how far should my front speakers be placed apart????

sta99y

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Hi ppl,

At present my Kef sats sit on a low (18" inch high) Ikea Tv bench which is 1500mm (1.5metre) in length, the Kefs sit at each edge slightly turned in towards my listening point and the center sits in the bottom partition. I sit 4.1metres from these so you can imagine its a medium(ish) triangle. The sound to me is fine and impresses all who get a demo.

My wife and i have been given a New solid oak side board which will replace my old (cardboard/chipboard) low tv bench, the oak side board is 900mm (3ft) high and 1200mm (1.2metres) in length. With my Kef sats sitting on the new side board i would imagine the speakers would now be at a better height for listening point but they would end up being a Foot (30cm) closer together which i feel maybe to close! Overall each speaker wil be 40cm apart fom each other,C & Fronts This now becomes a narrow triangle to my listening point.

I have Two other options which would be to have center on unit and Front L/R on stands which i do have a set with modified tops to match a Kef egg foot plate. Audio T had the tops made for me some years ago. The wife is not keen on stands as 2yr old running around and she thinks the Eggs on 90cm stands looks like Aliens! Strange lady lol. The other option which suits her (not me) is to keep center on unit hiding behind vase (vase moved when playing movie/music) and Front L/R up on the wall in corners like my surrounds are.

Really need all suggestions you have.

I could try and Ebay the Front L/R and replace with 2nd hand Kef IQ3's to stand either side of side board with her indoors permission lol.

Sorry for waffling on but just need some advice on how i should place them.

thanks for reading

Regards Darrell
 

chebby

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6 feet to 8 feet apart would be much better.

Stands are far better than sitting speakers on top of cabinets/sideboards etc. (which are basically large, hollow, resonant cavities.)

However, the safety of your toddler comes first (and harmony with with your partner next and audio guidelines a poor third.)

If you can wallmount your L/R front speakers on suitable brackets, that might be a solution. Otherwise you will have to wait a couple of years until it's safe to use stands.
 

sta99y

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Thanks for your input. If i were to wall mount i can use the feet as they can be moved to the back of egg rather than the base, also they would be 9-10ft apart and just below the coving angled downwards and toed inwards to my listening point.

i must say the oak sideboard is a proper heavy item costing a Grand but realise it may alter te sound like you say.

Cheers tho Chebby
 
A

Anonymous

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Correction to original post

As a rule of thumb speakers should be spaced at 0.8 x of the distance from the seating position to the speaker ,giving a 45deg angle

example x= 10ft to speaker ,spacing would be 8ft

This is for a home cinema setup
 

chebby

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lesmor:As a rule of thumb speakers should be spaced 20% of the distance from the seating position to the speaker ,giving a 45deg angle

not the seat to the front wall

So seperation would be 2 feet if you listen from 10 feet away? That's not even the width of a small tv.
 
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Anonymous

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lesmor:
As a rule of thumb speakers should be spaced 20% of the distance from the seating position to the speaker ,giving a 45deg angle

not the seat to the front wall
i thought you are meant to sit the same distance from the speakers as they are from each other ? on the edge of the triangle ..
 
A

Anonymous

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Have a look at this

http://www.cardas.com/content.php?area=insights&content_id=26&pagestring=Room+Setup

I set someones room up using these basic measurements once before and it sounded great.
 

Chewy

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Peter Foate:

Have a look at this

http://www.cardas.com/content.php?area=insights&content_id=26&pagestring=Room+Setup

I set someones room up using these basic measurements once before and it sounded great.

Looking at this article, I think it relates to stereo speakers not a surround sound set-up. It also seems a bit impractical, i.e. it suggests the speakers should be 0.447 times the room width, from the rear wall. This means in a 12ft wide room, having the speakers 5.36ft from the rear wall?! I can see that happening in a dedicated stereo listening room, but not a lounge.

The best resources I have found are the Dolby and DTS website here:

http://www.dolby.com/consumer/setup/speaker-setup-guide/index.html

http://www.dts.com/Consumer_Electronics/Home_Theater/Speaker_Layout_and_Configurations.aspx

The Dolby one has a nice little calucltor system for helping you lay the speakers out. Both suggest that the front speakers should be around 22-30 degrees off from the centre line of the listening position. This might not be practical for you since at 4.1 metres distance away the L & R speakers would need to be 4.8 metres apart from one another (at 30 degrees)!

To be honest a speaker distance of 80cm between left and right is very narrow, and will give very poor stereo imaging. As suggested by another poster, putting the speakers on dedicated stand should improve the sound quality, although the KEF Eggs are less susepable to this than traditional speaker boxes.

Infact Kef Eggs work very well placed on the wall, which is why they come with keyhole fixings on their bases. Depending on the width of your room you could put the left and right speakers on the side walls and angle them towards your listening position, which would keep them well out of the way from little fingers.

