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Does anyone have any comments on the visual effects of rather perfect component symmetry? What's in the center? The main amp, or preamp? If you have dual mono amps do you space them equally apart? I've never used expensive rack units but I tend to use spikes and footers on certain pieces of equipment.
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....asymmetrical system.
I like symmetry, mostly.
I'm curious about two things there: What speakers are those? They look like a 10" 2-way, but the lighting doesn't allow much detail. Second, what kind of flooring is that? It doesn't look like tile or concrete. Short-pile carpeting?
Thanks.
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We are inclusive and diverse, but dissent will not be tolerated.
The room has wall to wall carpet, with a rug over it. The rug is woven from cotton cloth remnants. It sounds good. This type of rug was recommended by Pierre Sprey who runs Mapleshade. Behind the listening chairs is a wool rug over the pile carpet.
When I took this photo I realized the rug wasn't centered side to side. I centered it (about six inches left) and I swear the sound is better now! More even soundstage. The right channel, which used to be a bit recessed, has come forward.
So responding to this post helped improve my sound! Go figure.
Thanks, Steve
Thanks for the reply. I thought the flooring looked like a short-pile carpet, but wasn't sure. We, too, have a rug (about 9' x 11') over carpet in our living room, where the stereo system is. Regarding your rug, up in Wisconsin, rugs made from remnants are often called "rag rugs", and are typically much smaller than yours, usually about 30" x 40" or so. My wife has a couple from her grandmother's old farmhouse. Related trivia... Decades ago, in my apartment, I had not a "remnant rug", but a large "sample rug", made by duct taping together the backside of carpet samples (about 20" x 30" each) from a flooring store! Chicks thought it was cool. ;)
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We are inclusive and diverse, but dissent will not be tolerated.
In the field of architecture and design, there is a common light-hearted wisecrack about our clients (and colleagues) who are obsessed with symmetry.As in: "That person has a symmetry problem . . ."
Although I'm fairly precise about speaker placement within the room, everything else is guided by convenience and available cable length.
. . . in theory, practice and theory are the same; in practice, they are different . . .
Edits: 11/07/23
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Pre-existing furniture choices can certainly cramp you style.
Dmitri Shostakovich
Not 100% symmetrical but close!
Close enough to look and sound wonderful.
Nature favors simplicity and in nature, simplicity favors symmetry. It makes sense that human nature favors symmetry.
"I've never used expensive rack units but I tend to use spikes and footers on certain pieces of equipment."What does that statement have to do with "System visual symmetry"? A rather "asymmetrical" statement, no? Just an observation. :-)
"All thoughts are prey to some beast" - Bill Callahan
Edits: 11/06/23
True symmetry with subwoofers and/or bass drivers often are not ideal as they can double up on the excitement of standing waves.
It don't matter if it looks lopsided.
But still, I don't like the look of off-center windows directly behind the speakers. It feels mind-bending.
Isn't that the truth Scott
System in my home office. Yamaha, ADS and Linn.
Sorry for the poor picture.
Dean.
reelsmith's axiom: Its going to be used equipment when I sell it, so it may as well be used equipment when I buy it.
I had the smaller ones stacked in college, very nice
...L200, L300 and L400.
Mine are the L300, which are my favorites of the three.
Fabulous mini speakers.
Dean.
reelsmith's axiom: Its going to be used equipment when I sell it, so it may as well be used equipment when I buy it.
the first "hi-fi" system I listed to was in 1978 at a friend's house. He had a Yamaha integrated amp, B&O tangent tracking TT, and A/D/S L-400 speakers. Sounded fantastic of course. I now have those same A/D/S speakers in my office... my friend passed away last December unexpectedly so those speakers will always be a great treasure to me.
Very simple, but I don't like clutter
Don't worry about avoiding temptation. As you grow older, it will avoid you.
- Winston Churchill
Nice grouping of equipment.
Thanks. And yours is just incredible.
Don't worry about avoiding temptation. As you grow older, it will avoid you.
- Winston Churchill
My room is not symmetrical, so I could not arrange my components symmetrically if I wanted to ...
Happy Listening
Long as everything fits in the old RCA cabinet
and the doors can close, it's all good.
Been a LOT of gear that's been in and out, placement
is (obviously) limited and equipment is chosen to adapt.
There was a TT on top for a long time, centered.
The CDP rests there now, comfortable and accessible.
Speakers are on either side of the cabinet on separate record shelves.
There is a symmetry involved, but not the sort you have in mind.
"Once this was all Black Plasma and Imagination" -Michael McClure
William Blake has something to say about this.
Unfortunately it's not centered in the room.
Gsquared
I can't achieve the level of some the beautiful systems being posted.
Limitations.
But it sounds so good!
Your interest may vary but the results will be same. (Byrd 2020)
I can't compete with the dead. (Buck W. 2010)
Cowards can't be heroes. (Byrd 2017)
Why don't catfish have kittens? (Moe Howard 1937)
real life listening as part of life and not some idealized/sterile
listening space to keep the music apart from life.
"Once this was all Black Plasma and Imagination" -Michael McClure
No photos, but my setup is generally symmetrical with KEF Reference 1s flanking an 85" Sony TV and a Velodyne HG15 in each corner. An Ayre VX-5 amp sits centered below the TV. A rack of Ayre gear is on an adjacent wall.
I read up a fair bit on system design and layout when I was designing a dedicated room that I never got to build. Like most considerations in this hobby there are two views.
