Why Is My Speaker Imaging Rubbish?

[anotherhobby]

Based on that picture, you need to move the speakers further away from you. I'd push them as far back on your desk as possible. The wall problems you are trying to avoid by having them pulled to the front of your desk are less of a problem than the other issues created by having the speakers there on the front of your desk.

 

[Chrispy]

TLDR so think maybe your comparison was poor to begin with?

 

[thedantestyle]

Imaging and soundstage are (usually) imperfect illusions. It depends on the recording, you and your brain and your imagination, room acoustics, speakers, listening position and speaker position, and maybe other variables.

Personally, I can identify sounds hard-panned left or right coming directly out of the left or right speaker, especially high frequencies from the tweeter, but the center (and anything else) is rather vague. ...It sounds like I have a "wide" center speaker. I'm sure that's true for most people, otherwise surround sound wouldn't need a center channel/speaker.

Yeah I mean have had a few sets of high-end open back headphones - adn stoundstange and imaging is talked about a lot - I can never hear as much amazing 'pinpoint of source' as many reviewers talk about.

But I can definitively say when I listened to different sets of speakers in the store - I could very much hear the vocals coming from an imaginary centre speaker - It wasn't ambiguous at all - same for my speakers when he set a pair of mine up in the store. Then I could hear percussion etc. coming from the speakers off to the sides. But it did make the listening experience considerably nicer to have even that separation honestly...

 

[fieldcar]

I think the first thing to do is to have the speaker laid out in the equi-distant triangle angles directly at your corresponding ears, the play around with slight toe-out. I like to aim my speakers' toe-in about 2ft behind me. If that doesn't fix it, it could be the desk surface. These speakers are likely designed for speaker stands, and you get essential floor reflections that can make speaker sound unnatural, which is why the Kali monitors have dip switches for desktop use. I hope you figure it out.

 

[thedantestyle]

You'd be surprised. Actually it's like 70% of service cases in all industry fields dealing with two or more wires. Should be less than 50% by common logic, but Applied Murphy's Law states otherwise.

Well FFS!

I sit here, making this list of ideas from you all (who have been amazing with the advice btw!) - And I've set some time aside to check all your ideas all at once - I've got sound deadening panels from the garage here, I've got towels, I've got a DB measuring app to check each speaker.

I figure I should check the wiring first just because... Surely I'm not a complete moron...

Yeah... I'm a complete moron! Whelp this is my first intro to the forum - great first impression *facepalm*

Thanks again to everyone, this has been epic by way of support.

 

[AnalogSteph]

LOL. Told ya so. It happens to the best...

Listen to some pink noise with one channel inverted while sticking your head between the speakers. It'll sound incredibly phasey, with a weird feeling of pressure on your ears. You'll always know what that means now!

 

[AdamG]

Yeah... I'm a complete moron! Whelp this is my first intro to the forum - great first impression *facepalm*

Your in good company. I bet we all have done this at least once in our Audio Journey and maybe more than once. Sometimes we miss the basic stuff we assume we did correctly. Welcome to the club!

 

[Tupisac]

Well FFS!

I work with wires every day and first thing you learn is to not trust the guy before you even if it was you. The time it takes to learn this skill is inversely proportional to the voltages and/or price of equipment you have to deal with.

But jokes aside - my spider sense tells me we're not done here yet:

Yeah I mean have had a few sets of high-end open back headphones - adn stoundstange and imaging is talked about a lot - I can never hear as much amazing 'pinpoint of source' as many reviewers talk about.

Assuming you're an ordinary, healthy human with a head and two properly working ears - this shouldn't be the case.

Again, simplest solutions first - check your audio settings on a computer, assuming it's your source. Generally you want to disable all audio enhancements, 3D surrounds, spatial audio and all this crap on the drivers and system settings level. Also, your AV receiver has lots of correction features - I suggest factory reset or try to bypass it completely for a headphone test.

Personally, I can identify sounds hard-panned left or right coming directly out of the left or right speaker, especially high frequencies from the tweeter, but the center (and anything else) is rather vague. ...It sounds like I have a "wide" center speaker. I'm sure that's true for most people, otherwise surround sound wouldn't need a center channel/speaker.

Go to a store (preferably selling studio, prosumer and music gear) and try known and working monitoring equipment including some reputable headphones. If your hearing is okay, then it's time to troubleshoot your system.

I don't know if it's JBL's waveguide black magic, but this works just perfect on the blue horizontal axis. Each tick has it's own distinctive place and I can point a finger at it.
Same with my HD-600 headphones, but the ruler goes through my head instead of being in front of me.

Precise imaging is definitely a thing, but I must admit I do smoke occasionally

 

[fieldcar]

Thanks again to everyone, this has been epic by way of support.

Glad you got it figured out. The best part of this forum is just generally growing and learning more. Some day you'll be helping someone else out, and that's great for the community.

I'd still try out these illustrations for speaker placement to help with imaging and soundstage.

I settle somewhere between B and C for my toe-in.

 

[Keith_W]

Yep, we all make that mistake. One of the first things I do when I wire up my system is to play a test track to make sure I have plugged everything in correctly. I am not beyond making that mistake either, especially if the connectors are not clearly marked. The speaker binding posts on my amp have a red and black ring painted on it which is only visible from the rear of the amp and can not be seen clearly from the top. I have made that mistake more than once. I fixed it by painting one binding post with my wife's fingernail polish.

