For large room: do floorstanders provide benefits over standmounts even with sub?

[Mentalrudy]

Hey everybody. In my fairly large room (l-w-h 26’11” x 22’4” x 8’10” or in the metric system 8m22 x 6m82 x 2m70) I have sincere modal issues. I will try to see what I can do with using multiple subs to combat these. This however would imply crossing over the subs pretty high (80, more likely 90 -120 hz).
Do, with this high crossover point) a floorstander provide any benefit over a standmount? I was told never to put small speakers in a large room, but why would I need a floorstander with big bass woofers if I'm letting the sub handle them?

Greets and looking forward to your thoughts.
Rudy

 

[DVDdoug]

It depends on the particular speakers. Sometimes the full-range speaker wins and sometimes the smaller speaker plus a sub wins.

The "best speakers in the world" are probably full-range, but if you have a home theater you still need a sub for the "point one" LFE channel.

I believe smaller speakers with a subwoofer are popular now because with home theater almost nobody wants 5 or more large full-range speakers.

 

[LTig]

Do, with this high crossover point) a floorstander provide any benefit over a standmount? I was told never to put small speakers in a large room, but why would I need a floorstander with big bass woofers if I'm letting the sub handle them?

The sub handles only frequencies up to 80-120 Hz. In the region above (until the cross over frequency of the next driver, mid or highs) a floorstander may still be better suited than a small standmount, regarding SPL capability.

 

[DanTheMan]

Larger speaker will provide more flexibility with sub placement because you can have a lower crossover frequency while retaining dynamic range.

 

[Mentalrudy]

I would either take the elac drf52 or the bookshelve model drb62 which was well reviewed here. I wondered if the floorstander would offer a 'bigger' sound even when crossover this high

 

[VMAT4]

I would either take the elac drf52 or the bookshelve model drb62 which was well reviewed here. I wondered if the floorstander would offer a 'bigger' sound even when crossover this high

I haven't heard either. But, just looking at the number of drivers, the floorstanders should have a bigger sound. At least this has been my experience.

 

[MarkS]

Depends a lot on what type of music you play, how loud you play it, and how much distortion in the upper bass is acceptable to your ears.

Also consider room correction if you don't have it already. Far more important than speaker choice in most situations.

 

[BJL]

This may be a matter of personal preference. I personally prefer floor standing speakers unless it is a tiny room. I find smaller speakers give a poorer vertical dispersion. They require stands so they aren't actually saving space. As noted earler (#4) you may be able to use a lower cross over to the sub. In my listening experience, floor standing speakers uniformly provide fuller sound and better soundstage.

I agree with the comment about the importance of room correction software, but disagree with the suggestion that it is more important than speaker choice. In my opinion, room correction/speaker eq can improve an okay but not particularly great speaker system to very reasonably good audio quality, but with a great speaker (meaning a speaker with good measurements and with, to you, subjectively fine sound) the software will elevate your system to near greatness.

I am now set up with a 7.1 system with seven identical floor standing speakers, eq'd with Dirac and I have never been happier, but to the previous point, as the speakers are excellent, the sound quality is superb even without Dirac. The software elevates superb to sublime.

 

[Oddball]

Hey everybody. In my fairly large room (l-w-h 26’11” x 22’4” x 8’10” or in the metric system 8m22 x 6m82 x 2m70) I have sincere modal issues. I will try to see what I can do with using multiple subs to combat these. This however would imply crossing over the subs pretty high (80, more likely 90 -120 hz).
Do, with this high crossover point) a floorstander provide any benefit over a standmount? I was told never to put small speakers in a large room, but why would I need a floorstander with big bass woofers if I'm letting the sub handle them?

Greets and looking forward to your thoughts.
Rudy

Would be good to understand why you would need to cross so high even in the case when you had 40-50hz capable towers? Is this a stereo or multi-channel system? Looks like you have a lots of room so perhaps positioning the speakers differently could help?

 

[Mort]

I also wouldn't think you'd need to cross that high with a room 20+ feet on a side. How far away is the listening position?

 

[Oddball]

This may be a matter of personal preference. I personally prefer floor standing speakers unless it is a tiny room. I find smaller speakers give a poorer vertical dispersion. They require stands so they aren't actually saving space. As noted earler (#4) you may be able to use a lower cross over to the sub. In my listening experience, floor standing speakers uniformly provide fuller sound and better soundstage.

I agree with the comment about the importance of room correction software, but disagree with the suggestion that it is more important than speaker choice. In my opinion, room correction/speaker eq can improve an okay but not particularly great speaker system to very reasonably good audio quality, but with a great speaker (meaning a speaker with good measurements and with, to you, subjectively fine sound) the software will elevate your system to near greatness.

I am now set up with a 7.1 system with seven identical floor standing speakers, eq'd with Dirac and I have never been happier, but to the previous point, as the speakers are excellent, the sound quality is superb even without Dirac. The software elevates superb to sublime.

I am sure your system sounds great and encouraging to see that at least some are using big speakers for the multichannel sound. Dirac will give you a clean and superb cut in these circumstances.

Not sure what AVR/AVP are you using, but just some food for thought. With such speakers you could try to go step further if you fancy, which would greatly complicate the setup, but some people don't mind. Dirac will not support running the large bed speakers and subs in the LFE+main configuration, which would then lend as additional benefit being able to send controlled (up to one's preference) amount of LFE signal to your bed channels. At the end might sound like crap in your room, but until you try will not know. This is what one could do on processors and AVRs like D&M, Storm or Trinnov.

