I have my system set up in the front room of my house. I have a loveseat with the right side in the sweet spot. Behind me is the living room and dining room. Off to the side is the staircase for upstairs. This positioning fills my entire home with beautiful music. I will often sit on my couch that faces the system and watch sports with music going loud if I am not interested in the commentators. I think if you can figure out a way to incorporate the system into your daily activities like this you will get much more enjoyment. I am sure there are sonic trade-offs compared to a dedicated and symmetrical space. I have lived with this for 12 years and cannot imagine having my system tucked away somewhere in a room.
Listening Room
Hello to all,
I think this is a situation many audiophiles find themselves in: That being your listening room is NOT a dedicated room that your expensive audio system resides in. You do NOT have a chair that is perfectly positioned in between speakers to optimize your listening enjoyment. Why? The room simply cannot accommodate a chair in the center or, most likely, your wife and/or significant other will not allow you to place a chair where it's supposed to be when listening.
Having said that, you listen to music from everywhere in the room. How does one go about speaker placement? How do you increase the sound stage? Are some speaker brands better than others when you do not have a dedicated listening room? Thanks for your input.
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Many thanks to all who offered advice and suggestions. Unfortunately, some members posting on this site have alternative agendas and must have way too much time on their hands. I tried to avoid them by simply changing a username, but I was not smart enough to realize that did not work. I'm new to this site and just trying to learn and get good advice. Nothing more, nothing less.
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@immatthewj 8% is not a great rate, and no you did not do good, unless that was in the low range of rates available at the time. ( but hey, at least you bought a house). I was busy having fun As a younger man during that time, so what do I know. I certainly hope you refinanced, as rates plummeted to 2.3 and 2.5% at one point. Unless of course you paid it off. As far as not living in same world, I’ve sold on ebay for well over 20 years, and have never seen it this bad. Crap load of watchers and interested buyers, but hardly any sales. Once in a Blue moon someone will buy. I have well over 2k 100% positive feedback and I’m selling some popular audio things at pretty well discounted prices, not crap. People just want your stuff for practically nothing nowadays. Even tried selling things here. Had luck selling here years ago. The economy sucks. Wish I was in your utopia. |
After becoming empty nesters, I coverted a 20' x 30' space to a listening room. Built up rig and room for listening. Sound absorbtion, diffusers, lighting accents, big recliner stayed at apex of speaker triangle. Wife and I shared the listening sweet spot. Last kid that left came back with hubby and 2 kids a year ago so bye bye listening room. All due respect, he served our country 4 years, but back to square one for them. Wife did offer living room for rig, but its a big echoy room. Alot of challanges if I get the time. Headphones a no go for me. Wife and I share the music moment. |
I fear this will spiral into a political vortex quickly. I have never see spending at this level, stores are full. restaurants are full, flights are full, and every 2 weeks there is a new Tesla on my street. At this rate, there will be nothing but Teslas soon. |
I don’t have any experience as a seller, but I am thinking that must be nothing new.
From the posts I see here on this site on a regular basis, people are buying some pretty nice stuff frequently.
I don’t know about a utopia, but rates have been higher than they are now. All of my vehicles are over twenty years old, but that’s by choice, and every time I go to the grocery store (or just about everywhere) all I see are new cars on the road and in parking lots. I don’t have a dime in the stock market, but obviously there are a lot of people who do as the DJ is apparently touching 40k and the S&P is kicking tail. 401ks should be rocking and rolling. A house across the street from me sold a couple of years ago, and the buyer had a ton of work done (including an addition and a truly industrial size garage) and it’s not my business so I didn’t ask, but I can only assume that the ton of work cost a ton of money. My neighbor directly next door to me died in ’21 and in ’22 her son sold her house (and I do know what it went for, and I was surprised it went that high) and the buyer basically gutted it out and remodeled. He did a lot of the work himself, but still he had to buy materials and he did have an electrician over for many days. Personally, I thought the house was fine the way it was, and I wouldn’t have spent my money that way, but each to his or her own. But I wouldn’t call any of the above "utopia," it just is what it is. And on an edit: across the street next to the house that just got the garage and addition are an older retired gentleman and his daughter who is a teacher. I got to know them as they needed help with their dog starting last fall, and they both lease (I think) Nissans, and both of them had their lease run out at the same time early last spring and now they are both leasing brand new ones. (I am going over at 7pm to give them a quick hand with the dog, and I’ll double check what kind of his and her cars that they are.) Back in ’05 I got laid off from being an airline mechanic, and I misread the future so I retrained as a RN, but I keep in touch with a buddy of mine, and recently they have a great contract going. If I would have seen that contract ever coming, I’d still be there. |
. . . too late to get another edit in, but they are both Nissan Sentras. And I assume 2024s.