I used to have the Kef 2005.2 speakers in a 7.1 configuration with the sides and rears up on the walls, and the surround effects imaging from these was superb!
 

sta99y

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Hi ppl thanks for all your input, I just used the calculator in setting up spkr placement. My room is 11feet wide so I put this in and it calculated that my fronts should be

Speaker Placement
You may use any unit of measure (feet, inches, meters, centimeters) but all measurements must be numbers only and use the same unit of measure.
Enter Room Width:

Results
The following distances should be used for speaker setup:

Woofer face (center front) to a side wall: 3.04
Woofer face (center front) to the rear wall: 4.92

So I understand they should be 3feet away from side Walls and almost 5feet in from my back wall, this puzzles me as my fronts would be halfway in my living room!! Pls tell me that the calculation is wrong!!

Thanks Darrell
 

sta99y

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G Davies thanks for your reply. I should mention that one side wall is 17feet long as it's the back of my house and it is all GLASS so no mounting there!! The opposite wall is stud plaster etc.. So the only way I could wall mount them is on the back wall that I look at, the one the tv is erected on. Having these around 3feet off the floor would be ideal to me but Lady of the manor says higher!! Just below coving and angle them inwards and downwards. Any good do you think??
 

Chewy

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bobbyg81:

Try watching this. no silly calculations involved.Speaker positioning advice at 5min 13s.

What hifis own guide.

Once again, this is for stereo speakers, for stereo music listening, not a 5.1 set-up. With the greatest of respect to What Hi-fi, I would rather set-up my system based on the guidlines laid down by Dolby/DTS which the movie soundtracks the system will be playing are based on!

And no calculations are 'silly' if you want to get the best from your home cinema set-up. If you've laid out the cash for a half decent system, its time well spent!

In response to your post Darrell, the glass wall rules out side wall mounting then
emotion-3.gif
If your TV is mounted on the rear wall, then that is great, you can mount the KEF Eggs on the front wall too. Mounting at ear level is recommended for L/R front speakers, with the centre immediately above or below the screen, mounting as high as you are suggesting might give you problems with seperation from the centre speaker (you really want them all to blend into the same front sound stage), you could mount all three up at that height, but general advice is to have the centre speaker as close to the screen as possible otherwise your brain can percieve that speech is coming from a different location than the screen, so its up to you to do battle with the lady of the house. Good luck on that one! I'm still trying to persuade my wife that my Monitor Audio Silvers are things of beauty with the front covers off!!
emotion-5.gif
 

sta99y

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Hey G Davies thanks for that. If I did wall mount F L/R up high I would also put centre up there so it would be like this..... F L/R will be 10.5feet apart with the centre 1.5feet below and in the middle of fronts. Basically as I have them now which is 1.5feet off the ground but up high.

Your spkrs will look great with covers off!!
 
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Anonymous

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chebby:lesmor:As a rule of thumb speakers should be spaced 20% of the distance from the seating position to the speaker ,giving a 45deg angle

not the seat to the front wall

So seperation would be 2 feet if you listen from 10 feet away? That's not even the width of a small tv.

Apologies for incorrect formula see original post now corrected
 
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Anonymous

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maxflinn:lesmor:

As a rule of thumb speakers should be spaced 20% of the distance from the seating position to the speaker ,giving a 45deg angle

not the seat to the front wall

i thought you are meant to sit the same distance from the speakers as they are from each other ? on the edge of the triangle ..

See corrections on original post

Seating position is different for HiFi compared to Home cinema , these are guides not hard and fast you need to experiment with position and toe in

The Cardas calculations are for Stereo and as someone has already questioned the front wall to speaker front is impractable in a living room , the dimensions from side wall seem to work ok
 
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Anonymous

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Does anyone on here not think that the best position for the speakers in any given room enviroment is where they sound/look the best to the listener.

surely that has to be the guide to follow doesn`t it?

its not possible in every room to get great results by following someone elses recommendations, afterall its your room and not theirs, so following their suggestions could result in a rubbish sound in your room

or have i got it all wrong LOL.
 

sta99y

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Albriscoe in a sense yes your correct but I guess I'm looking for advice from ppl that are in the same boat or have been there at a point. Rather than me drilling holes and mounting them cause they look nice but sound rubbish! Or having them hanging off the ceiling cause they sound great but look hideous! So recommendations and ppls own trails with answers is what I'm after! But thanks for posting.
 
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Anonymous

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not a problem

but don`t get too hung up on what others say

its your room and not theirs so I don`t honestly see how anyone can comment and it be right for you unless your very lucky

my advice is to experiment with your speaker positioning, which yes I know can be a pain but its will be worth it in the long term I promise.

you don`t have to drill holes anywhere, just use anything you have available to place the speakers on until you decide what/where is the best position, then listen for a few days or at least you are sure, then fix them permanently

good luck and I hope it turns out ok for you

Al
 

sta99y

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Cheers Albriscoe I know exactly where your coming from. Once my wife mentioned we were getting her mothers unit I knew how and were my speakers were going to be placed and at what height. When I was smoothing the wife over with some ferro rocharo (can't spell) I mentioned about my speakers and she nearly swallowed a whole one " so as you imagine she didn't agree with my ideas lol" I will try in different positions till I totally satisfied but thanks for every post and the time it takes :)
 

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