The Missing Sidewall-help!

Integrated is a Nait XS-II which has no balance control.

I'd have thought that with the shorter distance being four feet you should be ok. If it was six inches there would be more of a challenge. That said, our speakers are equidistant from the end walls, though one does have a bay window. The answer is to choose a house to suit the Hifi. It's what we've always done. 

Is it possible to position the speakers either side of the corner so they are equidistant from the corner on different walls? This will help make reflections more symmetrical. Without a diagram of your room and walls I'm not sure if this is practical.

I agree with HH,  I have my speakers on a 22 foot long wall,  the 'short' side is 5 feet from speaker to wall it doesn't affect the overall balance.   With 4 feet I would expect small boundary effects of around 3dB or less,  you will probably get more off the floor & rear wall.   Re a balance control, that won't be much help as any wall effect that does occur is all in the bass end from about 250Hz & below,  upper bass & higher are not affected.

Hungryhalibut posted:

 The answer is to choose a house to suit the Hifi. It's what we've always done. 

I guess it's probably a bit late for that! I know a good bricklayer who might be able to help, though...

Fit acoustic absorption to the wall at the 1st reflection point.

(N.B. to ensure there are no effects on the stereo image the absorption needs to extend down to 500Hz still with reasonable absorption coefficient.)

Hi,

such an effect is not something I would expect from placing a speaker 4 feet away from a side wall. We are not talking about 4 inches here?

Have you tried toeing the speakers in asymmetrically, with the 4 ft. speaker toed in further?  Otherwise I second Huges suggestion.

Have you calculated this through, or is this just a guess?

Perhaps if you were running some huge Acoustic Research rig with big Wilsons that gave out a larger than life panorama it would be an issue. Not at all with a Naim XS2 and what ever speakers your running with them.   Perhaps you have the speakers too close to the back wall ?   If you can take that speaker nearest the side wall out from the back wall so it's the same distance to either walls. Or with the Golden Ratio of four foot from side wall and 2/3rds to 3 foot from the back wall.

So first, thank you all for your suggestions, why? Success sprouted from your advice.

First, the old set up furniture wise put a love seat way way too close to the left side, dominant speaker. So we re-arranged the furniture and the love seat is now on the right side a couple feet from the right side quiet speaker, a sort of side wall, there's no wall on the right side for another 10 feet past the love seat.

Second, out came the tape measure and yes, the left side dominant speaker was closer than I thought by eye ball to the side wall, within three feet of the side wall/corner where the instrument rack was. So I pulled it out to four feet and one inch from the side wall/corner.

Third, time to bring it out from the back wall, moving the other sofa and then the throw carpet we are now 33 inches out from the back wall, versus the 20 inches it was at before.

Fourth, the speakers are 5 feet apart measured from the center line of the cabinets.

Finally, we towed each speaker in towards the listening position by about 10 degrees (we may* tinker with this as they sounded quite good firing strait ahead).

And now Aaron Neville's voice is very close to the center between the two speakers. The bass has more impact and is sharp. Instruments appear as they were staged. What a relief. We have our speakers back and we aren't going to touch or move anything*!!!

The speakers in question are ProAc D-20R and we love them, especially now that they are stereo again.

Thanks for your advice and suggestions.

Pheww.  I've found putting down a jig of sorts on the floor helps enormously with setting the right position.  I've used a long and wide piece of wood that's marked dead centre, along with placemats and other things that I have multiples the same size of used either side. Getting angles of toe in between the speakers symmetrically just so, and having the same distance from the hot seat.

also make sure both are spot on level as they look at you and make sure they have exactly the same rake angle if your using it.

most spikes need to be locked in tight. Make sure there's no jiggy play on the floor with them.

Five feet apart, centre to centre, sounds very close, especially as the speakers are toed in. It's going to make for a small and restricted, rather than room filling sound. I don't know how far from them you sit, but a general rule is to have an equilateral triangle. Reducing toe in will open up the sound as well. 

But if it works for you, then that's great. 

I have a similar situation with my Allaes. I have an unusual, what I would describe as a P shaped room, with listening point at the bottom of the P and speakers directly opposite at the top, and in front of a half bay window. At about the 5 0clock position on the curve of the P is an open staircase leading to a lower floor. Left speaker therefore has a side wall and the right effectively no side wall reflection. Nether has much rear wall reinforcement either.

An absolute nightmare one would think! But actually no. I arrived at a set up completely at odds with orthodox thinking and works great.

I have the left speaker well clear of the wall and both speakers well forward of the bay, almost effectively in free space. The speakers are only a few feet apart and also toed in so the axis crosses forward of the listening position.

I get a wonderful open, transparent sound with plenty of PRaT and involvement, vocals are rendered particularly pleasing and intelligible. Initially the picture seems a little light but with good recordings shows that there is no unwanted low frequency overhang or heaviness which opens up double bass for example allowing plucked strings and fret runs to be heard clearly and driving the rhythm of the music. Bass notes still go low but it stops and starts with agility and is only there when the music call for it. Of course its not all about the bottom end but I focus on it in this comment because people are often nervous about using Naim speakers away from walls.

