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Kef R3 distance from wall help. Also, good to pair with goldenear center?

Danskir

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Hi All,
I ordered a pair of kef R3‘s from crutchfield several days ago and am eagerly awaiting them (back ordered until next week).

Because of space and WAF constraints, about to pull the trigger on a goldenear supersat 50c. We don’t have adequate room for a larger center speaker but might be moving in a couple years. Will splurge on something then.

Questions:
- would it be worthwhile to bump up to the supersat 60c for now?
- If the 50c or 60c is the best soundbar looking center I can get at the moment, would I be better off without the center speaker and just use the 2 fronts to create a ghost channel?

- I’ll be placing the R3’s on shelves relatively close to back corner walls. The left speaker will be about 4 inches away from the back wall. The right speaker will be about 1-2 inches from the side wall and will have around 12 inches from the back wall behind it (the right side had a larger cabinet to accommodate components and larger shelf). Would I be better off spending the money on front porting speakers rather than the R3’s?

Thanks
 

abdo123

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The center speaker is more important than the L and R speakers. Honestly there is no point in spending money on the R3s when they will play less than 20% of the sound.
 

JRiggs

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The R3 come with foam port plugs. They can be configured to full plug or partially plug the port. Use them if you are that close to back wall.
 

HarmonicTHD

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Hi All,
I ordered a pair of kef R3‘s from crutchfield several days ago and am eagerly awaiting them (back ordered until next week).

Because of space and WAF constraints, about to pull the trigger on a goldenear supersat 50c. We don’t have adequate room for a larger center speaker but might be moving in a couple years. Will splurge on something then.

Questions:
- would it be worthwhile to bump up to the supersat 60c for now?
- If the 50c or 60c is the best soundbar looking center I can get at the moment, would I be better off without the center speaker and just use the 2 fronts to create a ghost channel?

- I’ll be placing the R3’s on shelves relatively close to back corner walls. The left speaker will be about 4 inches away from the back wall. The right speaker will be about 1-2 inches from the side wall and will have around 12 inches from the back wall behind it (the right side had a larger cabinet to accommodate components and larger shelf). Would I be better off spending the money on front porting speakers rather than the R3’s?

Thanks
Using the R3 only for TV surround is probably a bit overkill. Front porting speaker don’t make a difference in your case and as you can always plug the R3s as mentioned before.

As for the soundbar, try it out. Hard to tell, it depends so much on the room from my humble experience. I have a very expensive KEF Reference 2 center speaker, which worked great in our previous room and undoubtedly is objectively a very good center speaker. In our current room and with different furniture in it, I only use the main speakers as a phantom center. And I spent days with MultiQEx and REW trying to make it work for me.
 
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Danskir

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Using the R3 only for TV surround is probably a bit overkill. Front porting speaker don’t make a difference in your case and as you can always plug the R3s as mentioned before.

As for the soundbar, try it out. Hard to tell, it depends so much on the room from my humble experience. I have a very expensive KEF Reference 2 center speaker, which worked great in our previous room and undoubtedly is objectively a very good center speaker. In our current room and with different furniture in it, I only use the main speakers as a phantom center. And I spent days with MultiQEx and REW trying to make it work for me.
Sorry, I meant the R3’s will be the fronts but will be fairly close to the wall behind them. And, the sound bar is the goldenear supersat 50c which looks like a soundbar but is actually a center channel speaker.
 
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Danskir

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The R3 come with foam port plugs. They can be configured to full plug or partially plug the port. Use them if you are that close to back wall.
The right front speaker will have 12” or so from the wall behind it. Can I use the foam plug for the left one and not the right?
 

Steve Dallas

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Without more information, it is difficult to form an opinion on the OP's situation. Photos of the intended locations?

Front vs. rear port does not matter much in terms of wall proximity, unless the speaker is shoved right up against the wall, where the wall becomes an extension of the port and changes the port tuning. It does matter when the speakers are shoved into an actual bookcase, however.

In my ideal home theater room, turning off the center channel does not cause me to miss it. Turning off the left and right channels does cause me to miss them greatly. So, I don't think I agree with @abdo123 on skipping the LR and just going with a center, although we again need more information. I could probably get away with either configuration in my living room, as it is nowhere near symmetrical.
 
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Danskir

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The center speaker is more important than the L and R speakers. Honestly there is no point in spending money on the R3s when they will play less than 20% of the sound.
Is the goldenear supersat 50c such a drop in quality compared to the R3’s?
 

Steve Dallas

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The right front speaker will have 12” or so from the wall behind it. Can I use the foam plug for the left one and not the right?
You can try it and see how it sounds. You can also try using digital room correction to compensate for the differences. With what will you be driving these speakers? If it is an AVR, make sure it has Audyssey XT32 or Dirac.
 

abdo123

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Without more information, it is difficult to form an opinion on the OP's situation. Photos of the intended locations?