And thinking about it, once again adding on an edit, another across the street neighbor got into construction after he was laid off post 9/11 and he is always working. Which means to me that there must be a lot of builders who are building, and therefore I assume people must be buying. He rents, but that’s by choice best as I can tell, and he is driving a quite new F-250, so I can only assume that life, although it may not be a utopia, is going okay in his world.
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High employment, rising wages, dropping inflation… which has been two or three times higher in the past, stock market making new highs. Sounds pretty good to me, and I’m retired. The US has the sixth highest income in the world, with only tiny countries in front of us. It has been a little while since I checked but i think saying over 6 billion people have income far below the US average income is pretty safe. Over half (over 3 billion people) make less than $7/day. I think we’re in pretty good shape. |
I believe there some speakers that produce a more even "power distribution" through the room. My experience is that none are better than LARGE planar speakers, like big Magnepans. There are others such as some Audiokinesis models and Endow Audio speakers, using dynamic drivers. I thought of KEF blades as well, but they are not quite as good as it, in my humble opinion. Below the Schroeder frequency you need multiple subwoofers to continue an even "power distribution" in to the bass. |
Listen, a good stereo is a good stereo even if you listen in another room- and it’s really good when it sounds good in another room. More often than not, I’m listening from my kitchen or my front porch or over supper in our dining room and not a fussy, dedicated little chair to obsess or drive myself crazy in. My stereo is great and I very well know it. I bought it and I put it together. I’m listening to music and I suggest everyone else should put some of this entitled little anal chair energy into just listening to the music. If that’s how you’re listening, you can call it whatever you want but you’re listening to equipment. All that said, I look forward to getting myself a hot small system 'Listening Room' at some point soon in my retirement, but again, I'm going to be doing other things while playing music so it's more of a 'me space' for naps, my tchotchkes and art than an Audio Laboratory. |
My wife has resigned herself to my dedicated, treated listening room. That, or it goes smack in the middle of the living room, where it used to be for 40 years. 😬😆 @gents I have a chair in the sweet spot. I move my head even a few inches left or right, the sound changes. I do not “do other stuff” while I listen. That’s not listening, and it’s a waste, imho, of the investment in both time and money. If you wanna listen while you are cooking or repairing the car, get a cheap Bose Bluetooth system. Sorry, dude. |
@unreceivedogma , I used to have my system in the living room, and I could enjoy sound that I was quite happy with from a variety of locations. No, it wasn't like being at the apex of the triangle, but still I got a lot of enjoyment. I remember many pleasurable mornings/afternoons/evening sitting out on the backporch jamming on tunes. Or while I was in the shower. Maybe I had forgiving speakers (my old B&W 805s) or maybe I was just more forgiving. Now I am in a small back bedroom that is mostly dedicated to books, guns and listening, and I think that although it is imperfect I get width beyond that walls (I listen in the dark with my eyes shut) and the speakers disappear and with a good source material instruments float in the air, and back in my "room" there are no distractions like in the old living room days, but I think I had more fun listening back in the old days. |
I have been through the creating a main living space in the House to be an improved environment for listening to the end sound from both music replays and end sound from audio visual. If the most comfortable seat is wanted to be used and it means the moving around of furnishings to achieve this there will be a minimum of a raised eye brow from an observer with an interest in the room. There are fold away chairs that are very comfortable and suited to long periods of seating, look at the Camping Market or Carp Fishing Market. These are compromises to be made between two people, there is nothing I can say to fix such a situation. High Pitched Reflections of Windows are reasonably easy, close curtains or blinds, increase weight of material for curtains, or add curtains to be used with blinds. Hard Floor