 

[Spyart]

Dirac and triangle (as a starling point) is all you need. And 38% rule is a must too.

 

[tuga]

So today I went to a hifi store to test out some new speakers - I had him set them all up the same distance I'd be listening - they sounded pretty great - Had amazing imaging - and clearly defined center image for vocals etc.

Were the speakers on stands or on a desk as you have them?

You could buy really tall pro-audio stands and tilt the speakers' axis so that they point at the listening spot.

 

[Tupisac]

I think some of you guys are missing the point.

In the near field application desk, stands and a room are not this critical for imaging. And those shouldn't matter at all with a pair of OP's high-end open back headphones.

 

[anotherhobby]

The speakers need to be slid back on the desk so they are sitting at the back next to (or maybe on top of) the cable holes that go thru the top of the desk. My speakers are at 35° to each side in my near field setup (not recommending this specifically, just what I have). The model below is to scale of my desk. In the model, I pulled my speakers forward to the very front of the desk, where they are positioned in the image in the first post of this thread, and I measure around 65° to each side. This is not okay for good stereo imaging with speakers, not to mention the off axis sound quality issues listening at that angle on any speaker. There are other problems also, but the placement needs to be fixed.

 

[antcollinet]

Just a suggestion but have you measured each speaker? One could have a problem or one could be slightly more or less efficient than the other and at your very close distance you can hear it? Maybe your amp is not completely balanced and putting out slightly more power to one side? Get a microphone and do some measurements.


I second the proximity to a side wall causing boundary gain to one channel. With a mic and some eq you could fix that.

On edit: Looking at your picture of the room you have a cubby hall on the right side. This space volume will act as a bass resonator for the right speaker and could cause the imbalance that is pulling the image to the right. Can you try moving your desk to face the wall on the right, just for a test run and report back what you notice? That little hall cubby is going to be problematic without treatment.

Is that glass behind you? Can you provide a picture of the sides and back of the room please?

Oh and Welcome Aboard @thedantestyle

This is what I was thinking too. A big void behind one speaker that is not behind the other. That will seriously unbalance both Bass response and higher frequency reflections

EDIT - ignore - just seen your wiring post above.

 

[antcollinet]

Your in good company. I bet we all have done this at least once in our Audio Journey and maybe more than once. Sometimes we miss the basic stuff we assume we did correctly. Welcome to the club!

Yep - me too.

 

[srrxr71]

Imaging and soundstage are (usually) imperfect illusions. It depends on the recording, you and your brain and your imagination, room acoustics, speakers, listening position and speaker position, and maybe other variables.

Personally, I can identify sounds hard-panned left or right coming directly out of the left or right speaker, especially high frequencies from the tweeter, but the center (and anything else) is rather vague. ...It sounds like I have a "wide" center speaker. I'm sure that's true for most people, otherwise surround sound wouldn't need a center channel/speaker.

You may prefer to toe in the speakers more.Try aiming at your nose at first and toe out from there according to taste.

 

[srrxr71]

I agree. I think the magazine reviewers talking about pinpoint images in a “black” background are smoking something.

You’d be surprised though what is possible. Honestly if I had to guess and I could be wrong going point source at that distance helps. It’s unloads a lot from your brain. It keep things stable when you turn or move your head even slightly. Otherwise it’s comb filtering city. The sound changes with every movement.

With a 3 way like that your brain has to stitch those different frequency bands arriving from slightly different distances and angles. It makes listening more fatiguing. The illusion of a soundstage requires more subconscious brain processing.

 

[Weeb Labs]

So I made another thread a few days ago asking about whether I should get studio monitors or hifi speakers for good imaging sitting at my desk.

I currently own a couple of Wharfedale evo 4.2 speakers (3-way) - I believed - and many suggested these speakers would be no good for nearfield listening.

So today I went to a hifi store to test out some new speakers - I had him set them all up the same distance I'd be listening - they sounded pretty great - Had amazing imaging - and clearly defined center image for vocals etc.

Anyway, before I decided to purchase a set - I asked him to set up my speakers in the same position (he happened to have evo 4.2 in store) Just so I'd be sure the new speakers imaged better.... Lo and behold my speakers were AMAZING! Even better imaging nearfield than the ones I was going to buy.

So admittedly my desk is not the same as listening to speakers on floor stands (as they were in store) - So I pulled my speakers to the end of the desk to eliminate reflections from the monitor and desk - Ive attached a photo - but the image didn't improve one little bit. I've tried different toe-in angles as well.

The store owner suggested it could be my amp - but I suspect it's something in my setup/reflections going on.... What would you suggest I do next to get my imaging happening properly? Could it really be my amp? I'm using an onkyo tx-sr602 receiver which admittedly isn't amazing, but would it really kill my imaging? I could drive to the store with my amp but it's almost 2 hours drive away.

Check the delay settings on your AVR. If both channels are not identical, the result will be an extremely poor phantom center/imaging. This is worth checking even if you believe the problem to be solved.

 

[Mr. Widget]

Your in good company. I bet we all have done this at least once in our Audio Journey and maybe more than once. Sometimes we miss the basic stuff we assume we did correctly. Welcome to the club!

I'll never admit it.