[AKSA]

Some here may recall Steve Harrison commenting once upon Master Set, a method of aligning and optimising a pair of loudspeakers into a listening room.  I now have first hand experience of this, and it is astonishing, a genuine revelation.   

Those who know my setup will realise that my sheepish comments that '...it's all in the room treatment' are merely laconic lip service.  My setup was appalling, and it was a credit to the system that it sounded any good at all.  But thanks to Steve, and Marty Walker, who came along for the day to assist, it's now transformed.  And the results are nothing short of magical......

I never gave much thought to the room, thinking it was maybe important but not too much of an influence.  Now I know better.....

Essentially, the speakers are placed against the wall about 8' apart (250cms) and oriented towards the listener, so that both speakers and the listener appear at the apexes of an equilateral triangle.  The left channel is then disconnected from the amp, the right channel only playing on a bassy passage.  We used the first track, 'Cowgirl', on Famous Blue Raincoat by Jennifer Warnes.  This is just a vocal accompanied by double bass.  Ignoring the vocal, you listen carefully to the bass line, and try to pick any resonant buzzing.  We noticed it strongly resonating on the tenth note into the piece.  This requires constant repetition, of course, but the music is slow, and after a time you can easily identify a buzzing resonance on one note.  At this point we began moving the right speaker (left disconnected) out from the wall.  At 18" from the wall, the buzzing disappeared, and no bass note was any more prominent than any other.

The right speaker done, we then reconnected the left channel, and repeated the procedure with both speakers driven.  Of course, any room will have asymmetries, and these will load the speakers differently, so the room gain arising from corner and wall proximities will necessarily differ for a fully balanced listening experience.  We found that the bass resonance, and more than that, the soundfield integrity, was optimised at 13" from the wall.   Both speakers are unfashionably oriented towards the listener, each at 60 degrees to the rear wall.  We also found that at this particular point, and the tolerance is critical at around 1/16" (2mm), the soundfield and image was pretty much unchanged regardless of wherever you stood in the room!   

I now have a system truly integrated with my listening room which I can proudly demonstrate to anyone seeking a true high end experience, absolutely every quality of the sound is now superior!!  Performance on percussion, orchestra, vocals, and horns is nothing short of phenomenal, and I'm gobsmacked by the differences.   

I sincerely thank Steve for his gracious expertise, and his willingness to come all the way from Ballarat, a provincial city about 1 1/2 hours out of Melbourne, to share his wizardry.   I thank Marty too for his greatly valued input cleaning up the room prior to Master Set!!  Thank you Steve, Marty is next!!    Laurie, you gotta hear this!! 

Cheers,

Hugh

[Felipe]

Hugh,

Congrats on achieving the perfect synergy in your room. I must say i tried to the same a few months back, when i first read about this method of speaker placement. I got no luck though.
I believe one ends up concluding that not all rooms are "treatable" on that theory basis, simply because you have to sacrifice other object placements. Of course 2 speakers in a practically empty room (carpets and sofas) could be placed in whatever spot is best for sound issues...if that room is a "listening room".

Much has been talked (here and other forums) what WAF matters in our lives. I think most will agree on that. MY room specifically must compromise the TV placement, sofas and some furniture. I thought i had a pretty "viable and modifiable" room...but soon i realized that the speakers can only move a couple of feet back or sideways...a little more and they are out in the wife area !! I cant reverse the room the other way around...so basically i got stuck in the process...never achieving that karma integrity.

Maybe i got the procedure wrong...maybe one cannot be limited by other factors to achieve it...maybe i don't know what i am talking about 

Any way....glad to hear someone really got it and its not just science fiction !!
Do post whateve your experiences are...

Best regards,
Filipe

[LM]

Laurie, you gotta hear this!!

And me???   

[AKSA]

Lyn,

Any time, amigo, bring it on.  Today, perhaps?

Hugh

[stvnharr]

Hello,
For those who wish, you can read everything here: http://www.audiocircle.com/index.php?topic=64320.0 This will also link to the procedural steps.
Master Set will essentially work with ANY speaker in ANY room, or so the master set gurus have told me and others.
My steps need to be followed religiously, and even then it can be hard to do. It can be hard to hear the unevenness in the bass note(s).
There can also be a very small tolerance space for mitigating the bass resonance in the speakers, like only 3-4 mm, which is not much.