reflections are again easy, add something soft, it does not have to be permanently seen, and does not have to be overly sized. Choosing the density to align to the room will be the trickiest bit to achieve. Absorption is harder to manage, as it is most likely taking place in a non symmetrical happening, and soft furnishings are most likely to stay. Balanced Absorption can be improved if a dedicated Wall Panel or Two is produced, a partner can even select the Canvas Artwork, that would conceal the purpose of the Ab' Panel and leave only evidence of wall hung art. The Partner will need winning over to accept the locations selected for placement. Bluetak Helps as the room produces less noise, other masked noise will manifest, ratting Picture Frames and Ornaments, each easily tamed by a few pea size Bluetak Pellets squashed in behind or under the offending rattler. Once that side is done, if the Room still feels there is a upper frequency Roll Off, the Speaker Xover might need to be investigated for a little work carried out, to push forward Upper Mid's and Highs and Lean Up the Bass. Alternatively if there is seemingly too much emphasis on the Upper's Rolling them Off a little might be just enough to create a Coherence through the frequencies. Tweaking Xover's on Speakers not in Warranty Period is a common practice. |
Building the house of stereo was my biggest material achievement in my life. That's all I will say about the importance of having a dedicated listening room. But if you cannot rationalize it, afford it or have it wife approved, no biggie, enjoy what you got. A lot to be thankful for on this memorial day. |
@ghdprentice + 1 |
+1 KEF. I have the R500s that were a steal on close out a few years ago and to get a meaningful improvement I would have to spend probably 3-4 times as much and then would not have the very condensed thin tower 42" height footprint that I like, that makes for the excellent dispersion and which don't overwhelm the room. They are on Sympoosium platforms which improved the sound dramatically over the KEF spikes/cups. I have a large open multipurpose den that extends into the kitchen eating area 30 feet or more from where the speakers sit (the back of the speakers are 3 feet from the wall). I listen often from the kitchen or when I am in the kitchen cooking/prep area. Best listening chair - Ekornes stressless chair - expensive but worth it. First one is still in great shape 15 years old (leather worn out where your head touches with a custom cover, so it will go to one of the kids when they have the space/need). I got another one of the same model in a different color (believe it or not), still in production. It can't be in the optimal listening spot, so the KEFs are great. When I really want to focus on an album playing, I'll sit on a loveseat that is in the optimal position. It's comfortable, just not in the league of the Ekornes. |
From the "about" page on my website: "Vinyl Sundays" is a music appreciation concept. It was first launched as a public venture as "Classic Album Sundays" by Colleen ‘Cosmo’ Murphy in London in 2010 and has spread to cities in Europe, Australia and America. The idea is simple: in an era where music is treated as a free commodity, or worse, like sonic wallpaper, music lovers should be able to A) enjoy the experience of immersing themselves in recorded music the way it is best heard: in its entirety, uninterrupted, on vinyl, and on a quality sound system so that the artist’s original intention is fully revealed, B) hear & discuss the artist & recording’s unique story, and C) share the experience with people from differing walks of life, united only by their love of music. I had been wanting to give this idea a go in a salon-like setting, and gave it some trial runs in my NYC loft. With my move to Newburgh, I launched this as a monthly event. It has been going very well, so I may go for every two weeks. The best listening experience requires that I keep the seating for each event limited to five. Before entering the Audio Attic, guests will be required to turn off their cell phones and leave them at the door: there will be no exceptions. If you are tied to your phone by a umbilical chord, this experience is not for you. If this concept interests you, go to the CONTACT page and tell me a little about yourself and the types of music you enjoy listening to. Your name will be added to a waiting list from which I will make invitations each month on a first come first serve basis and on an algorithm not quite understood by me. I will provide some wine: guests are encouraged to bring some wine and snacks.
