Listening Height Adjustment -- Is This Why Two People Don't Hear the Same?

My speaker maker tells me Where the tweeter should be and I should be sitting at.  But he wants me 9.5 or ,10 feet from speakers.  He even gives me a tool 10 degrees toe in.  I looked  at your set up awhile back
 It's some very nice equipment. I would like to
Listen to Quads  right against the wall There  I listened to a pair set up like that ,,,,,amazing. 

Hi Folkfreak,

It saddens me a bit to see how much money and effort you have plunged into your system only to find out afterwards that one of the most important things for great sound quality (speaker placement) wasn't optimal in the first place.

As Tomic601 mentioned, I'm very surprised nobody mentioned Jim Smith's 'Get Better Sound'. It's by far the best $35.- you can spend on your system. I took one look at your system page and the first two things I noticed before anything else were that your speakers are too far apart and you're sitting too close to the wall behind you.

Your speakers too far apart means you're missing out on warmth and the soundstage won't be anywhere near as good as it can be.

Your head being too close to the wall behind you means you'll hear reflections from behind you mixed with the sound coming from your speakers resulting in who knows what but definitely not good things.

Folkfreak, you obviously spend a lot of effort to optimising your system but you're on the wrong path. I know this might sound arrogant but that's not how I mean this. I'm telling you this because I was there once. I had my speakers setup in the same and wrong position for 25 years! It was only once I read 'Get Better Sound' that I learned how to get the best out of my system. The difference wasn't subtle. I've since replaced my system for one costing ten times as much but the increased sound quality hasn't gone up ten fold. Twice as good maybe. But the sound quality increase I got from setting my system up right was at least 5 fold. Yes, it was THAT much better.

I sure hope you will find a way to get the best out of your system. After all, you've put the effort in so you should be rewarded.

Good luck,

Pim

BTW, to adjust and measure tilt, use something (anything solid will do) under the level on the low side and 'level' the speaker out. Do the same with the same thing in the same spot on the other speaker and you'll have the speakers perfectly tilted to the same angle. To change angles, just use something ticker/thinner or move the position of whatever it is you're using.

@pimbo you are more than welcome to come and listen to my system and you may be rather surprised that while it may break some commonly accepted “rules” of setup it does sound surprisingly good 😉

The post by @bdp24 in my system description is helpful in this regard, posting having heard the system in action

You might also want to consider how you come across in your first post in response to a well established member ... its more than a little arrogant of you to suggest I’m a newbie neophyte when it comes to setup. There’s absolutely nothing in “Get Better Sound” I haven’t tried, tested and rejected or adopted based on how it works in my room. If you’d bothered to read the thread and my full system description you would understand how meticulously I have done this, to make the system work in my room, for me. I’ve also benefited from the advice of Art Noxon in the core setup arrangement. It’s always amazing how people can diagnose acoustics based on pictures and specs, I wish I had that ability!

Oh and by the way using shims under Magico Q3s on Townshend Podia will actually cause them to fall over! Don’t try this at home!

Also you said

one of the most important things for great sound quality (speaker placement) wasn’t optimal in the first place.

The whole point of this thread is that the height of each listener’s ears needs to be optimized to the position of the speakers, and that differences in listener torso dimensions need to be taken into account.

My entire premise was that you’d optimized speaker placement in all other regards already, and my surprise was that a small change in this one dimension (vertical) had such effect, whereas front back was very different. Your paraphrase is a gross misrepresentation, or maybe I’m just a terrible communicator 🤔

And also one one thing you cannot tell from pictures is that the wall behind my head is both built from scratch as a semi absorbent surface and bass trap and then further treated with ASC and SR products, I’m more than aware of the impact of close in reflections, see my discussion of the use of GOBOs to treat reflections from the equipment alongside me. Like I said in my first post, this is not new to me and I’m fully aware of how to treat a room