How Wide?

[icehockeyboy]

Always had the front left and right speakers more or less in line with the edges of the screen, so they are approx 45 inches apart, but now have the opportunity to place them wider but is approximately 19 feet apart too wide?

Thinking about it that's how far the rear speakers are apart anyway.........

[Barry]

Always had the front left and right speakers more or less in line with the edges of the screen, so they are approx 45 inches apart, but now have the opportunity to place them wider but is approximately 19 feet apart too wide?

Thinking about it that's how far the rear speakers are apart anyway.........

Ideally the front speakers ought to be close to the edge of the screen, otherwise the brain has to struggle with the difference between the visual image width, as seen by the eyes, with the audio image width, as heard by the ears. This is especially apparent when live music concerts are broadcast.

[icehockeyboy]

Ideally the front speakers ought to be close to the edge of the screen, otherwise the brain has to struggle with the difference between the visual image width, as seen by the eyes, with the audio image width, as heard by the ears. This is especially apparent when live music concerts are broadcast.

Cheers Barry.

Anyone else care to comment?

[Macca]

Nineteen feet sounds like a bit much! As aways though you have to try it and see. I find that as your watching an image your brain tends to dwell less on all the hi-fi things such as soundstage and micro dynamics etc blah blah so they matter a lot less. Best advice I can give is if you are using a centre speaker get rid and rely on your front L & R, works much better especially with music programme.

[Spectral Morn]

A few feet to either side of the screen would be the very max one should go, but ideally just to either side of the screen is spot on with the centre speaker under the screen but placed just to the right of the screen centre line. In regards to rear spacing draw imaginary lines out from the front speakers to the rear wall and place rear speakers within that square or rectangle one at each corner and one in the centre if its a 6.1 set up.

The mistake many make is to take the speakers outside of that and place them further apart than is ideal. Keeping it symmetrical is a good idea too.

Good article here http://www.boyceaudio.com/technotes/HTLayoutPart2.html and here http://www.thx.com/consumer/home-entertainment/home-theater/surround-sound-speaker-set-up/


Regards Neil

[icehockeyboy]

A few feet to either side of the screen would be the very max one should go, but ideally just to either side of the screen is spot on with the centre speaker under the screen but placed just to the right of the screen centre line. In regards to rear spacing draw imaginary lines out from the front speakers to the rear wall and place rear speakers within that square or rectangle one at each corner and one in the centre if its a 6.1 set up.

The mistake many make is to take the speakers outside of that and place them further apart than is ideal. Keeping it symmetrical is a good

Good article here http://www.boyceaudio.com/technotes/HTLayoutPart2.html and here http://www.thx.com/consumer/home-entertainment/home-theater/surround-sound-speaker-set-up/


Regards Neil

Never ever heard of putting the centre speaker anywhere else other than dead centre........?

[Spectral Morn]

Never ever heard of putting the centre speaker anywhere else other than dead centre........?

Its a THX thing if I recall right and its only a smidge off centre. So place Centre speaker dead centre of screen then move it a smidge to the right so its just off centre.


Regards Neil

[nat8808]

Wouldn't it be ideal to have a very wide (and large in general) screen and a wide soundstage via widely spaced speakers?

By having your speakers next to or close to the edge of a screen which isn't of the ideal size, you end up compromising both audio AND visual.

You can achieve the ideal soundstage width to your taste and then just live with the visual compromise. That's how I would do it - I'm only two channel but am perfectly happy to have wide speaker placement with a small screen, sometimes even just with a laptop screen.

It doesn't bother me the mismatch but I do very much enjoy the wider stereo.

Theory should go out the window for a matter of personal taste - kind of what Macca says above.

[icehockeyboy]

Cheers gents!

Some of you mention stereo, but I don't use the AV stuff for music, and I was thinking the effects of an airplane or similar sound effect would be more convincing if it swept from one side of my room to the other, and not just right side of the 46" screen to the left side of it. Or vice versa of course. :)

[Macca]

You should set up your front l/r speakers exactly as you would for 2 channel music. So six to eight feet apart depending on how far away you are seated. Telly slap in the centre of them. As I said before ditch the centre speaker and reconfigure output from your amp accordingly. Too much material has a lot of the sound coming from the centre which gives you mono sound and unless you have paid out a lot for it can overload the speaker if using a decent volume level. The stereo pair will do a much better job of creating a phantom centre channel since they shate the load. You may also find it is easier to hear dialogue this way too.

[baron]

I agree with loosing the center speaker, I ditched mine years ago.

[Spectral Morn]

70% of the sound comes from the centre, that is the way most movies are made, the way the sound technicians design the sound, which in many cases is an integral part of the movie, ditch the centre at your own potential loss.

