I've really enjoyed watching Steve's latest series of videos - Sound Bytes. I took the 'Speaker Placement' one, to heart.

I thought I was at a very good place, with my combination of equipment, room, treatments...really everything in the audio chain. In fact, I have not done anything at all for months, to make any changes - no tube rolling, equipment changes, etc.  I do swap back and forth, periodically, between my tubes and my SS Sansui (sacrilege, I know - but I love both...)

We have all heard over and over, how important the room is - and I have done everything from, adding room treatment, changing up furniture placement, and especially, tweaking speaker placement - all with great results.

Using open baffles, I have had the speakers pulled out, close to 3 ft. from the front wall, and a constant 8' distance from the listening position. The sound has been really outstanding. So, like I said, I have not changed anything in quite some time now.

But, watching the video on speaker placement, I decided to experiment. The subject was 'nearfield', which, for the reason of placing speakers and listening chair, out much more in to the room, I (and most people I'm sure) have not tried. But instead of going 'Full' nearfield, i moved the speakers 1' closer, and the chair out 1' more. Like I said, not nearfield, but now 6'.

And, as part of the subject of nearfield, Steve suggests pretty extreme toe-in. Right speaker pointed at left shoulder and vice versa. I started there, but the result was pretty bright. I gradually toed them back out, and ended up with right speaker at right shoulder.

I ended up with this new setup, starting Saturday afternoon, and have had the most pleasurable few days of listening, that I've had in my listening career. There is nothing like a free upgrade

It's great to do that kind of experimentation. I find that in my room with my speakers I have to have the speakers closer to the walls than I would like and NO toe in. The HR-1 speakers are about 8 feet apart and about 10 feet from my ears.

Yep. It is fun and can be eye (ear) opening, the results you can get.

Art, that’s interesting with the toe-in. I never considered toeing them in even more. Since you brought it up, I’ll try that too.

Hey Art.  I’ve been experimenting with toe-in again. You said that you are toed in a little more than opposite shoulder. Do you have an approximation of how much in front of you, the angles cross?

Thanks!

Geno

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Absolutely. Pre Decware I had different pairs of stand mounted monitors (ProAc and Totem) and each behaved differently from the other and different from my current Omegas. IMO the only way to figure this out is to put in the time and effort moving them around, listening carefully, and moving them some more. Blue painter's tape is your friend.

Geno.

I forgot to mention that visually my two speakers cross about two feet in front of my head. I am not surprised that different placements in different room acoustics could result in different solutions.