How to position your speakers perfectly

[Rup 16]

 

 Best music for speaker placement and best speaker placement tutorial???

 

Having acquired a pair of Harbeth P3ESR speakers I'm having fun looking for the ultimate speaker placement. 

 

I have downloaded

The Visual Sound the Sound Liaison DXD Music Sampler 

as it was recommended to me as being a great speaker placement tool.

 (Using the coupon code “XFI2019” you can download the 352DXD for $16 or the 24/ 96 files for $8.)

Especially the phase coherent One Microphone recordings on the sampler seems excellent for that purpose:                 

Quote

 

     “These guys and this recording just rocks. Pace, rhythm, tone and soundstage are just off the charts.

The precise placement of all four of the musicians perfectly matches the photos of the sessions. The balance of all four instruments is darn near perfect. As you can no doubt tell, I am a huge fan of this recording. It is one of the best in terms of recording quality I have ever heard. Of course, and as always, your view of the actual music content may vary quite considerably from mine. Nonetheless, I think we would all agree that this recording sounds sensational

                                                                                                                                         source;  Sound-Liaison-One-Mic-recordings audiophilestyle review

 

 

  https://www.soundliaison.com/index.php/536-sound-liaison-dxd-music-sampler 

 

On the net i.e.  youtube, there are a great number of tutorials in speaker placement. 

 Any of these you would especially recommend?

                                                               https://www.harbeth.co.uk/speakers/userguide.php    

 

 

Edited October 31 by Rup

[yannakout 16]

If you're Anything like me you may be forever tinkering, it's part of the hobby I guess.

- trust your ears, I find when I get that spot just right I'll feel a sense of enhanced patience and enjoyment.

- avoid the problem spots ( 1/2 Or 1/4 distance to ceiling) Etc Etc...

- Find the right spot in your room(of you have the freedom

- if you're lucky try listen to well set up studio, I learnes a lot from the experience and took this hearing experience and used it to help with my placement of non nearfield listening.

- bring a friend to make slight adjustments while you listen closed eyes.

What I tend to do is find a reference placement and mark it with tape.

My methods and rules:

1) select seating placement that allows the speakers room to breathe from the back wall (my front ported pmc I still give 50cm)

2) Start at the equilateral triangle and NO toe in.

3) ensure that the tweeters are roughly in line with your ear levels

4) speaker width I view like a rubber band being stretched. If the sound is too thin (lacking in fullness and midbass) bring them in closer, move in your self to keep equidistant and reassess. 

Try moving them out wider if the sound is a bit too dense, some speakers really need room to breathe. Be careful to not lose the imaging of the vocalist or get too close to the side walls.

5) check in, is their depth to the soundstage or lacking deep bass? Mess with depth from wall. Also experiment moving either slightly closer or further from the listening position.

6) toe in. More Toe in provides enhanced focus and generally creates a brighter tweeter response. I do 4 quick checks before slow dial in. 1) no toe in, 2) toe in pointed right at my ears 3) toe in aimed 6 feet behind my head 4) half way between 3&1.

Once I find the best blend of soundstage width, focus and enjoyment. I'll make slight alterations.

7) I stand in the spot and see how it sounds if I’m slightly higher or lower than the tweeters (again may affect brightenes) I also again move slightly back and forward.

8 ) have an experienced friend have a listen.

now this is my reference spot. I will leave them like this for a full week to get used to them and truely listen. I will mark this and still have my marking from the equilateral triangle. 
keep these 2 spots marked precisely. Now if you feel you want more airiness, fullness or brightness etc etc make minor adjustments based on the previous rules.

 

 

[yannakout 16]

Also I found this to be quite unique, wont be for everyone, but hey it’s worth a try after you find your first reference spot

 

[Yamaha_man 426]

I must say I do envy the ease at which you guys move your speakers around and play with position.

 

[Nigel 567]

Yannakout, you left out an important item, the listening position. Just as the diagram above shows one particular freq or wavelength cancelling by the reflection from the wall behind the speaker, the same happens for many more freqs, especially the 3 wavelengths corresponding to the room W,L & Height. Various places in the room have primary and secondary cancellation points ("room modes") coinciding in clusters and you don't want to have your head there else you will be judging the overall sound falsely.

[awayward 1,304]

My speaker and stand totals 93kg, I place then on furniture sliders and they move with ease.

@Yamaha_man

Edited October 31 by awayward

[Yamaha_man 426]

6 minutes ago, awayward said:

My speaker and stand totals 93kg, I place then on furniture sliders and they move with ease.

@Yamaha_man

My speakers tip the scales at 150kg and are sitting on very thick carpet.

Trust me, it’s a mission.

[Gav67 58]

Try 300kgs each.  Very Minor adjustments can be made of the spikes in place but to test various positioning scenarios requires lifting the speakers to replace the spikes with casters. Then they are easy to move.  But I only go down this path if I have a day or two spare and want to try different positions.  

[warweary 543]

In the lounge I aimed for a 3 m by 3 m by 3 m triangle with the front on the speakers 1 m from the front wall.

[MrC 68]

Just now, warweary said:

In the lounge I aimed for a 3 m by 3 m by 3 m triangle with the front on the speakers 1 m from the front wall.

Excellent .. I have mine at just under 4 meters ... its called forming an EQUILATERAL triangle.  The mathematician in me couldn't help myself there!

[Krispy Audio 2,474]

I've found with my P3s that they favour being positioned slightly wider than equilateral, whereas most others favour slightly inside. Try going wider; you'll improve soundstage width yet they hold the centre focus well still. 

[Wimbo 1,968]

3 hours ago, MrC said:

Excellent .. I have mine at just under 4 meters ... its called forming an EQUILATERAL triangle.  The mathematician in me couldn't help myself there!

Isosceles is better. Near and far field 

[MrC 68]

1 hour ago, Wimbo said:

Isosceles is better. Near and far field 

Why is that?  Didn't you know that an equilateral triangle is also an isosceles triangle?  😉

[Wimbo 1,968]

30 minutes ago, MrC said:

Why is that?  Didn't you know that an equilateral triangle is also an isosceles triangle?  😉

Since when?

[MrC 68]

48 minutes ago, Wimbo said:

Since when?

The mathematical definition of an isosceles triangle is a triangle that has 2 sides of equal length.  Well ... an equilateral triangle has this property.  It is the same way we can say that a square is a rectangle (a special rectangle).

[gt1482 86]

Try the following suggestion from a Harbeth facebook group. It really works!

Quote

I prefer nearfield listening with Harbeth, but with speakers on stands (not a desktop) and pulled out into the room, as far away from walls as you can.
Try X meters between tweeter-to- ear, and 1.4X meters from tweeter-to-tweeter, and toed-in so tweeter aims directly at ear. I like X = 1 meter.
If you want to take it a step further, try getting the height of the speakers (or your chair) so your ear is right between the midrange and tweeter.
P3ESRs and LS3/5A types excel like this and image like crazy (and I ahve also done this with 40.1s, 30.1s, SHL5+, etc). You don't have to drive them as hard to get the same SPL level at your ears since you are not losing SPL's to the room. So when they say "85dB/1-watt/1-meter, 1 watt really goes give you around 85dB SPL. You also don't need as much amplifier power. 😉
Speakers also sound more dynamic this way because you are not getting as much smearing of transients from the room, or as much in terms of bass peaks/dips. And as I have said in the past, Harbeth's really excel at nearfield. If you set it up just right, they will pull off a very impressive "disappearing act," and if you listen at night with low light, it enhances the effect even more!