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IMAGE PROBLEMS VOCALS OFF CENTER

My image is off center.
I have changed practically everything.
Swapped interconnects, cd players, placed left speaker on the right and right speaker on the left and vice versa. Switched amplifiers, power cables etc etc. The image (noticeable on vocals) is about a foot to the right of center. DRIVING ME INSANE!!!!!!! I have this gear in an architecturally sound room. It was designed by Obsession AUdio in the U.S. and it is definitely not a room issue. It is not my hearing (as first thought) because others have noticed and confirmed the problem as well. HAS ANYONE ENCOUNTERED THIS PROBLEM?
Could it be an electrical issue coming in to the house????? Is that even possible?
Any and all suggestions are welcome.

Randy
butterscotchmusic
57 responses Add your response
newbee
4,767 posts
 
I had this problem for years and in more than one house and with several speakers. I had assumed I had a hearing problem in my right ear (image shifted left). Long story short - it was because of the speaker placements interaction with the rooms acoustic's and the placement of the listening position. I moved my listening chair and speakers into a nearfield listening arrangement - speakers are 8' apart (center to center) and listening position is 9' from speakers.

Don't rule out the possibility that your set up could be the cause.
tarsando
578 posts
 
Have you played a MONO source--you need to do this to see if it, whatever the content, is centered or not. If that's not centered and you switch the source channels and then switch the amp/preamp channels, as well as the speakers that you mentioned you did, it's got to be room acoustics some how, in my opinion. Also not every stereo vocal album has the vocal centered. Good luck!
jea48
4,425 posts
 
What is the make-up of your audio equipment, it would help. Tubes? SS?
gunbei
2,327 posts
 
How far off center? I experienced this same problem nad couldn't remedy it until I broke down the whole system because I needed to paint the walls. Initially, it seemed like the vocalists were off to the left side by half a head.

When I put everything back in, the layout of furniture near the center audio rack was slightly changed, but the center image had aligned to dead middle. The only other things that may have contributed to the shift was disconnecting and reconnecting all my cables. I had also placed contact enhancer on all the connections. So it could have any number of things that corrected my problem. Room acoustics, a bad cable connection to begin with, contact enhancer or pure luck.
d_edwards
204 posts
 
need your equipment listed....
donjohnson7192
1 posts
 
You could always experiment with speaker placement.
mijknarf
266 posts
 
When did this start? Has it always been there? When was the last time the image was centered? I recently had the exact same problem and I switched everything SCs, ICs, speakers, I tracked it down to a tube in my CDP that was going bad. Again, when was the last time it was centered? What changed since?
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