And definitely do not place the speakers as far apart as Macca is suggesting (IMHO), unless your screen is massive. It just won't work the way movie sound is designed, particularly if the movies are made to the THX spec.


Regards Neil

[Macca]

You are not losing that seventy percent though it is simply transferred to the front left and right speakers which are ususlly far more capable than the centre. THX is imo mostly a marketing exercise and ime a lot of the kit that is sold as THX certified is not up to delivering the reference spl without distortion in both amp and speakers. The centre is particularly vulnerable to this as it is required to do so much.

[walpurgis]

To my ears, centre speakers do dreadful things to stereo imaging.

[Macca]

I found that I had to turn the centre feed up to try to hear dialogue but then the centre starts to overload plus becomes too noticeable and the system was playing too loud on peaks - There are a lot of dynamics in a good soundtrack especially with action films and you end up turning the volume up to hear quiet passages then turning it down again when things get going. No-one wants to be doing that when you are trying to immerse yourself in the film. So I swapped in large-ish studio desk monitors for left and right and dialled out the centre and that made a huge difference to intelligibility of dialogue and no need to re-master the soundtrack as you go along either. I'd recommend at least trying this approach if you have the same issues I did.

[Figlet108]

So I'm not necessarily disagreeing with any of the different approaches expressed here, but my experiences led me down the path of getting a high end centre speaker (almost as high end as my main L/R speakers) precisely for the reasons Neil says about 70% of the sound being designed for the centre. I find dialogue exceptionally clear and during sections when there is dialogue from the centre and music from the L/R, there is a satisfying layering of sound that isn't quite as good for me with just L/R.

As for positioning of L/R, I'm in the camp of placing them just at the edges of the screen boundary. When for example there's a very directional sound, like a loud knock on the door that is on the left of the screen, if the speaker is too far away from the left boundary it just doesn't work and breaks the spell of the movie.

Also, when we talk about rear speakers in this thread, are we really talking about rear or surround speakers?

[walpurgis]

Hmm. As far as I can see if you use a centre speaker, you might as well listen to a mono system. The practice undermines the purpose of stereo.

[Figlet108]

Geoff, it depends on what material we are talking about.

If it's a movie that has dialogue engineered to come from the centre speaker, then yes it's mono, just as it was intended.
In modern movies the soundtrack usually comes from the L/R speakers and/or sometimes the surround speakers and this is in stereo / quad, which is again as intended.

If it's a stereo music video and for whatever reason the music is coming from the centre speaker as well, then I agree this is a bad thing and should be disconnected.

I'm all about recreating the sound of a movie (or music video) as was intended by the director and sound engineers that made it.
In the same way I found that for movies a sub (or two) always does a better job of the LFE channel than any L/R speakers. Mine go down to 24hz but the subs are in a different league for movie effects.

[nat8808]

But are the sound engineers making the 5.1 track as they want to hear it as a film or in order to fulfill common 5.1 practice which everyone expects, including a relatively mono sound? Personally I think 5.1 etc is a conceptual attempt to make your living room like a cinema but that it isn't necessarily concerned with bringing realism to the average, especially british, home with relatively small screens.

I would have thought that you'd want speech to move around the screen as per stereo rather than always biased to the centre of the screen. If you have a wide screen and someone speaks from near the edge of the picture, won't a centre speaker ruin the feel of the film by making the sound come from the centre?

As I say, when I watch movies at home (on 2 channel) I prefer to have the audio as ideal as possible (and therefore believable, wide stereo) rather than re-enforcing and bringing attention to the fact that you're just watching it on a small screen in front of you. In other words the sound is immersive and realistic whilst you just have to put up with the screen until panaoramic displays become commonplace at home - at least live to the fullest for one of the senses.

I'm not really into A/V so please ignore me if you like! I'm just curious to the differences between following the accepted methods and standards and doing what sounds more immersive.

[Macca]

Well maybe I shouldn't talk since my own 4.1 system isn't really set up ideally since the TV is off centre with one of the front speakers directly above it - I could remedy that but it would mean shifting things around a little and I have never found it a distraction, I just fed a little more signal to the speaker that is further away. Best practice is not the same in A/V as it is for 2 channel music since we have moving pictures that take up most of our brain's processing, a fact that tends to get glossed over by the salesmen. If you can watch a black and white film and forget you are watching in black and white, or a subtitled film in which you forget you are reading subtitles it is unlikely that you will become conscious of the fact that the sound is not quite a 360 degree wrap around. Not being able to hear dialogue clearly, on the other hand, is an immediate and noticeable distraction. As Jason says you can remedy that with a very high quality centre but have at least £1500 to spend! Far cheaper to dump it altogether.In any case we do not need a centre channel for music so I don't really see the requirement to have one for a film soundtrack. The fact that they are so expensive compared to the other speakers in the set up has always given me pause for thought - it is just one box with 2 bass mids wired in parallel plus a tweeter so why are they priced at 75% of the stereo pair? Seems to me to be an attempt to sell an additional high profit item that is not really necessary. Like a dealer selling a full system stereo set up and making all his profit from the cables he recommends you need to 'get the best from it'. A rear centre is far more useful but you rarely see them included in a typical package probably because 90% of people have no room for it since their listening position is against the back wall anyway.