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Well, besides not getting a friendly of point of view, I see you’re not big on the conversational skills. I didn’t spend any of that money over the last few decades to listen to equipment - the equipment serves me. And I can’t find a good reason why I’d spend time enslaved to a seat waiting to see what tricks a CD might hold in order to congratulate myself on my (subjective) aural brilliance. I spent that money to enjoy some music in my home, where I happen to do a lot of stuff and enjoy some quality of life - all at once sometimes. You want to sit in front of the stereo monitoring your head movements, dude, do what you will with your life and money. Having lived a little bit, I have to say it doesn’t sound like value or fun.By the way, do you keep logs on exactly which head and neck movements give you the best soundstage? |
@gents lol you are the comedian today, aren’t you? I am a cheap rat bastard: over 55 years, I have spent as little as possible to get as maximum as possible performance out of my gear. It’s come out to $850 per year on average over that time, mas o menos, less than some folks spend on cigarettes or booze. Yet I’m guessing that the sound I’m getting matches that of many, maybe most systems costing many - some, many many - times as much these days. The point of it all is to hear the music the way the artist intended. You like - or are at least ok with - music as wallpaper, and from your tone it seemed that you expect everyone to be similarly content with that approach. I’m simply saying that I am not only not content, but that these days - actually I’ve always been this way, it’s now more than ever - I block out and dedicate time to serious listening. It’s like zen, but it’s music. It’s out of respect for the artist. I’m an artist so of course I feel that way. As an artist, I have to be a cheap rat bastard about this, because I don’t have infinite amounts to spend as some here at audiogon do. As for head positioning, it’s an inside joke that you are not on the inside of. I have severe cervical stenosis that amazes most neurologists because it’s so bad that they think I should be dead, but I’m not and not only that, I’m asymptomatic except for one little thing so they won’t operate. But that little thing is not so little to me: it causes tinnitus. They didn’t believe me at first but the pitch and volume changes depending on which way I turn or tilt my head: if I took note of the notes I hear, why I could write a little symphony just from the sounds emanating from my neck. I finally was able to prove it a couple decades ago by taking an audiology test and holding my head in different positions and voila!: the hearing results were different depending on the tilt of my head. Now it is accepted science: a study was done in Germany on 97 patients with cervical stenosis with concomitant tinnitus and they found that by working around a particular nerve that they were able to relieve the tinnitus in 93 of them. But I digress. When guests visit my audio room for the first time, the first thing that they notice is that the room is quiet, and things sound different. And that they sound different depending on where in the room you are. And that’s without any music playing. I live in that room, and so yes I can even hear the difference from just turning my head. and I got the room to sound that way for $0.00 spent for that purpose. What I did spend the money on was 6” in the walls and 14” in the ceiling full of rock wool for a thermal barrier. Since rock wool has excellent acoustic barrier properties, my architect - who had designed a few recording studios - said to cover the walls and ceilings with fire resistant burlap instead of drywall and I would have the equivalent of a $250,000 recording studio room. For nothing. He was right. In other words, I take listening seriously. As many here do. But I’m not anal. For example. I know people who log the hours played on their cartridges. That’s a bridge too far for me. I’m a bit more practical (or lazy): when I start to get listening fatigue, it’s time for refurbishing. |
What does "being an artist" have to do with your proclivity to spend money? I dont doubt you like your room, but I am very skeptical that you are getting the results you think from rock wool. A great deal of the improvement you hear is based on how the room was treated before. Also the dimensions of the room have a great deal to do with how simply your fixes actually need to be. So the improvements you attribute to rock wool may be the result of other factors, including how much experience you have spent in rooms which are exceptional. BTW, I dont think that using recordings studios as the benchmark for listening rooms is necessarily correct. |
