Soundstage - Too much?


Is there such a thing as too much soundstage? Should the width of the stage extend to the side walls in your listening room? How would you compare the soundstage in your system to live music?
jtinn

Showing 2 responses by cornfedboy

jtinn: it's difficult for me to imagine an audio system's producing "too much soundstage." the width of the perceived image, like many other things, is affected by the quality of your components and the attributes/frailties of your listening enviroment. my speakers are just over 7 1/2 feet apart center-to-center and are placed some six feet from the side walls and rear wall. with a number of sources, the image doesn't just extend to the side walls but well beyond them. more typically, the depth of the perceived image is well behind the rear wall of my sound room. how do i compare this to a live performance? i usually can't unless i'm listening to a live performance of a familiar group or orchestra. studio recordings reflect the production and engineering more than a "reality" you might expect. drums, for example, are frequently recorded in spaces isolated from other instruments and vocalists. tracks are often recorded in different venues and then melded together in a seemingly coherent whole. i have a few discs through which i test an unfamiliar system's sound stage. generally, i begin with a couple of well-recorded acapella pieces: two of my favorites are by the fairfield four and the persuasions. on superior systems in good sound spaces, you should be able to close your eyes and "see" each singer placed properly in a straight or curved line that shifts slightly as the performers move in relation to their assigned microphones. for testing depth of image, i have a few other favorite discs. two of these (among many) are lt. kije on refernce recordings (lp and cd) and fanfare for the common man on telarc cd. from these i move to some rock pieces, including by way of example, the pink floyd tracks from the burmester test disc (vorfurings-cdii). these recordings should seem to come from everywhere, even behind your head. for image size, i generally rely on recordings with solo acoutic guitars; one of my favorites is "treetop flyer" from stephen still's stills alone. if, after all this, i want to get some fix, however flawed, on how a system compares to live performances, i put on two discs with which i have great familiarity, both by the eagles: hell freezes over (cd) and eagles live (japanese vinyl). no, you can't, IMO, get too much soundstage but can produce unrealistically large images of voices and instruments--elephant-like is my description. (after reading this, i fear i may have strayed a bit off topic here but hope you'll find my experiences helpful, nonetheless.) good hunting. -kelly
david99: it's easiest, of course, to measure from the edges of your speakers. the measurements that usually count most, tho, are from the center of your speakers (if alingned or approximate center if not) and the vertical mid-plane of the surface(s) to which the drivers are attached. but, as sedond notes: "the farther the better" is the general rule of thumb, no matter how you measure.