Nautilus 801 bass/room size amplifiers

Square rooms are supposedly acoustically inferior to rectangular shaped rooms. I've only had rectangular rooms so it's hard to verify.

Nevertheless, it is my experience that speaker placement can go a very long way in minimizing the negative affects of a room's inherent acoustic deficiencies.

You might try moving the speakers out perhaps 8 ft or more from the wall behind them. This should help quite a bit if you've not tried this before.

At the same time, you might also consider placing the speakers no more than perhaps 4 or 5 ft from the side walls.

(all measurements from the front center of woofer).

From this starting point, listen for a day or so and then move the speakers around in 4 inch increments (front, back, sideways) attempting to locate the best bass compromise. With a little diligence, you hopefully will find a speaker location that smooths out the entire bass region at least to a much greater extent than what you previously had.

Afterwards, you might try moving the listening chair about to also help obtain the best sonics. Although speaker placement should have a far greater impact over chair placement.

In addition, you might want to ensure that:

1. you have good heavy carpeting/large rugs and pad installed.
2. All reflective surfaces are removed i.e. tables, floor lamps, leather furnishings, mirrors, glass pictures, etc..

-IMO

While you're working on Stehno's suggestions, *do* extend the length of the room. This should help with room modes.
BTW, an agoner called Rives is into acoustics: you might try his site (site) or try contacting him for advice (if he doesn't catch on here).

Cardio:

I've had 805, 801 and 802's. In 25 years of high end, with planars, electros, ribbons, and more dynamics than you can shake a stick at, the 801 were the wooliest, hairiest speakers (both with and without flutes, Arcici's, etc.) I ever tried to work with

IN 24x14x9 plaster and lathe or 17x13x8 (way too small) drywall rooms, they had an unconquerable rise at 80 hz that ran from min. 8 db to max 12 db no matter where situated. the 802 were some better, but not much. Symphonic Lines and Levinsons (which I understand they were voiced with) never really opened them up. I tried 400 watts per channel of PS Audio, thinking that was it, but no.

Obviously, they work for some folks. Too many studios use them for classical mixdown for them to sound as bad as all that. I'm just saying that, in my experience, these were the most difficult and frustrating speakers I've ever tried to work with and I spent big money on updated, aftermarket x'overs, stands, and so forth. If you like them, the Rives Parc e.q. is the way to go and cheaper than trading the speakers and buying new.

Good luck,
Jeffb28451

Thank's for all of the great suggestions.
I've improved the bass to a listenable quality by moving the speakers about 6 feet out. Originaly I didn't think this could work because this puts the chair close from the back wall and from past experiments with other speakers this ruined the midrange, anyway whith the 801 everthing improved, soundstage, more relaxed sound and less brite. I will try even further as stehno sugjested.

I just plugged my room size in rives program on the website(informative) and the speaker position came out close to what I have now but I'm going to try the exact placement. I can see needing rives eq(good reviews) at some point and I imagine it to work good with a bi-amp system as it could be inserted before the woofer amps only?.. Comments please.

Has anyone heard the improvements from raising the 801 off the floor?

Joel

I never had the 801 in my room, but tried to get them to work elsewhere. The results were much like Jeffb's above -- incidentally with a class A Symphonic Line amp (125W rms/channel): a bump s/where in the late70's early 80's.

We did raise them off the ground using Nordost pulsar points (because those were available:)) to reduce floor bounce. It could be worth your trying.

You'd use an equaliser before the amp(s) and tailor the sound to your room according to the response you get at the listening position.

Some room treatment (bass traps & diffusers) will probably help more than anything -- but it will clutter the room:(

I also have 20x20x8.5 room.
I sit 15ft from the front and place the N801 40" from the front wall (measured to the tweeter) and 8.5 separation.
Did you say it will improve the sound by sitting against the backwall and move the speakers forward?

my 801's are placed almost exactly as rives simulator shows(around 5 feet from the front of the speaker) except I went for further apart(around 7.5 feet apart inside to inside). My room is 17 by 20 not 19 by 20. I measured wrong initialy. My seat is about 2.5 to 3 feet from the back wall. When I look at this it seems close to the wall to me and I picture a major reflection, which there is when the volume is turned up. I'm expanding my room to 27 feet.

Asin I'd like to know how you feel about the bass accuracy from 801. Check out thread: nautilus 801 bass accuracy... Thank's

I too have the N801's but in an L shaped room. They have given me real difficulties in the bass and I have been through Tact 2.0, Tact 2.2X, Rives and currently some Rane eq's believe it or not. I have also tried elevating them 6" or so (pointed down slightly - helped the bass but made a mess of the mids and was as dangerous as hell as we live in an earthquake prone area). The best I have achieved from them is by moving them further out from the wall on their standard castors - the fronts are currently about 6' from the rear wall. Other things that have helped have been eliminating the use of valve preamps - had two including a CAT - both added woolliness in the bass that the 801's make sound even worse. The various eqs all have their plus and minus points - I biamp so the Rane and Rives are able to be placed in the woofer path only. The Tact is a lot more complicated since it is a full range device and also has processing delays - no half measures there. Speaker cables also had effect - some added woolliness to the bass too. Right now I just use 3 paralleled cat 5 cables stripped and platted 3.0m long - works well - 1m didn't - no idea why not.

They really can be awesome speakers but they have to be driven with seriously good gear to get the best from them - otherwise they can sound pretty average or worse which I'm sure accounts for a lot of the negativity out there.

Good luck - any questions?

Murray

I had 801s for a while and was 'ok' with some room treatments. Then I replaced them with 800s and got a Accuphase DG-28 digital equalizer which did a lot for them to get rid of the Grand Canyons in the bass. Then I replaced those with Wilson Audio Maxx - and happily sold the equalizer, since it couldn't better the response of the Maxx....

There must be something to the large B&Ws that is not optimal....