 

[Mentalrudy]

Would be good to understand why you would need to cross so high even in the case when you had 40-50hz capable towers? Is this a stereo or multi-channel system? Looks like you have a lots of room so perhaps positioning the speakers differently could help?

My modal issues cause dips around 90-120hz. Thought I could solve that with dirac bass control, multiple subwoofers and a crossover at that point

 

[Mentalrudy]

Depends a lot on what type of music you play, how loud you play it, and how much distortion in the upper bass is acceptable to your ears.

Also consider room correction if you don't have it already. Far more important than speaker choice in most situations.

I listen to loud music, play it very loud and want as little distortion as possible!

 

[levimax]

One reason for near full range speakers (towers) and subs is that if you want optimum integration it helps if the mains can play flat one octave below the crossover point. So if crossing @ 80 Hz few bookshelves can play competently to 40 Hz. There are work arounds but sub integration is hard (much harder than the sub manufacturers and auto tune software vendors would lead you to believe).

 

[Mentalrudy]

One reason for near full range speakers (towers) and subs is that if you want optimum integration it helps if the mains can play flat one octave below the crossover point. So if crossing @ 80 Hz few bookshelves can play competently to 40 Hz. There are work arounds but sub integration is hard (much harder than the sub manufacturers and auto tune software vendors would lead you to believe).

Yeah, that's why I got the NAD M10 v3 and planning to use the dirac bass control upgrade to manage that

 

[Mentalrudy]

Yeah, that's why I got the NAD M10 v3 and planning to use the dirac bass control upgrade to manage that

which is another reason to give the choice between standmoints and floorstander some good thought: power hunger. I would think the 100w of the nad would better feed the bookshelves and maybe struggle a bit feeding the dfr52. However, having two +350w active subwoofers to handle the low end would mitigate that

 

[Matt_Holland]

I listen to loud music, play it very loud and want as little distortion as possible!

Then you should get floorstanders of 3-way design and ideally that have at least 2x6” bass dedicated drivers each, or a single 8”.

With a 3-way design there is less baffle step loss and sensitivity is typically 3-6dB higher than a 2-way. Distortion will also be much lower with a 3-way, both harmonic and intermodulation.

3-way speakers should also cause less floor bounce cancellation in the lower mid-range which leads a lot of stand-mount 2-way systems to sound lacking in weight and tonal accuracy.

Then there is the issue of general bass power and dynamics which will be better n a large room from speakers either large woofers or multiple smaller ones.

All the above is relevant regardless of having subwoofers in my experience.

 

[Vacceo]

It depends on the particular speakers. Sometimes the full-range speaker wins and sometimes the smaller speaker plus a sub wins.

The "best speakers in the world" are probably full-range, but if you have a home theater you still need a sub for the "point one" LFE channel.

I believe smaller speakers with a subwoofer are popular now because with home theater almost nobody wants 5 or more large full-range speakers.

You can definetly play LFE in some tower speakers. However, that means a massive behemoth like the Arendal 1528 tower...

I personally settled for two front towers for the front and bookshelves and subwoofers for the rest, which I think is the most common approach.

 

[BJL]

I am sure your system sounds great and encouraging to see that at least some are using big speakers for the multichannel sound. Dirac will give you a clean and superb cut in these circumstances.

Not sure what AVR/AVP are you using, but just some food for thought. With such speakers you could try to go step further if you fancy, which would greatly complicate the setup, but some people don't mind. Dirac will not support running the large bed speakers and subs in the LFE+main configuration, which would then lend as additional benefit being able to send controlled (up to one's preference) amount of LFE signal to your bed channels. At the end might sound like crap in your room, but until you try will not know. This is what one could do on processors and AVRs like D&M, Storm or Trinnov.

I would love to have a more high end AVR/AVP, but given my budget I decided to put the most money into the speakers because, especially since the advent of digital audio, the speakers, in my opinion, are the most critical component. I am now using the controversial (in this forum) Pioneer LX-505 as a pre/processor with a Buckeye eight channel Hypex 252 power amp.

I only use the sub (a Rhythmik 12" acoustic suspension version) for the .1 LFE channel and operate the bed speakers (Revel F206) full range. The sub in in the center front next to the center speaker, and seems to radiate nicely into the room with little or no discernible localization. Again, only the LFE channel. It might be fun to try, but I would not risk sending the LFE signal to the bed speakers, I believe that would exceed their capacity (in room measurement to 28 Hz). Also, I believe (someone correct me?) that Revel has built in a filter to block dangerous signals, so the very bottom sub bass would not be reproduced.

I wanted a uniform set of speakers and have found, especially with multichannel music, that doing so gives what I subjectively describe as a highly coherent sound quality, with no tonal variation between the speakers. I selected the F206 because they are not too heavy, not too large, and I could afford them. I considered the larger F208 for an incremental improvement but decided they weren't worth additional expense and handling due to weight etc. I have height speakers but they are not currently in service, for irrelevant reasons.

I'd encourage the OP to consider floor standers; they make a big difference.

 

[Oddball]

Putting most in speakers sounds like the best decision one can make and you have great speakers. There was a post in this forum where a member had 328, 208 and 206 and kept 206 also on basis of value for performance.

D&M LFE management starts with 3800H for $1K, so not necessarily hi-end.

As you noted, most speakers should have their own protection for low end signal they can't reproduce, but I also EQ them to their in-room response as additional protection.

For LFE protection you have the above 2 factors, plus can adjust the level of LFE signal, (-20 to 0dB on D&M) and the LFE signal should come (although did not measure) before its 10dB bump for the subs.