[Peter Wieck]

On Apr 26, 9:23=A0am, Robert Peirce wrote:
For me, stereo is about the imaging. =A0I can't tell if my room is down
3db at 400hz, and frankly, I don't care as long as it sounds good. I
don't even go in for room treatment of any sort. =A0Every room, including
a concert hall is going to have peaks and dips. =A0I just live with that.

Right now I have a pair of Apogee Divas in a room that is about
15.5'x25'. =A0Maybe I just got lucky, but I can walk just about anywhere
in the room and the image is locked in place. =A0The only place this fail=
s
is if I stand within a foot directly in front of one of the speakers.

I am planning to move and most of the rooms I am looking at tend to be
on the order of 10-12'. =A0Sometimes they are almost square. =A0I was all
hyped up on one product as a possibility for such a room until I found
out it was more about getting correct response from the room then the
kind of imaging I am after.

So, are there any imaging nuts out there who are dealing successfully
with small rooms? =A0What are you doing?

Yikes:

Coming in late, I get to see what has already been discussed to-date.
Cutting to the chase, I would refer you to advice published in the
early 1960s from no less than Acoustic Reseach on speaker placement.
Given that they specialized in acoustic-suspension 'bookshelf'
speakers of conventional/conservative (today) design, this will not
apply in detail to your speakers, but it will do so in general.

Take the longest wall in your room. Place one speaker (A) about two
woofer-diameters in from one corner. Place the other (B) about midway
between the first speaker and the other wall. Experiment with the
placement of speaker B until you have the what you perceive as the
best placement. Start with both speakers as close to the wall as
possible, moving only speaker B until you are happy. Then A out from
the wall (or not) and so forth. In/out from the wall affects bass
primarily. Distance from the walls and each other affects soundstage
primarily. Asymmetrical placement reduces/eliminates standing waves
and cancellation waves as well as multiple sorts of room effects.

This will give you the widest "sweet spot" available - closest to what
you (apparently) perceive in your present location.

Repeat the process on the shorter wall.

AR suggested at the time that if there was a listening audience and if
the listening room was used for other purposes than music, the long-
wall placement would quite regularly 'win' as it gave the greatest
audience spread. If for a single listener in a dedicated room, the
short-wall would win as the sweet spot could be made quite small. And
the natural progression to that concept is headphones.

OPINION (typical rant removed): I find the concept of a tiny sweet
spot as antithetical to the listening experience and about the
furthest thing from duplicating a live setting as is possible (except
for headphones). If I *must* keep my ears within a 12"/31cm cube in
order to realize the best possible performance from my speakers - that
is simply nuts.

Peter Wieck
Melrose Park, PA

AR3a
Maggie MG-III
Revox Piccolo
ARM5
AR14
AR Athena
Dynaco A25