I wrote my above writings on Audio Central and The Lab after successfully performing Master Set in my room in Ballarat.  I think it was the 3rd or 4th attempt. The last time was definitive in every way.  I was quite confident in every way, but maybe just got lucky.
The Master Set procedure yesterday at Hugh's was in interesting time. I think we got fairly close to perfection. The music sound is the same anywhere one listens in the room, and that means you are within a millimeter or two of perfection.

I thank Hugh for the writeup and I encourage any local Melbournians to come by his place for a listen. I'm sure Hugh will enjoy the company so as to procrastinate even further from needed and necessary other important duties that need to be done. If nothing else, one can marvel at the New Aksa Music Salon.

Just a couple more things, where the speakers sit in the room for perfect matching between them is not a matter of dimensions and distances, it's all about where the little spots happen to be. Each speaker and each room will be different. Even the bass notes that need atoning are different with each speaker in each room.  I've now done Master Set with 3 speakers in 4 different rooms. The bass note(s) that I have had to focus on has been different each time. The final placement of the speakers has been quite different as well. It all depends on the set of variables that the speaker/room interface present.

Also, for those who attempt this, don't be discouraged if at first you do not succeed in any way. Give yourself a break and some time, read up again, and try it all again. Doing this blind is VERY difficult as it can be very hard to hear the needed things. It took Hugh a bit of time yesterday to hear what I told him I was hearing. Marty had very difficult time as well. My initial efforts, some time ago, were the same. Eventually Hugh spoke the words that had once been spoken to me in advise by the Master Set guru, "you listen to any unevenness in the bass notes, and then try to make things as even as best you can".
Perseverance and patience are needed, some times in heaps.

Steve

[jhm731]

Did you take any measurements after performing Master Set to confirm that you've even out the bass?

What are the dimensions of Hugh's listening room?

[stvnharr]

Did you take any measurements after performing Master Set to confirm that you've even out the bass?

What are the dimensions of Hugh's listening room?

Measurements of what?
You listen to the bass line and move the speaker so as to obtain the most even response in the bass notes.
Granted, the ear as a measuring device is poor, but it is a good listening device.

The room dimensions are essentially irrelevant, and I don't know the dimensions of Hugh's room anyway.  What you first listen for is the bass resonance of the speaker/room interface.  There are only a few select spots where this is diminished, and that's what you try to find. The ear is as good a means as any, though I do think if one has a capacity for measuring that that could be quite useful.  But we didn't have that capability.

[AKSA]

JHM731,

No measurements taken, no expensive gear used.  Just priceless ears, backed by organic microprocessors, seasoned by human fallibility and suggestibility.  This makes the process achievable by anyone, and inexpensive.  You are looking for resonant peaks, clearly audible, as a bass instrument runs up and down the scale.  A lot of measurements were taken during development of the speakers, but in the room, it's all subjective....

The procedure attempts to identify and correct the resonant peaks in the room by careful placement of the speakers.  Once achieved for a particular set of speakers and a room it seems transferable to any kind of music.  It does not guarantee WAF, sadly, so it may not be workable for all.

Room is 4m x 5.5m, quite small.   Speakers are VSonics, two way transmission lines, designed by Laurie Menogue, also a Melburnian.  They are 89dB/watt/metre, crossover at 2600Hz, minimum impedance 5.7R, using the Peerless 884 woofer and 921 tweeter.  Phase shift across the 200Hz band at crossover is just 0.2 degrees.

Hope this is helpful.

Cheers,

Hugh

[LM]

Any time, amigo, bring it on.  Today, perhaps?

Hi Hugh,

Possibly.  I'm still officially on standby for Avalon but as I sit here listening to the thunder and hearing the rain fill my garden tanks after 2 months of waiting, I'm pretty happy they cancelled out on today's display and now I'm just waiting on the decision for tomorrow.  Think I might well be free this arvo when Rob is back from work.

It's not just Avalon that's under a cloud (like that one? - sorry) but the benefit concert for bushfire relief is on at the MCG today,  Ironic but its bucketing down.  Hope it still works out for them.  Give you a call as I'm most interested in the speaker positioning.

[Tliner]

Hi All,

Speaker placement is very critical. Following Master Set procedures is an excellent method of finding the correct speaker placement for your listening room, no doubt about that. But in my listening room it is not possible to live and have the VSonic speakers in the ideal position, they simply get in the way and I can't get the chairs far enough away from them. In my case the ideal listening position should be some 2 meters (8") further away from the speakers. Yes, and the room was designed as a listening room (18'w x 28'L x 12'H) with open spaces but over the years the spaces have been filled with stuff very successfully damping the speakers. But if speakers work well in my room they work much much better anywhere else.