I can see the virtue in both what @gents and @unreceivedogma are saying. I am not nearly as critical or scientific as @unreceivedogma is, and my listening room, such as it is, is not nearly as scientific or critical as his is, but my listening was in the living room for many moons, then my system went into hibernation, and when it came out at the end of ’17, someone said or did something that irritated me, so I moved it into a small back bedroom because a) I thought I would be isolated while I was listening, and b) I thought it would be more intimate (meaning between me and the music) and I thought that might be a better sound. So I dropped some dedicated lines back there and over the last six years have tried to do little things here and there to improve the sonic effect. But no full blown room treatments. Like I said, I am not as scientific or critical as @unreceivedogma . But when I am back there, there are no distractions and I am listening, not doing anything else. A room that small is an imperfect environment, and had I known the limitations, I might not have moved back there, no matter how pissed off I was at the time. I listen at very near field and it gets loud quick; I learned early on back there that in a room that small, earbleed levels get fatiguing fast. I have only played the Lou Reed Rock And Roll Animal one time back there, and that was when I first made the move. But although it isn’t as scientific or critical as @unreceivedogma , I do think I understand what he is saying when he says he is up in his attic to listen. When I am in that bedroom I referenced, I am there only to listen and therefore I hear more. But as to what @gents typed , when my system was in the living room and I was listening, frequently I would be barbecuing out on the backporch with an artist or band I really liked blasting away (but not distorting) and it was not just background or wallpaper. It was like having a musical group or an artist that I liked over to play for us in our living room and they would sound good. When I was outside undercooking red meat, of course I would not be analyzing the soundstage or the detail or the air, but the sound was full bodied and it would grab me by the ___ when a harmonica would blat out or a sax player would bite down and step out or a bluegrass band would start really getting down and having fun. And after we had finished eating, then I could turn down the lights in the living room and sit down on the couch and turn the level down a tad and enjoy from a different perspective. And as far as fun goes, I really did have more FUN when I was listening and not making listening work. Maybe I was not hearing as much in one sense of the term, but in another sense, maybe I was hearing more, and I was not nearly as uptight about it. But I am not saying either is right or wrong. If it works for you it’s right, and by the same logic, it cannot be right if it doesn’t work for you. As I type, my system is gradually being turned on, component by component, and after I hit ’post’ I am going to turn on the power caps for my amp, and then a bit later after I help the neighbors with their dog, I will turn power on to the amp’s tubes, and after I eat I’ll start listening back there in that little unfriendly bedroom to some music a(I just put some new speakers in their I am trying out) and I am sure that I will enjoy it.
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As I mentioned in one of those posts, I've always wanted to work out a really cool little system. A place for quiet listening. A five or 10 Watt tube rig, a couple of small spectacular monitors...otherwise, I love my big rig and my high wattage and a (very) occasional date with Black Sabbath or Little Richard. |
@gents , if I could start over, especially given the room that my system now resides in (and perhaps if it was still in the living room) that is what I would want to try at this point in my life as well. I'd like to hear one of Dennis Had's products with some very efficient speakers. I was shopping for speakers a bit ago, and I finally decided against a pair of Klipsh and wient with a pair of Revels instead, so I am pretty uch still locked into an amp that puts out a bit of power. |
Don’t discount the impact of Rockwool too much. My room was designed by an acoustician and Rockwool is in every wall and the ceiling. I also have no drywall inside the room like @unreceivedogma as well. I have a smaller room but enjoy every listening session immensely! I don’t care for music as background music because my mind is somewhere else and it is not enjoyable at all. |
One of the best “components” you can acquire for your system is a dedicated listening room. My wife uses the room almost every morning to read, drink her coffee etc. We spend evenings listening to vinyl, having a glass of wine or scotch. There is a puzzle behind the two chairs if you want to puzzle while listening. It is my favorite room in the house. It is fun to show to people who come over, I am not sure they fully get it. |
If one wants to have the ultimate seat when listening the image is approaching as Ultimate as it can get. On Cross Channel Ferry Crossings between GB and Mainland Europe these are used in the Freight Drivers area on the Ferries, what a pleasure these are in use for a relaxing ones tensions during the Crossing
