Getting the most from your loudspeakers, and loudspeaker setup

Just a few hints and tips to help you make the most of your loudspeakers and general loudspeaker setup tips

All loudspeakers will require a 'running in' period, they're mechanical in nature, a little like a car engine. Expect 30-100 hours until they're fully run in, maybe even more in some cases.

The wall you place the speakers against will have a large say in how they're going to sound. Solid walls reflect bass energy back into the room and reinforce the available bass response, so you'll need to pull the speaker further away in this case, particularly if they're rear ported. Partition/stud walls tend to absorb bass as they're more flexible, so you can place speakers closer to these types of walls with less bass issues. There will be differences between solid brick walls and breezeblock type walls.

Rear ported speakers usually need very careful placement, as their proximity to a solid rear wall will reinforce the bass they produce. Some speakers are designed to specifically work this way, whereas others need plenty of space to perform as intended. Sealed cabinet speakers are less affected by room boundaries, and will usually work better close to a wall, likewise front or side ported loudspeakers. Also, speakers that use slot shaped ports instead of circular ports tend to be able to be placed nearer to walls.

Toeing the speaker in will have a small effect on bass output. The bass of a speaker that is perpendicular to a wall can sound more exaggerated than that of a speaker that has been toed in.

Toeing in is recommended when the speakers are very close to the side walls to reduce high frequency reflection from the side walls.

If your system sounds like there's a hole in the middle of the music, toeing the speakers in will produce a stronger central image. Be careful though, as toeing in too much may rob the system of it's soundstage width. The best thing to do is face them straight out, then toe them in bit by bit until you're happy with the central image, striking a balance with the soundstage.

I would only recommend using the supplied foam port bungs as a last resort. These are supplied to dampen the bass when the speaker is used near to a wall, but they drastically change a speaker's sonic signature (not just in the bass region), and not usually for the better. You can experiment with making your own foam bungs using different densities of foam. The speaker will originally have been designed to properly utilise its open ports.

A thick rug placed between you and the speakers will tame excessive treble in rooms with reflective surfaces (laminated floors, bare walls etc). Use a mirror on the floor to determine the reflection point - when you can see the speaker's HF unit (the small driver) in the mirror from your seating position, that's the area that higher frequencies will be reflecting off, which is the perfect place to put the rug. The same can be done for walls, either with rugs, bookcases, dedicated absorbent panels, or anything else that's not a flat reflective surface.

Bookshelves and other furniture can help to break up general room reflections, cutting down on harmful high frequency reflections.

Tighten up the screws/allen bolts of your speaker's drive units once every 6 months or so. It's surprising how much some can loosen over time, limiting your speaker's optimum performance. Be careful not to overtighten though.

Investigate isolation products. Spikes are worth using to compensate for uneven floors, but are generally viewed nowadays as a dirty word. Spikes directly couple your speaker to the floor, which passes vibrations directly to your floor, which is only going to tempt your floorboards becoming an extension of your speaker cabinet and joining in! These vibrations can also find their way back up the stand back to the loudspeaker cabinet. By isolating the speaker from the stand itself (even if they use spikes), these vibrations can be removed between the speaker and the stand.

Some loudspeakers that have offset tweeters (i.e., not in line vertically with the other drivers) usually sound better with the tweeters placed on the inside, not the outside of the front face, unless designed to do otherwise. This will have a huge effect on the speaker's imaging abilities. Other speakers are less affected by this, and placing tweeters inside or outside can benefit depending on how far apart they’re placed.

Rather than buying a bi-wire cable (effectively two runs of cable per speaker), the same amount of money spent on a better, single wire cable with some decent jumper cables can bring about greater benefits.

Switch your amplifier on about half an hour to an hour before any serious listening. The amplifier needs to warm up, stabilise, components need to charge up etc in order to work at it's optimum, and drive your loudspeakers properly. Your speakers can only perform as well as the amplifier will allow.

Using low speaker stands will bring the bass out more in a speaker - higher stands bring out the midrange and treble more as the bass is less pronounced. This tweak can be used to your preference.

Filling stands to make them more stable is recommended, but do experiment with the amount of ballast you add, as some speakers work better on lighter stands. Filling them all the way to the top isn't usually recommended. I would fill no more than half way, which keeps the centre of gravity low, and keeps them more stable. 

On the subject of stands, single column stands may look less intrusive, but stands with more, slimmer columns will be more rigid, and can help by not overexaggerating bass. Open frame stands (open top plate) can also provide clarity benefits.

Ideally, keeping the space between your speakers free from any furniture tends to get the most from the speaker's imaging capabilities. I feel there's a psychological benefit for this as well.

If placing your speakers either side of a chimney breast, bring them forward so that the front face of the speaker is in front of the chimney breast itself. Setting them too far back can affect your central image, and confuse your speaker's imaging capabilities due to introducing reflections off the side faces of the chimney breast.

A smaller pair of bookshelf speakers and a separate subwoofer (or two) can yield better results than larger floorstanders sometimes when used correctly. There is more scope for choosing tonal balance too, but this approach requires careful set up to avoid phase issues, and the best place in the room for subwoofers isn't usually where you want to put them.

Finally, the greatest advice is to choose the right speaker for the room in the first place. A bigger, or even more expensive speaker isn't necessarily going to sound better.

So firstly - using a larger speaker in a smaller room can produce excessive bass, which will be hard to tame naturally. Choosing a large rear ported loudspeaker when the speaker has no choice but to be placed very near to a wall will exaggerate bass which will likely smother midrange detail, producing an overly soft, warm sound that lacks presence and punch.

Secondly - a smaller speaker in a large room may struggle to fill the space, and produce a strained, harsh sound. A small speakers will work better in a large space by adding a subwoofer, which will alleviate the strain on a small speaker. Using two subwoofers will help fill potential bass null points in the room better.

Choosing the right loudspeaker for your room has always been a key focus point at the little audio company / the little audio store, and this is generally reflected in our choice of loudspeaker brands. For more information, feel free to get in touch.

davidf

info@thelittleaudiostore.co.uk

david@thelittleaudio.company