The sound is still very room filling, in fact it rocks the whole house with ease. The only downside is yes the sound is very focused inward and soundstaging can be a bit restricted, its not particularly important to me as I tend to listen from different positions in the room anyway rather than a sweet spot and I like to hear and be moved by music rather than looking at spacial images.

Sometimes, with unorthodox shaped rooms, I think one needs to throw out the rule book and enjoy.

I'm of the opinion that with an odd shaped room. Once you've found the sweet area and hot spot , you don't really need much room correcting acoustic treatments.

Probably not as any reflections are not uniform, unlike a box or rectangle shape with corners and parallel walls trapping standing waves and bouncing reflections off each other.

It's always worth checking polarity if you've had the system apart and thingsdon't sound quite right, it's surprising how easy it is to get wrong even after years of experience (Naim plugs on both ends help but the you'll most likely be using Naim speakers).

So, third time is right.

We listened more into the night after my earlier post and while yes, as reported things were much better, the blend and sound of the music skipped about from recording to recording, something we had never experienced with our much larger and older speakers, so we wondered.

Replacement of them had been based on a home move to a house we love and which is now sans children, the place we would grow old in together. Lovely view out listening to music and watching the weather move through the green belt trees, the sunset light falling among them, but we worried would the old speakers fit, too big? So we went to our shop and listened found smaller speakers but then began the dance of placement and the missing sound or dominance per the wall closest speaker. Last night after my post and hours of listening, what if....

We'd moved a lot about and made space in our listening room, plus pulled so far out the smaller speakers were taking up as much room as the older speakers...what if....

So I called the shop and yes they were still in the shop, but under much interested scrutiny...I'll be right up...arrived and brought them back to answer. would they fit work, would they work?

And yes, this is the third time. We had an earlier pair of these speakers in a truly spacious home and loved them, but then a move to a smaller home, smaller room and were they too big, did this work? So to make space we traded sound, and no it wasn't the right decision, but then they were gone. Time and that feeling of the missing voice passed, until another trip a year after to upgrade the integrated at the shop where we had found them, our stereo shop, and there they were, our old speakers but in a different lovely cherry case,  the 75th Anniversary Model and for ten years all was great again, space be damned the sound of our music was back.

But then there came another move, a house without stairs, with bedrooms for grandchildren and family to visit, and a view to a yard and green belt and all the sunsets to watch as the seasons change, but oh my, was there room, would this work, and the wisdom of the past was forgotten in the rush and chaos of making order out of a new home, but try as we may the new speakers we traded our old speakers for got good, but never....

So today after 5 hours of driving in hellish traffic I brought those big old speakers home, to our new home, and set them up in the newly made and arranged space...and the music returned. There was a left and now a right speaker, voices appeared in the middle after small nudges to tilt them just enough to find our couch and a space wide enough for two or more now within the music.

How can this be? Very near back wall, about 7 feet apart, front ported, much more efficient, but as soon as I played them there is was the missing right speaker, and tonight hours later, rock, acoustic guitar, jazz, folk and when I finish these words classical "Jupiter" from The Planets.

You can come home again.

That's good, and it shows how room dependent speakers can be. And also that newer isn't necessarily better. I wonder what these old speakers might be...

Hungryhalibut they are Tannoy Turnberry SE 75th Anniversary.

Serendipity happens!

This morning I returned the new speakers that didn't work in our room to our stereo shop and recovered the shop credit for their purchase. While doing so the staff at the shop let mention that they had just taken in a very nice three year old Super Nait II in trade!

However it now sits in its box between the two speakers above while the evening meal and blended margarita settle. I will soon swap out our Nait XS/Hi Cap and swap in the Super Nait II.

High hopes!

In one word "synergy" the Super Nait II will be staying for a life time.

Hi, sometime a particular component fits in 'just right', and it's great when it does.

I suspect that the (much) older speakers have much narrower lateral dispersion of sound in the mid-range and HF than the newer speakers and this helps to achieve much better room integration of the sound, particularly when 'toed in' as you have them.

Huge posted:

 

I suspect that the (much) older speakers have much narrower lateral dispersion of sound in the mid-range and HF than the newer speakers and this helps to achieve much better room integration of the sound, particularly when 'toed in' as you have them.

Nahh.  Tannoy speakers, especially the Prestige range have a very wide dispersion in all frequencies.  Although most have an unusual frequency response and impedance curve.

Toby and Huge they now fill the room with music and have a wide sweet spot on the listening couch. The Super Nait II just makes everything so much clearer, the lifting of veils thing, and the dynamics are raised to a new level with bass that is both able to pressurize the room and start/stop. The decay of the single left hand note of the piano at the start of "Desperado" by the Eagles was a piano in the room and K.D. Lang's voice on "Case of You" was as beautiful as we have ever heard it. Keith Richards voice ached the lesson of loneliness on "This Place is Empty" and finally Eric Clapton "River of Tears" both shook the house with its driving bass intro and then took us into his voice and guitar as they both sang the river of suffering he has experienced in his life. Didn't play our live recording of the Highway 99 Allstars (we were there the night they recorded at the Highway 99 Blues Club and danced during "Sweet Little Angel"). I suspect with what we have heard so far that a dance in the living room will occur.