[Mag]

Some of you guys have real nice rooms and equipment. But your doing it all wrong!! It's time to think outside of the box. Am I the only one doing this? Sure not everyone has an appropriate room, but if your one of the lucky ones Please do it right.
  What am I talking about? You need to have speakers directly off to the sides of your sweet spot as well as coming from the front. I also recommend another set in the diagonal gap. This creates a wide seamless soundstage and you will be immersed in the center of the action.
  When properly implemented it will only set you back $15,000. But hey, that's just pocket change for some of you.
 And you two-channel guys are definitely out of the loop.

[inguz]

I have no idea what you are saying  .  But the correct two-channel placement is better  .
http://www.essex.ac.uk/ESE/research/audio_lab/malcolmspubdocs/C78%20Loudspeaker%20placement.pdf

[dwc]

Counterpoint:

Multiple sources of sound (i.e. speaker drivers) coming in from different locations at different distances results in (what should be) a single "sound" arriving at your ear at different points in time.  This muddies your brain's spatial representation of the sound, destroying imaging.

Even on a single speaker, there are those who prefer a single driver over multiple drivers, this being one of the main reasons. It's also the reason why Meadowlark and other speakers "tilt back" to time-align their drivers.

[mjosef]

Isn't the object of Multi-channel to have many sources of sound from alll directions???? Like when you step out of your home into the world...sounds coming at you from many directions...

[bpape]

Yes - but they're supposed to be from discreet channels.  The surrounds provide mostly ambient information and also a path for pans from front to rear.

6 speakers playing 2 stereo channels set up as described would likely be a mess.

Bryan

[Mag]

On the contrary, if it sounded like hell, I would change it. Perhaps its not imaging one comes to expect with just 2 speakers. I would describe it sounding like the real thing. Don't get this confused with surround sound. This is a wide wall of sound covering 180 degrees in the front and sides like if you were sitting in front of a band at a bar.
 My observation with my ears and shape, sound coming from the side is perceived better than coming from the front. You still need the front speakers to fill the gap in the soundfield that is noticeably missing with just side speakers. With good placement and matching speakers the front and sides blend together giving the impression of one wide speaker not two or three. Speakers in the diagonal which are 2 feet farther away are not necessary, but add to a fuller sound.
   I want to clarify that the side speakers are also fronts.. The diagonal speakers in my setup are the surrounds for 5.1. And I think it sounds just as good as the movie theatre when watching movies. I should also place a surround speakers to the side, need to move wires around though.

[bpape]

The wall of sound is what I would expect.  Kind of like at a concert.  Just a wall of sound with no sense at all of imaging.  That's great for rock but not for much of any other kind of music where individual instruments definitely have their place. 

I also have to believe that if you ever measured the frequency response, you'd find a TON of issue related to comb filtering based on the interaction of all of the speakers.

Bryan

[Frihed91]

We all like different kinds of sounds and if there were anything such as "the same sound" we all hear it differently, anyway.  That makes for lots of room for us all to claim that A is right and B-Z is wrong.

This guy likes what he likes.

[bpape]

Absolutely - to each their own.  If that's what flips his switch, great. 

Bryan

[fredgarvin]

The imaging that we all enjoy is, of course, a studio illusion that has little to do with most live sound. Although in orchestral recordings that is not usually the case. I prefer great 2ch imaging myself rather than the "Wall of Sound". I remember in the '80's many audiophiles were using 2 rear channels with lowered volumes to produce an ambient or reverberated sound. Very open sounding. It was a nice idea actually.

[dwc]

I remember in the '80's many audiophiles were using 2 rear channels with lowered volumes to produce an ambient or reverberated sound. Very open sounding. It was a nice idea actually.

My father in the 80's bought a delay unit which he used on his "rear" speakers to enhance this effect.  Not sure how popular that was.

[fredgarvin]

Yeah, the digital delay was an outgrowth from pro sound. It was quite a wang-doodle and too expensive for me then. what I did then was stack 2 pairs of speakers,  three ways on the bottom(BIC) and my two way diy speakers on top.  Messed up imaging but a lot of slam! 

[John Casler]

I remember in the '80's many audiophiles were using 2 rear channels with lowered volumes to produce an ambient or reverberated sound. Very open sounding. It was a nice idea actually.

My father in the 80's bought a delay unit which he used on his "rear" speakers to enhance this effect.  Not sure how popular that was.

Likely an "AudioPulse Digital Time Delay".  I had a few of them.  They actually worked well if you didn't "overdo" the echo/delay and volume.

I had mine in 1973ish.  I used it for the rear channels of a HT, before there "WAS" such a thing as HT.

In fact that was before VCR's, so I used a SONY Broadcast 3/4" Tape deck.

The Monitor was an ADVENT 750 front projection TV, which was spectacular for the day.

[Digital]

.
I used to listen to a lot of music in strict, 'old-school' 2-channel, but lately have been really digging the subtle, yet enveloping sound field I experience with Dolby's IIx circuit engaged.

Try it out for yourself and let me know what you think.  To me, it appears to be pretty much the only matrix effect offered by my equipment to manipulate the musical reproduction in a way that might be considered 'natural depth of field'.  The reproduction I refer to is from LP and standard redbook CD, not surround SACD or DVD-A ~ though these sound great with IIx as well.

Andrew D.
cdnav.com

.

[nathanm]

Does anyone know if there had been any experiments done using discreet, multi-channel mono recordings of instruments in isolation played back over multiple speakers arranged in such a manner so as to mimic the physical locations of the instruments in space?  I remember reading something where they did it with a choir, but I am not sure about a regular band setup.

[95bcwh]

This is the first time I saw this article! And only now I realized that what I have been doing actually have some scientific basis My two channel setup is very similar to Figure.1  in this paper. I have a small room 10ft width x 14.5ft long x 8ft height, by conventional wisdom, many people would have place the two speakers along the shorter wall and have them firing down the long wall. I've tried that, but I didn't like the compressed soundstage because my speakers were too close to each other (< 6ft). So I turn the whole setup around and have my speaker aligned along the long wall, 8.5ft apart, and I sit pretty close to the wall (just like Figure 1). The phantom image that I got was phenomena! Way better than most of the systems I heard at the RMAF06.

I have no idea what you are saying  .  But the correct two-channel placement is better  .
http://www.essex.ac.uk/ESE/research/audio_lab/malcolmspubdocs/C78%20Loudspeaker%20placement.pdf

[MaxCast]

Sometimes I prefer 5 channel stereo instead of the DPL II.  Just like CD's the program material is hit or miss. 
Try turning off  (if you can) the three front speakers in DPL II mode.  Listen to the  garbage that (sometimes) comes out of the rears.

[Mag]

The first time I tried speakers to the side I had them like 3 feet away perpendicular to my left and right ears. The placement in the room wasn't all that good in my L shaped living room. Anyways the sound seemed to come from in front of me and not from the speakers. I thought it sounded phenomenal.
I evolved to multi-channel stereo from surround sound. I had upgraded to better speakers and had every intention of selling my other ones. But before doing that I thought why not see if using more speakers makes a difference. For me it sounded better so I just left them in my setup. Eventually I thought I'd try using the width of the room with speakers to the side instead of length of room setup front and back. Not only was I hearing way more detail it had a wide soundstage which I grown use to. IMO it comes down to your room acoustics as to whether or not you need or can use extra speakers. In my situations more speakers has always sounded better to me than two.