[Hipper]

The issue with speakers and nearfield is if they integrate all the drivers at your listening position.

Before you commit to replacing your current speakers you should seek advice from the speaker manufacturers, or other users, on the question of nearfield listening. Ideally of course you should trial speakers in your room.

My speakers are these:

http://pointillistic.com/vmps-audio/RM30.htm

122cm tall and 150cm from my ears but they work well like that.

[EVOLVIST]

The issue with speakers and nearfield is if they integrate all the drivers at your listening position.

Before you commit to replacing your current speakers you should seek advice from the speaker manufacturers, or other users, on the question of nearfield listening. Ideally of course you should trial speakers in your room.

My speakers are these:

http://pointillistic.com/vmps-audio/RM30.htm

122cm tall and 150cm from my ears but they work well like that.

Heh. To the bolded point, throughout my long search for speakers, I've yet to run into a speaker manufacturer who has said that their speakers won't work in my room. Maybe they are just figuring that the end user will have room treatment/correction already, or maybe they just want to sell speakers.

At any rate, with the ones that are being made for me I have a 60-day return policy, so the max I'm out is the shipping back to the company.

[brother love]

Re: nearfield listening ...

If you can do the 5' triangle, great; but I am using 6' & it works out best measurement-wise for my 12' x 14' space.

Based on your previous more expansive room ...

If you prefer a wide soundstage (which I personally do), toe-in your speakers to where the intersection is approx. 1 ft. in front of your head.

You mentioned the loaner speakers, but what new speakers did you purchase?  Type of speakers could play into orientation/ placement recommendations.

[EVOLVIST]

Re: nearfield listening ...

If you can do the 5' triangle, great; but I am using 6' & it works out best measurement-wise for my 12' x 14' space.

Based on your previous more expansive room ...

If you prefer a wide soundstage (which I personally do), toe-in your speakers to where the intersection is approx. 1 ft. in front of your head.

You mentioned the loaner speakers, but what new speakers did you purchase?  Type of speakers could play into orientation/ placement recommendations.

I'm not as much of a soundstage person as I am a depth and imaging person. Obviously, soundstage is nice, but it some cases, depending on how far your speakers are apart, it can be a little artificially wide, like listening to a pair of Senn HD800s. It's still very pleasing, though.

As for the speakers, I've ordered Tekton Design "Mini-Ulfberhrts," which aren't even on their website yet. I think my serial numbers will be #3&4.

So, these guys are a bit taller at 5'3", which should be fine with an 8ft ceiling. They are nominally thin at 10" and average in depth at 15". I made sure to order them with grills, otherwise they would be butt ugly due to their double tweeter array.

Of course like I said in my last post I have 60-days on them as a trial, yet since they are so new, and nobody has actually gotten them in hand yet, I have no idea how long it's going to take to get them to me. It was said 2 weeks, but I ordered them August 7th, and there's been no word.

In speaking with James from GIK this morning, he wasn't too concerned with what speakers I have in the room, as long as the problems inherent to the room or fixed.

It's amazing that I could feel that anxious over listening to speakers in my untreated room. It makes sense, however, in that my brain is trying to decode left speaker reflection on the right side of my head, and vice versa.

[timind]

Cool article. Steve is practically a legend.

Do you happen to have pics of your room?  No bother if you don't. I was curious in how your room looks.

For me, the main improvement with the square room config was image depth.
Here are a few pics:

[EVOLVIST]

Timind...That is really friggin' cool! Thank you.

After reading the article it really got me to thinking. You asked for a rainy weekend, well, I'm in Houston, Texas, so this one will be quite rainy. If I have power I'll be good to go. 

[roscoe65]

For me, the main improvement with the square room config was image depth.
Here are a few pics:

How far from the front walls are your speakers?

[Wind Chaser]

I'm not as much of a soundstage person as I am a depth and imaging person.

This doesn't make any sense. The soundstage is the context for the content of imaging. The two go hand in hand. A puny soundstage may work for a very simple arrangement, but not much else. You can't pour a pint into a shot glass. There has to be enough room on the stage for everyone with adequate space between them to facilitate good imaging. Too many people have no idea as to what good imaging is because their speakers aren't far enough apart, so everything is tightly crammed together like sardines in a can.