With regard to distance of the front L/R from the screen a pal of mine has a relatively expensive B&W/Onkyo 7.2 THX set up that was professionally installed and the installers wanted the front L/R as far apart as was possible in the room - that's about 13' wide - with a 60 inch screen. I've never heard of the idea that the speakers should be close to the screen boundary - is that a THX requirement?

[Figlet108]

Some great points coming out and I'm itching to respond :)
However I'm on a train to Birmingham for all day meetings so I'll have to wait till this evening.

One elephant-shaped grenade I will throw into the discussion is the room correction that I believe is essential for a good A/V setup.
My Onkyo SC5508 uses Audyssey MultEQ XT32 for set up and room correction. I used to be a sceptic in this area coming from the purist position of stereo hifi, where "thou shalt never digitally correct the signal!". I have to say that for movies in an A/V setup I am now 'a believer' - praise be!

The difference good room correction and setup makes is *huge* for directional sound and effects. Of course it doesn't help the music soundtrack, but as Martin quite rightly says, that's just a part of the movie experience and the directional sound and effects are what make it so much more immersive in my opinion.
The point is that good setup and digital room correction actually makes the *exact* speaker placement less of an issue and there's more flexibility for breaking the rules (don't be afraid of Lucas and his THX police SASing through your living room window to arrest you :) )

Anyway, my train's here - more later.

[Spectral Morn]

Over the years when I was out of two channel audio retailing I was involved in AV and general brown goods retail and I got a fair bit of experience re the different solutions available and one thing that was pretty key was that all the speakers needed to be the same/identical and if one was using a better centre then it came from the same brand, range and was thus voiced the same as the other speakers. An early attempt by myself to break this failed miserably in that I could hear the transition of voicing which broke the suspense of disbelief, so as the sound panned there was a Venetian blind effect. Only by replacing the centre with an identically voiced speaker solved this.

As has been hinted at there is no one cover all approach to this as different movies either THX or not will take a different approach so more so than with two channel more compromise is required to hit the sweet spot more often than not imho. One of the most impressive films I have heard in recent years was a Dolby Pro Logic movie Azumi, with excellent sound steering and a real replacing of the room acoustic for the movie reality.

Sound pressure level metre is required C weighted and 75 db is the level to hit, though most modern amps come with mic and automatic setup. I always double check manually.


Regards Neil

[icehockeyboy]

Hmm. As far as I can see if you use a centre speaker, you might as well listen to a mono system. The practice undermines the purpose of stereo.

Stereo?

Who is talking about stereo?

We are talking multi channel AV here.

Not stereo, that's my other set up. :)

[nat8808]

Stereo?

Who is talking about stereo?

We are talking multi channel AV here.

Not stereo, that's my other set up. :)

People are talking stereo purely in terms of the soundstage about the screen.

Perhaps you're saying that a 4 speaker approach will make the dialogue float potentially in the middle of speakers (depending on the placement) whilst the centre channel gives it bias towards the front of the surround sound-image? I guess it depends on how your A/V processor can handle the lack of centre - if it can compensate properly, it shouldn't make any difference.

[nat8808]

One elephant-shaped grenade I will throw into the discussion is the room correction that I believe is essential for a good A/V setup.


Not really elephant shaped - that would imply we're all choosing to ignore the obvious.. but I would guess that 90% dabling in A/V don't use room correction becuase they don't have it.

[Figlet108]

Neil, I find myself in violent agreement with you (is there a smilie for that?)

Anyway this thread needs some photos, so here's my setup - it's far from ideal given the constraints of room and marriage...

Here are the front three speakers + 2 subs:
https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/-Te8BByt2jr4/U26OizB4msI/AAAAAAAACVw/kaoQrfkQ1dI/w831-h554-no/2014-05-10+15.37.06_resize.jpg
I would have preferred to have the speakers a few feet further apart, but that'll have to wait for the house upgrade...

And the back 3 + projector:
https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-n9p5pbE2BdI/U26Oi-g2VNI/AAAAAAAACVo/0_y1fxX_9qU/w831-h554-no/2014-05-10+15.43.35_resize.jpg
At one point I tried 2 rear speakers but it was pointless. Franky the single rear is still a bit pointless given the size of the room and having the sofa right at the back wall, but hey it makes me happy knowing it's there :)

So interestingly, watching Eurovision (obviously! what else would I be doing), on the HD channel they are broadcasting in 5.1, but the centre channel is completely silent. The music is almost exclusively coming from front L/R, with only applause and some 'ambience' coming from the surrounds.
It actually sounds very good in my opinion.

