Speaker Help Required


I have a 12'x14' living room with a cathedral ceiling.

My 2-channel audio system is along the 12' back wall. I have a 6.5' audio / video rack which houses all my audio gear (mostly Linn) with a bookshelf speaker (Linn Katan) at each side of this rack (roughly 7.5' apart) sitting on stands (Linn Katan stands). The left speaker is about 3' from the side wall and 2' from the back wall with a powered subwoofer (Linn Sizmik 10.25) between the left speaker and the side wall in the corner. The right speaker is also 2' from the back wall but no side wall since it is an opening to my hallway.

Because of this setup, I’m hearing more of the left speaker than the right speaker. I tried different amounts of toe-in, which seems to help a little but I’m still not 100% satisfied. Some people have suggested that since the Katan are very small speakers, the subwoofer is not only providing the added bass but may be participating in some midrange too which is why I’m hearing more of the left channel.

Since I cannot move things around in my living room nor add a door to the hallway opening, I’m looking for a pair of “full range” floorstanding speakers to replace my bookshelves / subwoofer combo in hopes of rectifying this problem. Also, my wife is totally opposed to any “room insulation / sound proofing” idea since we use this room for entertaining friends and family and the décor is her territory.

What floorstanding speakers would you recommend for a $2000-$2500 budget that will help with my issue?
agiaccio

Showing 3 responses by martykl

Map, IME it's the rare plant / plant stand that's meaningfully absorptive in
specifically this region (or any region, actually, although they can be effective as
dispersion tools) These devices aren't gimmicks. That most analytical of a-
philes, John Atkinson, has written pretty extensively on why these treatments are
among the most effective tools available to the listener and he details the
physics involved for those who might be interested. OTOH, a plant might do
the trick and there's no arguing the price advantage!

Marty
My guess is that you're getting bass reinforcement between 80ish and 150ish cycles from the left corner and none on the other side since there is no corner. This may well be audible since it can generate lots (app 12db in my room, relative to 80db) of excess energy in this frequency range which is vaguely directional. Any floorstander with enough bass output will create the same frequency response hump, so if this is indeed your problem, that's not the answer.

A $350 bass buster (or app$450 ATC bass trap) is the best solution. These are hemholtz resonators tuned to absorb energy in the octave above 80hz (this is a very common problem). I'm told the ATC version allows some "fine tuning" of the active range. BTW, even if this doesn't solve your stated problem (left leaning sound) you'll probably be very happy with the overall improvement in sound. I sure was.

Good Luck,

Marty
BTW the bass buster is 4' tall and -in cross section - is shaped like 1/4 of a circle (fat wedge of pie). The flat sides are each 9" deep and they snug up to the walls forming the corner. There are about 100 colors available - so you may want to check the echo buster web site before concluding that the wife wil nix the idea.

Marty