When I fired up Hugh's VSonics for the first time (A/B them against the prototypes) in my room all was well and the bass had good slam but there was something lacking as Hugh's VSonics were in a slightly different position. I moved them (Hugh's speakers) around a bit and there was a really great improvement particularly with the soundstage, detail and imaging etc. I delivered them to Hugh a few hours later and the bass had extra slam, richness and depth. The speakers had more room to breathe, not as much furniture and stuff in Hugh's room, believe it or not! Later I heard, along with Martin a secondary bass note reflecting from subterranean levels below the floor. The speakers were duly placed on thick insulating carpet and all the parameters were lifted yet again. Now I will have to wait until Wednesday for a listen,

This revelation prompted me to move my speakers around a bit while playing "Cowgirl" getting the bass right as described earlier and what an improvement, and the speakers are not in the way. I moved the woofer around too and the imaging is about and it is about as good as it gets. But the slam and the overall bass is something really to be felt too. I have known that speaker placement is critical but have been too slack to do much about it. But what can someone do on a rainy day. Yes the rain is torrential in Melbourne at the moment.

I will be over on Wednesday Hugh, can't wait.

Cheers,

Laurie

[jhm731]

Hugh-

Mahalo for the info.

Steve-

Measurements of the in room speaker response using a calibrated mic at the listening postion and a PC based measurement program
can help confirm speaker placement.

Room dimensions can also be used to determine speaker postions that will minimize the interaction of room nodes, see:

 http://www.cardas.com/content.php?area=insights&content_id=27&pagestring=Room+Setup

I've also found that it helps to decouple the speakers from the floor by using isolation platforms like the Townshend or devises like the
Symposium Rollerblock Jr.

Aloha,

Dan

[stvnharr]

Hugh-

Mahalo for the info.

Steve-

Measurements of the in room speaker response using a calibrated mic at the listening postion and a PC based measurement program
can help confirm speaker placement.

Room dimensions can also be used to determine speaker postions that will minimize the interaction of room nodes, see:

 http://www.cardas.com/content.php?area=insights&content_id=27&pagestring=Room+Setup

I've also found that it helps to decouple the speakers from the floor by using isolation platforms like the Townshend or devises like the
Symposium Rollerblock Jr.

Aloha,

Dan

Hi Dan,
That's all fine if you want to buy all the needed stuff to do that measuring and etc. In fact, if it can be done on a real time basis this could be useful in instances where it's all a bit hard to hear things.  But it's not really necessary as it can be done by ear.
I've read the Cardas information and used to set my speakers up that way. However I find the Cardas information to be a bit random and with no explanation, let alone documentation, of the numbers as to what the numbers mean, or where they came from. A three decimal point number is pretty specific and should represent something, but there is nothing about that.

The most important part of setting speakers in the room is where they sit in relation to each other so that each speaker pressurizes the room equally. This can get to be a rather long winded explanation that will likely only confuse, so I'll leave it.

Master Set works on making each speaker equally pressurize the room making for a stable sound anywhere in the room.  The Cardas method does not do this. Cardas is pretty easy to set up, just a tape and some arithmetic.  Master Set is a bit difficult.
With Master Set you can sit anywhere in the room with same sound.  With Cardas there is a small sweet spot of a few inches only. Move from that and the sound changes.
Oh, there is no real studied documentation on Master Set either.  But it does do what it purports to set out and do.  It works.

Steve

[Tliner]

Hi Steve,

Last year when I was at a friends place he used the Master Set method of speaker algnment in a room. The first time I had heard of it and since nearly forgotten about it. The speaker alignment was satisfactorily done in less than a half hour. Later, after about 1/2 of set up a sweep with a Cardias equipment was completed. And although there were a lot of numbers produced they indicated that the speaker placement was about spot on.  As long as one knows what you are listening for IMHO the ears have it!

We have a holiday house and to set up a reasonably good listening area has defied every attempt to date. One speaker stuffed under a breakfast bar and the other is free standing at least 2 meters (6') from anything. Solution; wreck the room/house and completely alter it to suit music. Unfortunately there are some listening areas which are far from optimum and the poor old speakers are blamed for poor sound.

Cheers,

Laurie

[AKSA]

This thread could easily lead to conflict between those who measure and those who do not.    