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- Two things about me: A ) I’m a cheap rat bastard. I find the cheapest way to get results worth 5 to 100 times or more than what I spent. And B ) I’m lazy. Well not really lazy, I just want to get the results I want as quickly, easily and cheaply as possible and I will do what it takes to get there and no more, so that I can enjoy the results and go on to the next thing. - My wife and I bought a distressed 1865 4.5 story brick townhouse based on the #5 design in Villas & Cottages by Calvert Vaux (one of the designers of Central Park and Prospect Park in Manhattan and Brooklyn) for $5,780. The building had been abandoned for 26 years and was largely gutted. We hauled 82.5 tons (not a typo) of garbage and construction debris out before we could start with a top to bottom restoration and rehab to 85% of Passive House performance standards. - the room was used prior to its current use for 26 years by crack heads who squatted there. There was evidence of 4 fires in the building. It’s a miracle it was still standing. - to get to 85% of Passive House performance, we need to add significant amounts of insulation and building envelope tightness to a very high standard, beyond what code requires (though code is catching up), yet since it is an important historic building in New York State’s second largest historic district, we had to do it in a way that the city’s architectural review committee would approve of. Rockwool is the ideal material for this historic + energy performance construction because of its thermal barrier qualities and because it doesn’t begin to melt until temperatures of 2,000 degrees are reached. Blown in foam insulation is the last thing one wants to use: it’s not reversible, it gases off for years, it ignites at 380 degrees, and once it starts burning, it generates more heat, causing other things to catch fire and it burns until it burns out. By using this material, we are making sure that this historic building has a great chance to last another 160 years - our architect specialized in marrying architectural preservation with building energy performance. He also had designed a few recording studios. He knew that I had been involved in this hobby since I built a Dyna 70 kit at age 14, and he knew that I lived in a spectacularly wonderful 2,000 sq ft Lower Manhattan loft that was nevertheless an acoustical nightmare. Since the energy specs called for 6” of rockwool in all the envelope walls and 12”+ in the roof, and since rockwool also is great for acoustic room treatment (many acoustic panels and audio room treatment products use the material), he said that instead of covering the audio room (the entire 400 sq ft attic) with sheet rock, to cover it with fire resistant burlap and I would have for FREE what his clients spent $250,000 - $400,000 on for their recording studios. - I do not see why you would not aspire to the best room performance that you can afford. Recording studios must achieve a high performance standard because the recording engineers need to hear what is being recorded as accurately as possible. I’ve captured that performance level for zero dollars. Please explain to me why that would not be desirable. - As a visual artist, I put a lot of work into creating something that I hope my audiences will spend the time and effort that it takes to appreciate it. Similarly, recording artists go to sometimes great lengths in the recording studio to achieve a desired result. I believe that the ideal we all strive for here at audiogon is to have a playback environment that reproduces the recording artist’s intentions with as much fidelity as possible. - As for my being “scientific”, I don’t really know where that is coming from. As I think I said before, I am hardly as anal as many people here at audiogon. Like most people, I make do with what my grasp can reach, and rely on research and common sense to get the best results out of my room, which is suited due to its shape (the gabled roof yields few right angles) and what I did with it based on my limited learnings. - I’ll be the first to admit that my approach is not for everybody. My approach is for me. It works for me. My single mindedness and simplicity of approach, adherence to basic - not rocket science - principles, and reliance on vintage components are maybe the most important take aways for members of audiogon to use or ignore as they see fit. - RESULTS: I don’t get the “I’m into the music not the gear” thing. As I just explained above, the gear is at the service of bringing out all of the artist’s musical expression and intention. Art is in part about emotion. For about three months since Jon Specter spent 3 months rebuilding my amps, I’ve had people up to The Attic about every other week. Half the time, guests literally start crying because they have never experienced music like that and simply cannot believe what they are hearing. The word that is invariably offered to describe the physiological phenomena of the sound in the room is holographic. The music both surrounds them and penetrates them physically (I not infrequently hear very high quality systems, as good and sometimes in some ways better than mine, that leave me cold because the music stays on a plane in front of me, as if being etched on a blackboard). - As for my charming personality: I used to be a shy quiet nerd. Then I moved to nyc. Then I started working for big ad agencies. I did well. You don’t do well in that business without developing very sharp elbows. Maybe in the final third of my life I will learn to mellow out again. sorry everyone if I’m being redundant but somehow it seems like I’m not making myself clear enough to some here. |
