Yamaha describes my NS-5000 speakers as bookshelf speakers although with 12" woofers and their size and weight they are of course floorstanders. I think Yamaha, and others, are just describing a traditional style of speaker, mostly 3-way, that are boxy and originally were sealed so could be used on home or apartment bookshelves, unlike ported speakers. Standmounts, for the most part, are smaller speakers often not reaching lower bass, thus often use subwoofers, while floorstanders tend to be taller and narrower, which fit better into most rooms, but also can get heavier and larger up to massive sizes. Of course, the descriptions here can get blurred. So unless someone is offering a vintage looking sealed speaker actually meant for a bookshelf, it's probably more appropriate to describe today's bookshelf speaker as "bookshelf style" or "traditional bookshelf style".
Why "bookshelf" sspeakers?
This is not a rhetorical question. I’m asking because I don’t know.
The question is this: What is the point of "bookshelf" style speakers if they are not going on a bookshelf or table? In other words they are on speaker stands.
Here is the reason I’m asking. For a short time I had a pair of Aerial Acoustics 5T speakers along with a pair of Aerial Acoustics 6T towers (which I still have).
I listened to each set of speakers through a Bryston AV amp. I felt like the 6Ts sounded much better. More bass. Fuller sound. (I think a subwoofer would have resolved that easily for the 5Ts.)
The 5Ts are not exactly small and would barely fit on most bookshelves (although they are front ported and recommended for bookshelves by AE). The ones I listened to were on heavy metal stands which made them almost as big and heavy as the 6Ts.
So why buy smaller speakers which need to go on large heavy stands that make them as big as a floor standing speaker and not sound as good? Space saving does not seem to be the answer and I see some ’bookshelf’ speakers that are a good bit bigger than the AE 5ts.
I’m sure there must be a good reason since I see many people with them. And of course my assumption that a floor stander sounds better than a bookshelf might be wrong.
I guess cost comes into play somewhere in the equation as well.
Interested in people’s thoughts on this.