There are two camps on this matter of speaker setup.  I am not saying measurement is unnecessary, or unimportant.  It is a legitimate, proven methodology.  A lot of measurement is also required when designing a speaker.  There is moreover a wide range of software available for sound and acoustic measurement.  But the correlation between what the software can do, the metrics it creates, and what the subjective, repeatable results are in the room is poorly documented.  Taking account of cost and effectiveness, with the input of a lot of work, Master Set gives good results which makes listener position almost irrelevant in the room.  To my knowledge nothing beats it on price, either.

If this thread deteriorates into a fight, I will terminate it immediately.  I will not tolerate fighting on my forum regardless of right or wrong.  

Cheers,

Hugh

[stvnharr]

Hi Steve,

Last year when I was at a friends place he used the Master Set method of speaker algnment in a room. The first time I had heard of it and since nearly forgotten about it. The speaker alignment was satisfactorily done in less than a half hour. Later, after about 1/2 of set up a sweep with a Cardias equipment was completed. And although there were a lot of numbers produced they indicated that the speaker placement was about spot on.  As long as one knows what you are listening for IMHO the ears have it!

We have a holiday house and to set up a reasonably good listening area has defied every attempt to date. One speaker stuffed under a breakfast bar and the other is free standing at least 2 meters (6') from anything. Solution; wreck the room/house and completely alter it to suit music. Unfortunately there are some listening areas which are far from optimum and the poor old speakers are blamed for poor sound.

Cheers,

Laurie

Laurie,
Everything has it's compromises, to be sure.
Master Set merely requires somewhat of some clean uncluttered wall space and a clear area in front of the speakers. The rear of the speaker is usually out into the room somewhere around a foot or so.  But for sure, not every room is adequate for doing this.
As with many things, you just do the best you can.

Steve

[richidoo]

The most important part of setting speakers in the room is where they sit in relation to each other so that each speaker pressurizes the room equally. This can get to be a rather long winded explanation that will likely only confuse, so I'll leave it.

At your convenience and pleasure Steve, I would very much like for you to indulge us in your ideas and understanding about Master Set. The subtleties are always the hard part to grasp. Your experience doing it a few times is valuable to us who are learning to do it. 

I bought a used CD with the Cowgirl song and it arrived scratched to hell, lots of dropouts. Inspired by this thread today, I finally found a way to play it without errors, so I am ready for 1st attempt at Master Set this weekend. Tonight while listening to it, I was thinking: The song only plays about 8 different bass notes in three chords. I have some bass measurement audio tracks which have sine tones at 1Hz increments, courtesy Realtraps. I was wondering if the two concepts could be put together in some way.  Would it be useful to create an audio track of acoustic bass playing a simple chromatic scale to hit more freqs while tuning? Or a series of tracks which focus on specific notes held for longer tones. I have gigastudio with a great acoustic bass sample, so I can create an acoustic recording of any pattern that might be valuable in tuning the speakers. Also, I find the singer's voice to cover up the bass at times, so maybe the cowgirl track can be used to tune mids after the hard work on the bass is done with a bass only track. I believe that the texture of the acoustic bass is critical to hearing resonance as a deviation from clarity. Sine wave signal has no texture so it would be useless for listening. A music signal is a more valuable test signal to test the room, just as it is with testing amps. I would love to know your thoughts on this Steve and Hugh. Thanks

fwiw, I have used Cardas Golden ratio setup and preferred placement by ear. I have moved the speakers (and treatments) where the software measurement told me to move them, it still wasn't anything special. Tact was pretty awesome, but gave me a headache from the fake space it created. My current setup is by ear, but symmetrical along the lines of traditional setup rules and sounds pretty good in the sweet spot, but less so elsewhere. I hope the master set can improve that as it has for you guys.
Thanks
Rich

[LM]

Hugh,
Looks like I'm now free tomorrow - I'll give you a ring later.

Steve,
I'm a little like Laurie, I have what is essentially a devoted listening room but it has a couple of fixed structures (let alone furnishings) that intrude and make it a rather asymmetric space and which leaves me with rather limited options for placement of each speaker.  I used the rules in the Vandersteen owners manual as a start point (does cater to some degree for asymmetry) and then moved the speakers in small increments till I was pretty happy with what I was hearing; but I'm equally certain there is still scope for improvement.  I guess the potential I'm seeing in this Master Set method is that it might well offer something towards improving my 'not strictly rectangular' room situation.  What do you think?