One supports symmetrical layout with speakers equal distance from the sidewalls and mirrored treatment placement throughout the room. I believe the intent here is for the most balanced interface with the room.
The other supports asymmetrical layout with speakers intentionally offset. Also acoustical treatments should not be placed identically on each side of the room. Here I think the intent is to avoid greater build up of room nodes with doubling from equal distances and reflections on each side.
A more radical variation of that for difficult rooms is diagonal speaker placement across a corner, rather than square with the room
Regarding component placement I prefer avoiding placing them between the speakers. For me that was originally esthetics, but later I read there can be acoustic reason for that configuration. Jim Smith knows far more about this than I do and that is his recommendation as well. As noted, the downside can be longer wire runs.
Unfortunately no absolute answer.
"The secret of life is honesty and fair dealing, if you can fake that you've got it made." Groucho
I had these Cabinets built specifically for Audio. With Cables completely out of sight. And places for each component. I have Mono-blocks and place them at near the end of the Cabinet, closer to each speaker. The TV is in the Middle, where we can watch Concert Videos and Movies. Bass amps are Class 'D' and 'Out of Sight' in Cabinets Below. Pre-Amp near the Center as well as DAC and the Raspberry Pi (My only Source).
Nice horn and setup Cut-Throat
Thanks! --- And yours as well for a lot more $$$$ I'm sure.
This is the current configuration of my system.Previously the preamp and CD/DAC were on the on the sidewall near my listening chair.
I decided to change to fiber for the 28' run from the side location where the NAS and streaming equipment is still located.
I have always been opposed to have anything more than my amps between the speakers. I think mainly to not have it cluttered looking. Personal preference, nothing more. Now that it's done I really don't mind it.
Though I do have to walk 10 extra feet if I want to put in a CD. :-)I did this mainly because of the lower quality of the interconnects I made for that distance.
We all know what the quality of a good 28' interconnect would be even if I did DIY as the others I currently use.28' of single mode Corning fiber was under $10. That was a no brainer. The sound had more improvement than I expected. Quieter and better imaging.
To answer your question I am obsessed about things being balanced. Spacing things equally is again for me a personal thing.
For subs and speakers I believe spacing is important from personal experience.
Edits: 11/02/23 11/02/23
Just enough symmetry to look very good, but not too much.
Where do I shower and don the appropriate attire before entry ;-)
...and I thought I kept a tidy listening room. Not even close!
Edits: 11/02/23
Tubes go well with them! I guess my arrangement is pretty symmetric given the offset placement of the dormer. I'm also an ARC fan. :)
Those are beauties. I would love to hear if there are some time.
Those are beauties. I would love to hear if there are some time.
Given more room height, I'd go with the 8 or 9' flavor! ;)
Listened to those speakers several weeks ago..... Really nice!!
Thanks for the nice comments guys.
Looks terrific. Love those speakers.
nt
Congratulations on a marvelous system. Well done.
" Don't look back. Something may be gaining on you"
Satchel Paige
This was the room before moving some of the front end to the front of the room.
Edits: 11/02/23
Those are some unique room treatments.
What are the spiked items on the walls ?
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2022/03/30 Historical Records CENSORED
Emailtim
They are DIY diffusers.
An electrical engineer friend that rebuilds every piece of audio equipment that comes to him brought a couple over one day.
I didn't expect much out of them except for the fact that anything Phil touches works amazingly well.I hung them from my absorption panels and was stunned at the improvement to the sound. After that I built more until I am at the state I am at now in the picture of my room.
They are plastic martini glasses without the bottom. Glued to 1/4" foam core and painted.
One of my wires tennis friends came into the room and asked if it was some kind of
50 Shades of Gray thing going on.These are speakers he designed and assembled though I did all of the woodwork.
Edits: 11/03/23
Assuming this is the second system to the ESL room, and is more than suited to continue the planar sound signature of the Big Boys but at a more casual setting.Not many would incure the cost of RAALs to use as a portion of the treble duties as the two (LCF ?) ribbons are highly capable in there own right.
The cone drivers appear to be some of the newer SOTA cross woven units with eyebrow raising strength to weight ratios.
He designed to a specific hi performance requirements and you executed the panel and enclosure work. Both are to be commended on the design, execution and details.
Would love to hear this in full song. Your big panels room is a whole other level though
Edits: 11/03/23
This is my electrical engineers system at his home.
The only speaker I know for sure are the super tweeters and they are LCY K100.
I know the main ribbons he rebuilt once it got them. He replaced the magnets with
neodymium magnets that was quite a process in it self.
The crossover network is 4th order Butterworth and extremely complicated. From the time he started the them he has modified them over 50 times while listening and testing.
He is an amazing talent.
A year ago he offered to upgrade my ARC 610t amps to KT120 from 6550 tubes. Once he started looking at them he said he would like to replace old parts that didn't test properly before he did the upgrade.
He ended up all of the Caps many resistors, transistors, diodes and relays. At last count close to 250 parts in each amp.
He ran into one issue that added an extra 5 weeks to the project. The short story was that during the original build at Audio Research they had more orders than they had parts for and made a design change to some amps and never included it on the schematic. I meant that he could not get the voltage to adjust properly to the bias circuit.
He finally got some information from an engineer at ARC that was there at the time and he have Phil the information he needed. I had 2 different schematic amps with consecutive serial #. I was amazed at the commitment Phil had to figure out the issue.
I effectively have new amps that sound much better and put out about 1/5th the heat with the new
KT120 tubes.
Sorry for the length of this post.
