Should I be using bookshelves over floorstanding for my setup? Pictures included

[sting004]

I've been mulling over the idea of replacing my bookshelves with MA Silver 300s (or 500s), primarily because the wife thinks they fit the space better than bookshelves + stands, but we also feel they have a "fuller" sound after listening tests.

You can see my space is not ideal; the TV is mounted too high, and there's a fireplace in the way. We moved into this place a year ago and I've been trying to work around this ever since. Also, please note that wire rack of a tv console is temporary. I have no acoustic treatments.

My thought now was putting a very low height console under the fireplace to put everything into, and run a 2.1 setup (hoping I don't need a center with the MA's, but if need be I can grab the C350 or new center from the 7g line).

I guess my question comes down to: given the layout here, are the Silver 300s / 500s wasted? In the corner, the towers would be about 2 feet from the left wall. They'd be about 1.5 away from the back wall.

Any opinions appreciated; I'm very new to this compared to you guys.

 

[fieldcar]

I slightly regret upgrading from the JBL s38ii's to the JBL 590's, as the room correction from my X3700H with audyssey XT32 made them sound identical. Sure, the 590's have a nice wide dispersion and go down to 35Hz instead of the s38's 45Hz, but I cross them over at 80Hz and let the room correction and subwoofers do their jobs. A frequency sweep from 20Hz to 150Hz is damn near perfect. The only flaw I notice is the beaming that the 590's woofers do around 110Hz and up, but it's not the speakers, it's the nature of directivity above a certain frequency. I'd get a receiver with room correction instead. If you want "fuller", I just offset the subwoofer's level. Denon allows you to change this offset per input, which is great, since I don't like too much LFE in movies, but I want a few dB more with music. Anyway, thats my 2 cents. Good luck.

 

[Hipper]

The fireplace is that glass panel I presume? How much heat comes out of it and onto the speakers and gear? That would be one of my concerns.

Regarding book shelf and floorstanding speakers, it's about how they throw out the sound - their dispersion pattern - how powerful they are, and of course how good/accurate they are. Perhaps with book shelf speakers you might have more control over the height of the tweeters (it's usually best to have the tweeters at ear level). Placement issues will be the same unless you are using unusual driver designs (e.g. electrostats). Therefore the choice between book shelf speakers and floorstanders is not about space, unless you buy massive size ones. Check with the manufacturers what size room they are suitable for and perhaps what amp they would recommend (or look what others are using).

Because of your room layout, with a wall on the left and what could be an opening, or a wall further away on the right, you will get an unbalanced sound for two reasons: the bass will behave differently each side, and the higher frequencies will reflect off the left wall earlier then they will of the right. Room symmetry is usually the ideal.

For bass, you may be able to do something to even it up by moving the sub (or two or more subs) about - I don't know much about that but there are some on here that do. All rooms need something done to get the bass right. This is often done through careful positioning, room treatment (Bass traps), subs, or Digital Signal Processing (DSP) or an equaliser, or any combination of these. DSP can come in the form of hardware (eg MiniDSP) or software on a PC.

For the higher frequencies, you could get some acoustic panels on feet. Place one against the left wall halfway between the speaker and your ear. The right one should be placed on the right side the same distance away from a line drawn between you and the mid point between the speakers.

Room treatment is is not usually that attractive but you can get art panels that have images or patterns on them, even your own photos. Positioning (of speakers and listening chair) may also be limited by domestic considerations. DSP/EQ is probably the most flexible method although it is not perfect.

 

[sting004]

The fireplace is that glass panel I presume? How much heat comes out of it and onto the speakers and gear? That would be one of my concerns.

Room treatment is is not usually that attractive but you can get art panels that have images or patterns on them, even your own photos. Positioning (of speakers and listening chair) may also be limited by domestic considerations. DSP/EQ is probably the most flexible method although it is not perfect.

Glass panel, yeah. We don't ever use it. I've tried to get the wife to approve removing it entirely but no go. She likes the look! We occasionally turn it on just with the lights but without any heat.

The right side, which I should have shown, is open and probably 12 feet to the opposite wall. We keep a mini gym area on that side of the room.

For the most part, bass sounds great just with the SVS PB-1000. I use a Denon S750H with just has base Audyssey, but the bass response seems great to me.