Front vs. rear port does not matter much in terms of wall proximity, unless the speaker is shoved right up against the wall, where the wall becomes an extension of the port and changes the port tuning. It does matter when the speakers are shoved into an actual bookcase, however.

In my ideal home theater room, turning off the center channel does not cause me to miss it. Turning off the left and right channels does cause me to miss them greatly. So, I don't think I agree with @abdo123 on skipping the LR and just going with a center, although we again need more information. I could probably get away with either configuration in my living room, as it is nowhere near symmetrical.

I think you misunderstood what i meant, If there is no Center speaker plugged in and configured in the AVR then the R3s will play 100% of the sound making them incredibly important again.

However in a situation where a subpar center is plugged in, the Ls and Rs are barely playing anything in most content. This is how the last show i watched looks like in Audacity. L, R, C and LFE respectively.

1674323134726.png
 

HarmonicTHD

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Sorry, I meant the R3’s will be the fronts but will be fairly close to the wall behind them. And, the sound bar is the goldenear supersat 50c which looks like a soundbar but is actually a center channel speaker.
Yeah I that’s how I understood it.
 

HarmonicTHD

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The right front speaker will have 12” or so from the wall behind it. Can I use the foam plug for the left one and not the right?
Not recommended. But one can only tell by measuring as there is always an off chance that in your case it might even improve something.
 

HooStat

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The goldenear uses a ribbon tweeter which has a vastly different disperson pattern than a coaxial R3. I would also look at the R3c center, or, as someone else suggested, another R3 (which only come in pairs, so you could look for used). If the budget does not permit, I would look at another KEF center channel from the Q series. Depending on what you listen to and how loud, they might be totally fine. They will certainly blend much better than the Goldenear.
 

Open Mind Audio

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Is it out of the question to get one of the KEF center speakers (for instance, one of their on-wall or in-wall options)? Accessories 4 less has good deals, and that might give something closer to timbre matching with the R3s. Though admittedly it may not be a significantly better match than the GE Supersat.

Too bad the aesthetics are complicating things, preventing you from the logical choice of a KEF R2C center or just using a 3rd KEF R3 as the center, which is what I'd do if able.
 

Steve Dallas

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I think you misunderstood what i meant, If there is no Center speaker plugged in and configured in the AVR then the R3s will play 100% of the sound making them incredibly important again.

However in a situation where a subpar center is plugged in, the Ls and Rs are barely playing anything in most content. This is how the last show i watched looks like in Audacity. L, R, C and LFE respectively.

View attachment 258867

I didn't misunderstand you. You simply did not explain your point well. ;)

I understood you to say he should just skip the LR and go with a center, using the AVR to downmix everything to the one speaker. I would never do that--especially with an MTM design--however a good friend of mine does exactly that, and with a Goldenear center speaker like the OP, so my mind went there. It is used for the TV above the mantle in a large living room, and it sounds fine for filling the room with TV sound. That solution may actually work better than sub-optimal LR placement in a room like theirs.

My poorly made point was supposed to be that I would rather have the LR than even a good center in my various home environments.

I am well aware of how movie soundracks are mixed and how AVRs work.

Cheers!
 
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Danskir

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Next house we’ll definitely go big with the center assuming it isn’t on top of a fireplace again.

I have a 7.0 system and a zone 2. Running a Pioneer Elite sc-65 for the surrounds, backs, center and zone 2. And, I have an old Yamaha ax-592 powering the fronts.

The fronts and center in these pictures are just what I had lying around lol.
My previous living room speakers were klipsch rf-52 ii’s for fronts and matching rc-52 ii for the center. I was never very impressed with them.

Definitely no chance for another R3 or R2c despite how much I’d love that.

EBFB4488-0419-4DBA-BDC4-9EC0B0B63A90.jpeg
EC29FF55-3231-4D30-B29F-AC5EDEA044CD.jpeg
 
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Danskir

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Is it out of the question to get one of the KEF center speakers (for instance, one of their on-wall or in-wall options)? Accessories 4 less has good deals, and that might give something closer to timbre matching with the R3s. Though admittedly it may not be a significantly better match than the GE Supersat.

Too bad the aesthetics are complicating things, preventing you from the logical choice of a KEF R2C center or just using a 3rd KEF R3 as the center, which is what I'd do if able.
Re. in wall center - Not much room between the tv and mantle. Also, I have a mantlemount bracket. So, when I pull the tv down it’ll sit right in front of the center speaker.
 

Steve Dallas

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Nice place!

From what I see there, KEF speakers are a very good choice for that room. If it were my house, I would start with a pair of R3s and see if I actually miss the center.

BTW, KEF has some slim center channel speakers similar to the Goldenear that would be a better match to R3s:


The tweeter in the Goldenear speaker is very limited in vertical dispersion, which is not a problem with the KEF versions.
 
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