[mantaraydesign]

Hi all!


Any suggestion on how far apart the front LEFT and RIGHT speaker should be? I was told they should never be more than 10 feet apart.


Right now, I have my front LEFT and RIGHT speaker at 11 feet apart and toed in towards directly at the listening position. I am sitting about 20 feet from the LEFT and RIGHT front speaker.


Thanks for any advice!!!

 

[quadriverfalls]

According to the THX and DOLBY sites, the front L/R mains and the main listening position should be an equilateral triangle or the same distance as the R/L mains are separated. At 11' apart, your main listening position should be 11' away with the R/L mains toed to fire directly at the spot. By being 20' away, you may well be adding some phase shift where by the signal reaching your ear has shifted due to it's interaction with the signal coming from the other speaker, the walls, ceiling, floor etc. In your case, the mids and highs are actually crossing over each other before reaching where you are sitting. That has got to mess with the sound I'd think.


At the very least, I'd try position the mains and aim the speakers right at the listening position (check this with an elcheapo laser pointer to be sure.... you'd be surprised at how what you "think" is aimed at the listening position, really isn't at all). That's probably going to mean very little if any toe in. In which case, I would DEFINITELY look at treating the first reflection points and probably even more room treatments to improve the sound quality.


For bass, it's probably not that big of a deal due to bass waves being so much longer and omnidirectional. But for anything in the mids and especially the high end where the sound waves are much smaller, their ability to get "out of sinc" is much greater.