"Small" solution for larger space

[wemist01]

New digs. Listening room with traditional audio attractions will be on another floor.

This question here is basically one of "what small hardware will serve a large, open space well? The environment is one where the kitchen, dining and "living room" are all joined, almost in an L shape, but with the foot of the L very stubby. Hardwood on all the floors, with some carpets. Picture kitchen at the top and living space a the bottom. The L-foot ends with a fire place, built-in waist-high cabinets on each side, TV above. It is easy to imagine small speakers in these corners serving the TV and playing music. But the speakers need to work well in room corners. There is also the possibility that the kids might want to stream bluetooth. I'm not sure I have space for an amp, but if there needs to be one, it has to be small. A rather odd scenario, but hopefully others have dealt with similar.

The solution may be to buy a TV with good sound and keep the music separate. But I don't have a good solution for the music part at all.

 

[rdenney]

My living room is my "music room". The piano, tubas, and stereo are located there. It opens vertically to a loft area, to the left from the LP to the entry area of the house, and to the right through a 5-foot doorway (always open) into the den. The TV-watching setup is in the den.

The TV setup uses a Yamaha AVR, old Linn Index Plus speakers for front right and left, a pair of Polk RTA15's for the surround speakers, and a cheapie Boston Acoustic subwoofer. Only the AVR is newer than 15 years old, and some of it is much older than that. Mostly the wife watches television, and for me the 4.1 setup is more than sufficient. When I'm listening to or making music, she retires to the bedroom where I have another television with no special setup for sound--but she doesn't really care about that.

The main system is not at all compact, but it could be. Despite the size of these rooms, the distance from the speakers to the listening position is no more than maybe seven feet. These are Revel F12's driven by a pair of 15-year-old B&K Reference 125.2 amps. I suspect that a pair of bookshelf-size speakers plus a subwoofer would do as well. I want the ability to listen at realistic levels (though I do so only rarely), and these days there is no reason to be power-constrained. For most normal listening at the listening position, 40 watts of clean power into these speakers would be abundant. I think I could build a very decent system around streamed audio using a laptop as a streamer (using a streamer with an EQ function), a good DAC/preamp like a Topping E30 in preamp mode, and a mid-power Class D amp. A pair of Elac Debut Reference 6.2's and (maybe) a subwoofer would finish it up, and for less than a couple of grand you'd be giving up very little to the best available at any price.

But if you really need to be quiet in your corner of an open-concept space, look into closed headphones and a good headphone amp, coupled to the laptop and DAC, or find a good DAC/headamp combination. I have a couple of headphone solutions for times when the really wants to watch TV in the Den and I really want to listen to music.

The relevant similarity is the speakers are close to the listening position despite being surrounded by a larger volume. Power needs are less but bass resonance will be more--hence the need for equalization in your playback system.

Rick "maybe not helpful but maybe a useful data point" Denney