Whadda Ya Mean, Measurements?

[David Meek]

Okay all you sound poobahs, wake up! I've got some questions for you. In every speaker review ever written there is a sentence that goes something like ". . . placed each speaker 41 inches from the front wall and 23.5 inches from the side wall . . ." or some such.

Well, that's just lovely. WHAT portion of the speaker did this boob place that far from the walls? Did they mesure to the back of the speaker from the front wall? The front? The middle? Ditto on the side wall measurement? And what about toe-in? Are the measurements taken after toe-ing in the speaker or before? With toe-in you've now brought non-parallel surfaces into the measurement . . . . What's an anal-retentive type to do?
:B

If your speaker is 2 inches deep and 3 inches wide, it probably isn't going to matter 'cause their Bose and don't sound worth s$&% anyway. But for the rest of humanity, our speakers are deep enough and wide enough that this discrepancy can mess with the imaging and soundstage. What about it?




David - HTGuide flunky
Our "Theater"
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[JonMarsh]

Well, David, that's why the phrases "some assembly required" and "season to taste" were born, I suppose! :LOL:

What is very important re the bass in a room, is the distance from the boundaries, and the fb of the box. Ideally, you want to setup so that the room lift kicks in just as the speakers are starting to roll off. Obviously, this will vary depending on the design. The best fit occurs with a soft roll off, such as a Q of 0.5 sealed box, or an overdamped reflex alignment.

Also, the boundary distances must be staggered by the golden mean ratio to avoid peaks or nulls, i.e., to distribute the modes. That's 1.618:1. So, you might have the woofer cone 0.8 meter off the floor, depending on it's design, speaker stands, etc. Then, if your room is more narrow, the side wall distance would be 1.618 times that 0.8 meter. Then that distance is multiplied by 1.618 for the rear wall distance.

As to the placement the boobs in the print magazines use, well, do you think they're all that right most fo the time? Remember, the few that still do measurements (like Stereophile) DON'T measure them where they listen to them, and in fact splice in the near field LF curve to an MLS measurement above 200 Hz.

Trust your ears and your instincts. Just remember, though, it may not result in high WAF. But it will sound good....


Best regards,

Jon




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