[Figlet108]

Not really elephant shaped - that would imply we're all choosing to ignore the obvious.. but I would guess that 90% dabling in A/V don't use room correction becuase they don't have it.

Fair enough, no elephants and no grenades, however I find it very hard to believe 90% of those with A/V amps don't have auto setup in this day and age. I would have thought it was the opposite with 90% of current A/V amps having auto setup.

What A/V amp do you have and does it not have auto setup?

I agree with Neil that levels often have to be tweaked to taste after the auto setup, but it's the parametric eq, bass management and whatever else those fancy algorithms do that add the real value.

[Macca]

I've got three a/v amps and none of them have room correction or auto set up.
One of them has transformer hum though.

Pretty serious home cinema set up you have there Jason. Makes me want to sort mine out.

[Figlet108]

My previous Yamaha A/V amp from 5 years ago also had auto setup, but I concede - looks like I've underestimated the proliferation of A/V auto setup on AOS.
I guess getting back to the OP, the question is does Craig have auto setup, as I think it would reduce the impact of 'how wide' (in my opinion).

Martin, going down the route of separate processor/power amps and gradually collecting all matching speakers for the full 6.2 setup made a massive difference to my previous setup. It's the speakers that really pushed the cost up though for me, as having Audiovector front L/R meant collecting the rest was always going to be a bit painful. On the other hand decent power amps crop up on ebay all the time at cracking prices.

[Spectral Morn]

Neil, I find myself in violent agreement with you (is there a smilie for that?)

Anyway this thread needs some photos, so here's my setup - it's far from ideal given the constraints of room and marriage...

Here are the front three speakers + 2 subs:
https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/-Te8BByt2jr4/U26OizB4msI/AAAAAAAACVw/kaoQrfkQ1dI/w831-h554-no/2014-05-10+15.37.06_resize.jpg
I would have preferred to have the speakers a few feet further apart, but that'll have to wait for the house upgrade...

And the back 3 + projector:
https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-n9p5pbE2BdI/U26Oi-g2VNI/AAAAAAAACVo/0_y1fxX_9qU/w831-h554-no/2014-05-10+15.43.35_resize.jpg
At one point I tried 2 rear speakers but it was pointless. Franky the single rear is still a bit pointless given the size of the room and having the sofa right at the back wall, but hey it makes me happy knowing it's there :)

So interestingly, watching Eurovision (obviously! what else would I be doing), on the HD channel they are broadcasting in 5.1, but the centre channel is completely silent. The music is almost exclusively coming from front L/R, with only applause and some 'ambience' coming from the surrounds.
It actually sounds very good in my opinion.

Nice set up those look like Dali's, a very underrated brand in the UK. I haven't been around current AV amps but last time I was most mid priced upwards amps did have mic set up and knowing the pulse of AV is features I would be surprised if most sub £500 amps these days don't come with mic set up.

I think that's a first, someone violently agreeing with me.


Regards Neil

[Figlet108]

Yes they do look like Dalis, I agree, but they are actually Audiovector Si3 avantgarde arrete (http://www.audiovector.com/index.php/floorstanders/si-series/avantgarde-arrete)
The centre is one notch below the arrete, the SiC avantgarde (http://www.audiovector.com/index.php/centers/si-series/si-c-avantgarde)
These all have ribbon tweaters which to my ears perform part of the magic.

The surrounds/rear are the K-XX (http://www.audiovector.com/index.php/in-on-wall/k-xx)
These are also very wife-friendly.

As for auto setup I've also not looked at the current market for a few years but a quick look on Richer sounds shows auto set up for £150 (http://www.richersounds.com/product/av-receivers/yamaha/rxv375/yama-rxv375-blk) (maybe less I didn't look for long)

[Spectral Morn]

Yes they do look like Dalis, I agree, but they are actually Audiovector Si3 avantgarde arrete (http://www.audiovector.com/index.php/floorstanders/si-series/avantgarde-arrete)
The centre is one notch below the arrete, the SiC avantgarde (http://www.audiovector.com/index.php/centers/si-series/si-c-avantgarde)
These all have ribbon tweaters which to my ears perform part of the magic.

The surrounds/rear are the K-XX (http://www.audiovector.com/index.php/in-on-wall/k-xx)
These are also very wife-friendly.

As for auto setup I've also not looked at the current market for a few years but a quick look on Richer sounds shows auto set up for £150 (http://www.richersounds.com/product/av-receivers/yamaha/rxv375/yama-rxv375-blk) (maybe less I didn't look for long)

I have seen those at a few shows but didn't know much about them, nice looking speakers.


Regards Neil