[stvnharr]

The most important part of setting speakers in the room is where they sit in relation to each other so that each speaker pressurizes the room equally. This can get to be a rather long winded explanation that will likely only confuse, so I'll leave it.

At your convenience and pleasure Steve, I would very much like for you to indulge us in your ideas and understanding about Master Set. The subtleties are always the hard part to grasp. Your experience doing it a few times is valuable to us who are learning to do it. 

Rich

Rich,
I'll try writing something up and posting it, but could take a little bit. I've thought a lot about what's going on with this, and coupled from what I've heard from the Master Set guru, Rod Tomsen, I might have something intelligible to write that goes beyond what I've already written.
The bass line in the Runaway Horse song is a bit limited in that there are only a select number of frequencies generated. However, I've always found that I have been able to hear an enhancement somewhere, and then been able to smooth it out, which is all that's really required.  I have often thought that a bass track, such as you suggest, could be helpful.
In some of my early attempts at MS, before I acquired the Horse song, I used a jazz track that opened with an acoustic bass scale that was repeated. But I had trouble getting the required bass enhancement from it.
For what ever reason, the bass line in the horse song works pretty well for what's needed.  The one thing I've found about the voice line is that when you get things real close to the matched point, the voice really tightens up into something nearly surreal. I've never been able to tune the mids, with the slight toe out of the speaker, as suggested in Master Set.  I've always heard near perfect evenness in the notes.

Steve

[stvnharr]

Steve,
I'm a little like Laurie, I have what is essentially a devoted listening room but it has a couple of fixed structures (let alone furnishings) that intrude and make it a rather asymmetric space and which leaves me with rather limited options for placement of each speaker.  I used the rules in the Vandersteen owners manual as a start point (does cater to some degree for asymmetry) and then moved the speakers in small increments till I was pretty happy with what I was hearing; but I'm equally certain there is still scope for improvement.  I guess the potential I'm seeing in this Master Set method is that it might well offer something towards improving my 'not strictly rectangular' room situation.  What do you think?

Room shape doesn't matter too much, as long as you have a clear wall to set up the speakers at the start.  One of the "points" in MS is to find the small zone where sound is heard from one speaker with both playing.  This only occurs in a small zone close to the wall, with the other speaker coupled to the wall. This setting of the "anchor" speaker is then independent from the other speaker and stays stable when the other speaker is moved.

One thing that should be remembered is that what one listens to from the two speakers is the summed response of both speakers. Thus there are two variables at play. In a non MS alignment, changing one speaker automatically changes the other one. With MS, you tend to just have one variable at play, and that does make things a little easier.

Steve 

[jhm731]

Hi Dan,
That's all fine if you want to buy all the needed stuff to do that measuring and etc. In fact, if it can be done on a real time basis this could be useful in instances where it's all a bit hard to hear things.  But it's not really necessary as it can be done by ear.
I've read the Cardas information and used to set my speakers up that way. However I find the Cardas information to be a bit random and with no explanation, let alone documentation, of the numbers as to what the numbers mean, or where they came from. A three decimal point number is pretty specific and should represent something, but there is nothing about that.

The most important part of setting speakers in the room is where they sit in relation to each other so that each speaker pressurizes the room equally. This can get to be a rather long winded explanation that will likely only confuse, so I'll leave it.

Master Set works on making each speaker equally pressurize the room making for a stable sound anywhere in the room.  The Cardas method does not do this. Cardas is pretty easy to set up, just a tape and some arithmetic.  Master Set is a bit difficult.
With Master Set you can sit anywhere in the room with same sound.  With Cardas there is a small sweet spot of a few inches only. Move from that and the sound changes.
Oh, there is no real studied documentation on Master Set either.  But it does do what it purports to set out and do.  It works.

Steve

Steve-

I use the Cardas formula as a starting point and move the speakers around from there. My room is just a bit smaller than Hugh's (138" x 210").

My speakers have rear firing ports. I've found that they sound, image and measure better further out from the rear wall. The sweet spot is not just a few inches.

BTW- Sumiko trains their dealers on the Master Set methodology. Here's a review:

http://forum.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/fr.pl?rspkr&1197744079

The Wilson Audio set up procedure also uses a similar methodology.

"With Master Set you can sit anywhere in the room with same sound."

If you're sitting a few feet directly in front of either speaker, the image/soundstage is the same as sitting between the speakers?

Dan