Guest suddenly takes it upon herself to move my speakers


Has this ever happened to anyone here?

You have your speakers positioned just as you like them, and then a guest takes it upon themselves to suddenly move your speakers?

Obviously I’m not going to get any sympathy from anyone in the non Audio world, so I thought I’d post my frustrating experience here.

I also imagine that many of your speakers can’t simply be slid out of position due to spikes or carpeting or sheer weight. Probably a good number of you, who like me have speakers on hardwood floors, have some marks in place to be able to return speakers to their exact position. (Which I didn’t)

But a recent female first time guest was sitting on the floor positioned between the speakers as we listened and for some reason decided that they should be pointed directly at her. Now some people might think “how obnoxious,” and others might think, ‘hey, a woman who wants the toe in angle optimzed for her seating position! She’s a keeper! Let her handle whatever she wants!”

And while I did like the enthusiasm, there was a supertweeter precariously balanced atop each speaker fireing rearward that could have easily toppled off and broken. (And no, there are no kids in the house).

I still haven’t found the exact sweet spot I had them in. For a long time I felt like a bit of an audio slacker since I never installed the factory spikes or rounded cones TAD provides for the CR1’s. Until a few months ago I read on another forum that many CR1 owners choose to just keep the stands on the floor, or haven’t found a benefit to using the spikes/cones on hardwood.

Obviously I’ll use the incident to try and eventually find an even more optimal positioning than they were in, but it still irks me that someone would just assume it’s okay to move a sophisticated audio setup that they truly know nothing about.

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Showing 2 responses by audiokinesis

You now have the perfect excuse to invite her back for a speaker-position-tweaking session!  And her ears may be better at it than yours, because she is probably completely free of our preconceived notions!

Audiophile etiquette can be picked up but audiophile enthusiasm for "dialing it in" cannot.  If she innately cares that much about sound quality, dude, give it every possible chance to work out between you. 

Duke
@stereo5 wrote: "You gentlemen are very good at blowing this off as nothing. I would love to see your reaction if it happened to one of you. I bet everyone of you who said to “get over it” would not be able to."

I had it happen in the final half-hour leading up to the opening of an audio show. A well-meaning friend came into the room and "fixed" my speakers’ toe-in. So I let him listen like that for a song or two then put them back the way I wanted, which to his surprise actually worked as advertised. He learned more that way than if I had taken it as a personal affront. 

Some things may be worth taking offense over, but most are not.

Duke