2. speakers
  3. 1220993821

Vandersteens and room acoustics

I own a pair of Vandersteen 2Ce sigs with an Anthem power amp and Rogue preamp, and VPI Scout.
The Vandys sound really good but from past auditioning sessions, I believe they can sound better. I'm not sure how I would accomplish that (outside of new equipment) and I'm wondering if there are room treatments that would help in this room.
My listening room is 8W X 13L X 7H, obviously a less than ideal setup. The Vandys and component rack are on one short wall with the centers of the speakers about 5 feet apart.
The backs of the speakers are a little over a foot out from the front wall.
The "out" sides of the speakers are about a foot from the side walls. The best listening position I've found is about 6 feet away. The floor is reasonably thick carpet over cement slab with padding, obviously. The walls are bare.
Are there treatments that you would recommend? I have seen some sorts of traps behind Vandys and other speakers in system pics here, and elsewhere. What change would that give me? What about acoustic (whatever) on the side walls? Thanks in advance for any help.
kmulkey
newbee
4,767 posts
 
I would try putting the speakers with their backs to the solid long wall firing towards the balcony railing. I would place them about 4ft out into the room, 9ft apart, and put the listening chair just in front of the rail. That might just work!

A room doesn't have to be sealed to work well, don't worry so much about the openings except they do affect bass response and can cause an 'imaging' imbalance if you set up speakers so one speaker is adjacent to a wall and the other is adjacent to an 'open space' (there is another thread up right now on that issue.

FWIW I personally prefer the sound of speakers located on a short wall when ever possible. The sound seems more resonant/warm/natural, and on a long wall it has sounded cleaner/cooler/more clinical. But it might not be so in you home so give each wall (or open space).
elevick
2,636 posts
 
I had 2ci's and they really sounded best far from any walls (3 feet or more away). If you want to stick to the smaller room, see about trading the 2's for smaller vandy's. This is one time to downsize. Otherwise, room treatments, lots of them may make the room sound bigger.
russ_l
95 posts
 
Kmulkey- your small room forces you to listen, pretty much, in the near field. Unfortunately, Vandies are not meant for near field listening but are meant to be listened to a minimum of 8, 9 or 10 feet away. The extra distance allows the sound from all the drivers to arrive at the listening position at the same time and in phase. That is the basic design concept for the Vandies, 2s, 3s, 5s, even the Quattro.

Russ
audioconnection
1,271 posts
 
Vandersteen 2 series will work better than you could all believe in this room although the bigger room would be best.
In small rooms A simple Vandersteen High pass
installed in front of the amp is the solution.
Just install the High pass assessment box first to see which setting works to your preference.
Johnnyr
iplaynaked
193 posts
 
I did a system for a guy who had 2c's in a similar sized room (with higher 10ft ceiling), and wanted to upgrade to the "Signatures" Even though the older 2's sounded just fine in that room, the Signatures had a SIZEABLE HOLE in the bass response, that I could not get rid of!
Everything - midrange, tweeter, etc - was all better with the Signatures, but the bass was AWEFUL! (and dynamics suffered accordingly). Infact, I took the Sig's out in a larger room, moved em all around, including listening positions, and never could get any descent bass response out of em. Dunno why, really.
It was strange, because the overall physical dimensions of the speakers were virtually identical (from what i could see) - and yet the response curve of both speaker models was VERY different.
We ended up going with those orb full range things.
More to discover