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Speaker placement in small living kitchen


Hey guys, i am moving into a new apartment soon which only has a bedroom and a combined kitchen/living room. So since there won't be a dedicated listening room but enjoying music is a common activity for when i am entertaining guests i am trying to get the best possible stereo sound in the living room.

This is what the room looks like (with an example furniture arrangement):

http://i47.tinypic.com/vpgrrq.jpg

The dimensions are 4,0 x 5,3m (or 13.12' x 17.38').

As you can see the room is pretty small and i am basically already sacrificing a dining table which i am willing to do if i can have better sound in return :) The uneven left wall might be a problem (maybe evening it out by installing a custom tailored shelving unit could help there?), same for the kitchen backsplash. There is also a solid metal beam nearly directly above where the couch is in the picture.

Equipment will be my Braun LV720 active speakers which i will drive with a matching Regie preamp/receiver, TT and propably lossless music via an iMac through an external DAC.
The speakers have knobs for control of the low/high frequencies and the service manual even has setting guidelines for specific problematic room situations.

As long as i can also fit a desk and for example a sideboard to put the audio gear on i am happy. A chair opposite of the couch and a smallish coffee table would be nice too.

I already thought about the Cardas speaker placement guidelines but that would result in a pretty unusable living space.

What would you guys do in such a situation? I am thankful for any ideas :)

Best regards
cornucopia
2 responses Add your response
springnr
43 posts
 
JBL MSC1 room mode control or similar product could help.
whart's avatar
whart
3,037 posts
 
Corn - i took a quick look at your diagram and from what i could tell, your listening couch backs up to the kitchen/counter/bar object? And, is a bit higher than your ears, sitting down, so in effect, it is like sitting very close to the back wall? If you tried speaker placement on the long (or side) wall, that may still put you in the same place, in that your seat will be against the wall behind you (the other side wall). So, I'm not sure you have many alternatives on that, other than to have a small chair that can be easily moved closer to the center of the room, and closer to the speakers and further away from the kitchen as back wall, at least for solo/critical listening.
You could do some sort of drop down acoustic blind to 'block' the kitchen if the backsplash is highly reflective, but you might want to see how the room sounds first. My biggest concern, frankly, is that your listening area is close to noisy appliances, refrigerator compressor hum, maybe some noisy low voltage lighting, etc. As long as you are ok with semi-nearfield listening, having a smallish room isn't so bad, and you could use your furniture, selectively, to absorb. Diffusers are pretty effective, but i think you'll need to wait until you get in there and experiment a little. You may be pleasantly surprised (and if in an apartment building, you will have limits placed on how loud you can play, based on whether you want your neighbors to hate you.
Good luck, not sure I helped.
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