I suppose just treating that left wall wouldn't do much, would it? I don't think I have much of an option placing an acoustic panel on wheels on the right hand side in the middle of the room!

 

[pozz]

The only flaw I notice is the beaming that the 590's woofers do around 110Hz and up, but it's not the speakers, it's the nature of directivity above a certain frequency.

Don't quite follow you here. Speaker design determines directivity?

 

[Hipper]

Sticking a panel only on the left wall would absorb reflections on the left side. It may be that the right side reflections which have roughly (2 x 12) 24 feet more to travel may not be so noticeable, or you could absorb them on that far right wall but I think it would be better to have a second panel where I said. The panels should be very light and easily lifted and stored out of the way when not in use. I use GIK 242 panels for side wall absorption. They can have wooden feet.

 

[pozz]

@sting004 I wouldn't buy Monitor Audio stuff, personally. They have the typical off axis cancellations at the crossovers and the tweeter shows beaming. What @Hipper said about bookshelves vs. towers is pretty much it. The measured performance is the first-order consideration. Other effects (like the broader imaging of towers) are secondary.

 

[sting004]

@sting004 I wouldn't buy Monitor Audio stuff, personally. They have the typical off axis cancellations at the crossovers and the tweeter shows beaming. What @Hipper said about bookshelves vs. towers is pretty much it. The measured performance is the first-order consideration. Other effects (like the broader imaging of towers) are secondary.

What would you recommend instead? I'm in Canada so my options may be a bit more limited. What was attractive about the MA's was the size/look which are wife-friendly. The bigger, bulkier stuff will probably not go over as well.

The Silver 300s can be had in the ~2200 range CAD and the 500s around ~2600 CAD here, either through a local retailer or on audiomart.

 

[pozz]

What would you recommend instead? I'm in Canada so my options may be a bit more limited. What was attractive about the MA's was the size/look which are wife-friendly. The bigger, bulkier stuff will probably not go over as well.

The Silver 300s can be had in the ~2200 range CAD and the 500s around ~2600 CAD here, either through a local retailer or on audiomart.

I live in Canada too. I think my first choices would be Revel or Arendal Sound. I haven't looked at prices, though. Canada has a treaty with Norway so no import fees for the latter, and Revel speakers are available at dealers.

JBL would be on my list as well. Not sure what else unless I dig a bit.

 

[fieldcar]

Don't quite follow you here. Speaker design determines directivity?

I'm talking about how in nature sound below 100Hz can't be localized. I find the transition from omni-directional to directional a bit jarring when I run frequency sweeps and start to experience un-corrected peaks and nulls that vary depending on the speaker. It's irrelevant to the conversation and to actual music and movie content. Sorry I brought it up.

 

[pozz]

I'm talking about how in nature sound below 100Hz can't be localized. I find the transition from omni-directional to directional a bit jarring when I run frequency sweeps and start to experience un-corrected peaks and nulls that vary depending on the speaker. It's irrelevant to the conversation and to actual music and movie content. Sorry I brought it up.

View attachment 159016

Oh I see. I definitely agree that directivity control is important. One clear advantage of towers over bookshelves if done right.

(Bass localization is OT but always interesting.)

 

[bloodshoteyed]

I live in Canada too. I think my first choices would be Revel or Arendal Sound. I haven't looked at prices, though. Canada has a treaty with Norway so no import fees for the latter, and Revel speakers are available at dealers.

Arendal online prices should have all the costs included

regarding the room....i'd probably move all the stuff to the left side wall (have a similar problem atm in my living room)

 

[mikehcox]

Arendal online prices should have all the costs included

regarding the room....i'd probably move all the stuff to the left side wall (have a similar problem atm in my living room)

That's a really great idea:

• You don't have to worry about your TV or speakers getting fried by the fireplace (except maybe for the right speaker).
• You now have the gym equipment behind you, less distracting. Although, that depends on what you have behind your current main listening position (may be moving the distraction to your left).

Of course you're going to have to get that approved by your significant other.

 

[youngho]

I've been mulling over the idea of replacing my bookshelves with MA Silver 300s (or 500s), primarily because the wife thinks they fit the space better than bookshelves + stands, but we also feel they have a "fuller" sound after listening tests.

