

[Bill O'Connell]

Hi Nathanm,

  I brought over to Jerry's some very familiar vinyl ( personal favorites) " For Duke Bill Berry M&K Realtime pressing, Eva Cassidy (Songbird ) Tracy Chapman, Nightnoise, and a couple others  and then Jerry had some recordings that he was familiar with. We listened at first with his current vinyl setup then with the new Eastern Electric Phono preamp. He was as impressed with the phono pre as I was with his listening setup. To quote Jerry " thats not another level its a whole story".
  The only other time I heard drums sound so real was at Quintessence Audio's dedicated room running a pair of Avantgard Duo's. All other instruments sounded fantastic also and vocals were stunning. To look at the system my first thoughts were ok nice stuff, upon hearing I was speechless( well almost ).
 I probably could have done without Jerry's first comments upon meeting though "Your old ".    I guess I have a young sounding voice over the phone. This was just after the counter guy at the golf course asked me if I was deserving of the senior rate.  then the bartender asked at the 19th hole if my brother and I were father and son.  Then upon visiting my mother in the hospital the doctor thought I was possibly her husband.     This business will turn you grey before your time.

 Later,
 Bill

[nathanm]

I probably could have done without Jerry's first comments upon meeting though "You're old ".  I guess I have a young sounding voice over the phone.

The nerve of that guy!  Well, you can get back at him by taking those Triphazer boxes off his speaker cables and hide them somewhere when he ain't lookin'.  Then see if he becomes wroth or not!  

I think the nearfield thing works great for vocally kinda stuff but for 'bigger' sounding music it seems a bit unnatural.  I was wowed by the count-the-bumps-on-Patricia-Barber's tongue tracks he played but some of my own tunes sounded small and thin.  I think the mini monitors make a big difference, if the speaker size is too large it doesn't blend very well up close.  There was a big soundstage improvement going from the SP Techs to the much smaller Dynaudios IMO.  Still, those little floorstanding things he had once was the most 3D thing I ever heard.  Don't remember what brand they were though.  It was like being back in the womb, only the womb was a brushed snare drum.