[timind]

How far from the front walls are your speakers?

Not sure what the front wall is in this config, but measured from the tweeters: straight behind to wall is 32 inches, straight to side along plain of baffle is 36 inches and diagonally to wall is 25 inches. Speakers are 70 inches apart measured tweeter to tweeter. My listening position from tweeter to ear is 7 to 8 feet depending on mood and chair placement.

When I initially set this up it was eyeballed. After living with it I decided to measure for exact placement by measuring from the corner on each side and running a string across the room. I then measured along the string to get perfect speaker placement and taped spots on the floor.  My eyeball measurements were off a couple inches from perfect.

Here are a couple pics of my first attempt when I was using Thiel 1.6 speakers. The Thiels should give an excellent spatial presentation. In the square room I couldn't get any image depth so tried this after some research and am sticking to it. I have the opportunity to move into a more traditional shaped room, but I'm too happy with what I'm hearing to change.

Here's a before and after with Thiels:

[EVOLVIST]

This doesn't make any sense. The soundstage is the context for the content of imaging. The two go hand in hand. A puny soundstage may work for a very simple arrangement, but not much else. You can't pour a pint into a shot glass. There has to be enough room on the stage for everyone with adequate space between them to facilitate good imaging. Too many people have no idea as to what good imaging is because their speakers aren't far enough apart, so everything is tightly crammed together like sardines in a can.

I'm talking an overtly large soundstage greater than 90 degrees. Perhaps I wasn't clear enough. Anything greater than 90 degrees is not inherent in a stereo recording, with 80 degrees being more of the norm, at least from my understanding. I mean, haven't you heard placement of speakers to where everything in the center sounded diffuse, because the speakers were too wide apart, causing elements of the recording, right and left, to sound hard panned when they really are not?

[Wind Chaser]

I'm talking an overtly large soundstage greater than 90 degrees. Perhaps I wasn't clear enough. Anything greater than 90 degrees is not inherent in a stereo recording, with 80 degrees being more of the norm, at least from my understanding.

90 degrees? 80 degrees? Could you explain what you mean by this?

I mean, haven't you heard placement of speakers to where everything in the center sounded diffuse,because the speakers were too wide apart...

Honestly, I have not. Usually it's the exact opposite where the speakers are too close together and the soundstage is too small.

[EVOLVIST]

90 degrees? 80 degrees? Could you explain what you mean by this?

You might want to read up on the origins of stereo. Alan Blumlein. How the Westrex system of 45/45 on the cutting head of a record was developed and why, and how that still applies to recordings today, because even when recording consoles began implementing pan pots (as opposed to simply assigning elements right and left), these pots were still limited to 45 degrees for the right channel, and 45 degrees for the left, making a sum of 90 degrees. How your recordings were mixed is encoded into vinyl or CD, and the max that an analog mixing board can throw the soundstage right and left is 90 degrees.

There are, however, digital widening effects, and of course binaural audio, but, as you might know, this accounts for an extremely small percentage of available recordings.

Despite the limitations of 90 degree stereo, the pleasant surprise has always been spacial cues, due to great microphone techniques, which adds depth, layers and 3D information to recordings. See also Alan Blumlein. This is where the magic of stereo really comes in, when you have engineers who know how to properly mic instruments, to set the depth of recordings. On the other hand, these same techniques lend themselves to mono recordings, too, so it's no limited to just stereo.

[Wind Chaser]

I'm not interested in reading up on the history of stereo. We were talking about something else. If you have a clear concise answer to my question that would help; if not, that's fine.

[EVOLVIST]

I'm not interested in reading up on the history of stereo. We were talking about something else. If you have a clear concise answer to my question that would help; if not, that's fine.

I'm not sure what's difficult to understand. If you can only separate instruments 90 degrees, while using pan pots in a mixing console, then the width of the stereo image will max out at 90 degrees. Period.