You can see my space is not ideal; the TV is mounted too high, and there's a fireplace in the way. We moved into this place a year ago and I've been trying to work around this ever since. Also, please note that wire rack of a tv console is temporary. I have no acoustic treatments.

My thought now was putting a very low height console under the fireplace to put everything into, and run a 2.1 setup (hoping I don't need a center with the MA's, but if need be I can grab the C350 or new center from the 7g line).

I guess my question comes down to: given the layout here, are the Silver 300s / 500s wasted? In the corner, the towers would be about 2 feet from the left wall. They'd be about 1.5 away from the back wall.

Is this mostly for music or video? If the former, do you listen primarily to stereo? Would you like to do home theater?

For the television, did you consider a telescoping pull-down mount? Like https://www.mantelmount.com/

Most conventional speakers are designed to be used in a free-standing manner, which typically means >3 ft (more would be preferable) away from a wall. Using them closer than that will increasingly tilt up the frequency response below 1 kHz. You may be able to address this to some extent through equalization (aka "room correction," otherwise speakers with bass tilt controls like in professional designs) or the use of boundary-adjacent designs (on-wall speakers or cardioid dispersion ones). However, there will also be reflections from the walls that will interfere with the frequency response. For example, positioning the front of the speakers 2.5 ft from the fireplace wall (since you mentioned 1.5 ft and the speaker is almost 1 ft deep; also, many folks would refer to this as the front wall, since it's the wall in front of the listening position) will result in a strong cancellation at around 113 Hz due to cancellation (sound reflects off the wall, bounces back, and then destructively interferes with the speaker because it's now 180 degrees out of phase with the sound coming directly out of the speaker at this frequency), then a smaller peak at 226 (constructive interference), a null at 339, etc. The closer the speaker, the higher the frequency at which this sort of interference (usually called speaker-boundary interference response or SBIR) occurs, and the farther the lower. Absorption becomes increasingly difficult at lower frequencies and requires thicker and thicker depth.

Perception of stereo reproduction typically benefits from a symmetric reproduction environment. Since the right loudspeaker is not adjacent to a side wall, absorption (with 4-6+") the left side wall near the left loudspeaker and at the first reflection points for the left and right loudspeaker would be advisable. Higher directivity or narrower dispersion speakers may help ameliorate this to some degree, but some degree of lower-to-mid frequency absorption would still be beneficial on the left wall.

At the end of the day, I'd probably go for a soundbar with subs and surround speakers in this space as pictured, along with as much absorption as possible.

Young-Ho

 

[bo_knows]

The fireplace is that glass panel I presume? How much heat comes out of it and onto the speakers and gear? That would be one of my concerns.

Regarding book shelf and floorstanding speakers, it's about how they throw out the sound - their dispersion pattern - how powerful they are, and of course how good/accurate they are. Perhaps with book shelf speakers you might have more control over the height of the tweeters (it's usually best to have the tweeters at ear level). Placement issues will be the same unless you are using unusual driver designs (e.g. electrostats). Therefore the choice between book shelf speakers and floorstanders is not about space, unless you buy massive size ones. Check with the manufacturers what size room they are suitable for and perhaps what amp they would recommend (or look what others are using).

Because of your room layout, with a wall on the left and what could be an opening, or a wall further away on the right, you will get an unbalanced sound for two reasons: the bass will behave differently each side, and the higher frequencies will reflect off the left wall earlier then they will of the right. Room symmetry is usually the ideal.

For bass, you may be able to do something to even it up by moving the sub (or two or more subs) about - I don't know much about that but there are some on here that do. All rooms need something done to get the bass right. This is often done through careful positioning, room treatment (Bass traps), subs, or Digital Signal Processing (DSP) or an equaliser, or any combination of these. DSP can come in the form of hardware (eg MiniDSP) or software on a PC.

For the higher frequencies, you could get some acoustic panels on feet. Place one against the left wall halfway between the speaker and your ear. The right one should be placed on the right side the same distance away from a line drawn between you and the mid point between the speakers.

Room treatment is is not usually that attractive but you can get art panels that have images or patterns on them, even your own photos. Positioning (of speakers and listening chair) may also be limited by domestic considerations. DSP/EQ is probably the most flexible method although it is not perfect.

Excellent advice.