Speakers that work close to a back wall

Ghettoyout, if you're spending that sort of money, I'd recommend you audition the big Shahinians. Audio-T in Reading have Hawks.

Thank you for the tip regarding the Hawks. May well investigate. My dealer has now lent me a pair of Duette 2s. They are very substantial speakers with heavy duty stands. They come in wooden crates. You would need a van for all the various boxes. No wonder they retail at £20,000 with a 15% price rise, or thereabouts, to come.

Anyway, as you might expect, they are very good. Treble was  a bit bright for me though. They are not as natural sounding as the Sabrinas for example. They do tend to disappear and image very well. Although very well made, they are a lot of money.

Probably worth waiting for the new Kudos models that should plug the gap between the Titan and S20s.

I remain,

Ghetto Yout'.

If you want speakers that work close to a wall then you might want to select ones that aren't rear ported. In my experience, most rear ported speakers need 60cm or more to sound really good, which is not practical in many rooms. I'm at a loss to explain why manufacturers do this.

One exception is ATC, who make sealed speakers. They sound excellent even close to a rear wall. A Supernait has plenty of power to drive them too.

Solid Air posted:

If you want speakers that work close to a wall then you might want to select ones that aren't rear ported. In my experience, most rear ported speakers need 60cm or more to sound really good, which is not practical in many rooms. I'm at a loss to explain why manufacturers do this.

Rear ports help lessen the audible noise from air movement & internal cabinet higher freq noises that can be heard with front ports.   Yes they do need more space to sound at their best because of rear wall reinforcement,  but I point the finger at some manufacturers who aim for max and/or lightly damped bouncy bass that forces out in the room placement.  That aside there is a lot of rubbish myths about ports & rear ports in particular.  Bottom ported designs seems to be best of both worlds.    I have designed my own speakers to work closer to the wall than would be normal with commercial rear ported designs, so it can be done. But if I was looking for a speaker to buy that worked best close to the wall,  then I would for sure choose an IB  (non ported) design.  

The speakers I've heard that best handle this are from PMC (TL design) and ATC (sealed box design). However, I should say that I've mainly tried standmounts, and it may be that floorstanders have different characteristics.

Back to the drawing board. I've had a nice extended home demo of the Larsens and have finally decided they are not for me so they are back in their boxes ready to go home and the PMC's are back in place for now. The Larsens were a lot of fun but ultimately not quite what i want and as i keep speakers for a long time (and am positively glacial in making a decision) i'll be taking my time choosing the next pair. The search continues....

I'm with Mike-B.  Close to a wall go for Sealed Box / Infinite Baffle designs.  All ported design principles (front, rear, bottom, open TL etc.) have design compromises that are exacerbated when placed close to a wall, even though the degree of compromise varies between principles, it's always there.

Unless a ported design is specifically designed for close to wall operation it will be significantly compromised when close to a wall; if it is specifically designed for close to wall operation it will be significantly compromised when in free space and get bad reviews, so almost no-one will now design a speaker that way.

Frenchnaim posted:

PMCs work well close to a back wall, but not flat up against the wall, obviously. I've found them totally unfussy as far as placement is concerned. The Twenty or Twenty5 series.

Il second this i have twenty 5 24 PMC very close to a rear wall and they are very happy with their positioning