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Has Anyone Ever Run TWO Identical Pairs of Speakers ?

I’m considering buying an extra pair of tower speakers identical to the ones I currently own. I would wire them as 4 ohm speakers powered by about 250wpc,

Each set of two speakers would be placed next to each other so there would be 2 identical left channel speakers and 2 identical right channel speakers, with each pair separated by about 1/2.” 
My listening chair chair can be as close as 8’ from the “center” of the speakers to as far back as 20’ from the “center” of the speakers.

And the actual distance between these two seperate pairs of speakers could range from 6’ from each pair to as much as 18’ for each pair. I would of course spend a great deal of time ‘dialing” them in for the best sound.

Has anyone ever tried this, and what were your results?

I’d appreciate your collective informed thoughts.




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agwca
108 posts
 
I did this for about a dozen years using Paradigm and Polk speakers.  The end result was very nice SQ. The upper mids and highs of the older Polk 5jr speakers added to the lower mids/bass of the Paradigms 7se speakers.
Later tried various speakers to see if I could get the sound I want thru only one pair.  Bought Monitor Audio Silver, Paradigm SE1s...ended up playing them together as individually, each lacked a bit.

While it was an eye sore to look at multiple speakers, I enjoyed the sound.  Today I run 1 set of speakers made by Focal.  Also have a set of Triangles.  Each does well on their own.
mijostyn's avatar
mijostyn
8,569 posts
 
Very bad idea. First of all you will only get an additional 3 dB out of it. Worse, you will permanently damage whatever imaging you have. You can split up woofers that way because the wavelengths they operate at are very long but, you can not do that with midranges and tweeters. At shorter wavelengths the speakers start speaking in two voices instead of one. Tweeters have to be no farther than 1/2 inch apart to speak in one voice up to 20 kHz. When you move them apart like you plan on doing you are listening to a choir instead of a single voice and you smear the image and detail. 
pzwief
1 posts
 
http://www.audioemporium.com/double-lintons/
fiesta75
1,378 posts
 
mijostyn - You are absolutely correct in theory and the higher the frequency, the more it matters. My question is have you tried it? Sometimes the benefits outweigh the image issue. Just my 2 cents.
danvignau's avatar
danvignau
935 posts
 
In the early 1970's, I ran stacked Advents (tweeters adjacent), powered by a Phase Linear 400. These speakers (and stacked was popular), were flat enough to not add too much of anything anywhere in their frequency range.   A decade later, I ran the Phase linear through stacked B&W DM 14's (Also tweeter adjacent) for many years (25?), including years that I also owned Acoustats or Maggies.  It works well with speakers that do not accentuate anything too  much, but it is a horrible thing to do with some speakers that do have noticeable peaks and valleys. 
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