You can attempt to circumvent what's inherent on the physical medium by placing your speakers a certain distance apart, but that does not mean you will achieve a "wider" soundstage, only a possibly skewed one. But yeah, I've heard center channel imaging become recessed in the soundstage by having too great of a distance between speakers.

That's as succinct as I can put it. Otherwise, you can lead a horse to water...

As for me, my goal is to learn more about room treatment, which is why I've taken every post into consideration (for those addressing room treatment, that is).

[Wind Chaser]

  

You're still not making any sense. You mentioned "an overtly large soundstage greater than 90 degrees." WTF is a 90 degree soundstage??

[brother love]

https://www.stereophile.com/asweseeit/36/index.html

"Classical stereo theory, applicable to recordings made with crossed-pair coincident microphones, suggests that for optimal playback the speakers should be placed 45 degrees to the left and right of the stereo centerline, subtending a total angle of 90 degrees. But in many living rooms (and dealer showrooms as well), the total angle is only 45 degrees or so. Many books and magazine articles suggest an intermediate answer of 60 degrees (±30 degrees from the centerline), with the two speakers and the listener's chair forming an equilateral triangle."

I do the equilateral triangle set-up, so 60 degrees. That is why I toe-in my speakers to intersect a foot in front of me in order to get a wider soundstage than my speakers (but still keeping the same distance for each leg of the equilateral triangle). To each their own though.

[brother love]

This doesn't make any sense. The soundstage is the context for the content of imaging. The two go hand in hand. A puny soundstage may work for a very simple arrangement, but not much else. You can't pour a pint into a shot glass. There has to be enough room on the stage for everyone with adequate space between them to facilitate good imaging. Too many people have no idea as to what good imaging is because their speakers aren't far enough apart, so everything is tightly crammed together like sardines in a can.

EVOLVIST, to Wind Chaser's point ...

I have always thought of soundstage accounting for overall width & depth of the musicians on the stage, & imaging accounting for specific musicians/ instruments location on  a stage. I always refer to J. Gordon Holt's Audio Glossary:

https://www.stereophile.com/reference/50/index.html

imaging: The measure of a system's ability to float stable and specific phantom images, reproducing the original sizes and locations of the instruments across the soundstage. See "stereo imaging”.

stereo imaging: The production of stable, specific phantom images of correct localization and width. See "soundstaging," "vagueness," "wander."

phantom image: The re-creation by a stereo system of an apparent sound source at a location other than that of either loudspeaker.

soundstaging, soundstage presentation: The accuracy with which a reproducing system conveys audible information about the size, shape, and acoustical characteristics of the original recording space and the placement of the performers within it.

[EVOLVIST]

Right. I had already said something to affect that I wasn't being clear with my original post.

Those are very cool definitions. Thanks for those.

Phantom image.... Hmmmm....

[Wind Chaser]

https://www.stereophile.com/asweseeit/36/index.html

"Classical stereo theory, applicable to recordings made with crossed-pair coincident microphones, suggests that for optimal playback the speakers should be placed 45 degrees to the left and right of the stereo centerline, subtending a total angle of 90 degrees.

Okay, that is a clear explanation, but from the way Evolvist explained it, I'm not so sure that's what he meant.

[EVOLVIST]

Okay, that is a clear explanation, but from the way Evolvist explained it, I'm not so sure that's what he meant.

I explained the mechanics behind it, but you refused to read - instead wanting to be spoonfed the information - which explains why you suddenly get it, when someone actually spoonfed you. Then, in a not so subtle way, you have either refused, or you are incapable of drawing a logical line from A to B to C.

In the quoted text from Stereophile they explicitly say that the speaker setup in question is tied to the actual recording, which I have been saying all along, i.e. mic techniques, which dovetailed into record cutting techniques, which ran into the way recording consoles were designed, which all runs into sound reproduction via a physical medium, which is the same as it was 80-years ago (more or less). Thus the quoted article.

I hope you've learned something. Now, do us both a favor and stay away from me, unless you can draw a little diplomacy from your passive/aggressive tendencies.