The long and the short of it is ...... err, what exactly?

[Marco]

Cool

Marco.

[Colinx]

My system is unfortunatly (may be) in a L shaped room. I have tried having the amps etc in the ''other half'' of the room. It was placed on the same external wall as the speakers but behind the dividing part of the wall. I thought it well out of the way of the speakers line of fire, easy to get at to change discs etc, and cuts down on the cable length required. I did not notice any change in the sound compared to the previously tried mid way solution. The lay out as is, that is equipment at one of a 16' ish room, behind the sofa, speakers at the other end does seem to give me the best overall balance. I had assumed that the removal of the rack from between the speakers was the main reason for the improved sound. This was proved to be wrong when we ''short'' term placed a console table thing between the speakers (well behind) while decorating elsewhere. That had no effect at all on the sound.

[Marco]

I'm not surprised it didn't, Colin. Such things are liable to have no effect.

TV's are the worst thing you can put between your speakers, particularly the old kind before flat-screens were invented.

If you want to ruin the sound of your hi-fi system, plonk a big old TV right in the middle!

Marco.

[anthonyTD]

hi guys,
all you're really doing is playing with capacitance and resistance/reactance [again] the difference it makes will depend on a few things, i.e. the ability of your preamp to drive long lengths of cable, i.e. it should have a relatively low output impedance to do this without any degradation of the frequencies you're transmitting, the amplifiers output impedance should also be as low as possible not to see a long cable as a problem, or the speakers and cable should be matched to the load [valve amps] to get the correct power transfer at all frequencies, of course there’s also the capacitance of each cable to throw into the equation, capacitance and reactance will always have an affect at one particular frequency extreme or another, it just depend on the value and the equipments ability to overcome its affects. So, in my opinion, either situation can be a problem, depending on your equipment's design.
anthony,TD...

[Marco]

And your system works quite happily with your gear in between the speakers, albeit the speakers are well out in front

Marco.

[The Grand Wazoo]

TGW,



From experience it's simply the fact that unless you're using really crap badly designed cable then you'd probably have to use about a mile of the stuff before any detectable (by ear) sonic degradation would occur, depending of course on the amplifier(s) being used. Some are fussier in their relationship with speaker cable than others.


Marco.

This gets closer to the thing that really intrigues me.

It's all about your ear collecting the information & your brain processing it. Now I'm a strong believer in the power of the brain to perform 'error correction' to a greater or lesser extent.

I often heard it said in relation to speakers with not much deep bass that your brain makes up for what you don't hear. I used to think that was a load of old tosh - now I'm not so sure. Of course the brain can't put the physical thump in your chest that a big speaker can, but maybe it can make you think you heard it.

Now if that's the case, then why shouldn't your brain be able to correct things like imbalances in stereo information like different lengths of cables.

If you need convincing of the power of your brain to process information and apply error correction just like a CD player then you need to read the following paragraph which staggered me & started me thinking about all this stuff..............

The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mind.

Aoccdrnig to rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoatnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be in the rghit pclae.

The rset can be a taotl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit a porbelm.

Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, it lokos at the wrod as a wlohe and tehn rletaes it to the ohetr wodrs nxet to it.


.............see what I mean?

[Marco]

Hehe... Very interesting!

I know people who write like that without realising they're doing anything wrong

Marco.

[Iain Sinclair]

Hehe... Very interesting!

I know people who write like that without realising they're doing anything wrong

Marco.

And most of them write for hifi magazines!

[Marco]

I believe it's referred to as 'inventive prose'

Marco.

[Mike]

Why is in between the speakers the worst place to site the equipment?

It seems to be about the quietest place in my listening room.