Another Zu Thread


Sorry - I'm sure this is in the archives, but I've been reading them for several hours and haven't come up with anything super definitive.

Can anybody comment on what setup works best with the Druids and/or the Definitions? I have read >10ft to the listener for the Definitions.

Does the floor material matter? I have read that they need to be placed on hard surfaces, not carpet - true?

They appear to work in a fairly standard triangle pattern - separated by X feet, user seated Y feet away.

Toe in? Do these speakers do the "head in a clamp thing" or does it support multiple listeners reasonably well?

Distance from back / side walls?

Any help would be appreciated, either in direct answers or point me to a thread that discusses all the physical setup issues.

-Kirk
kthomas
I love my speakers so much as do the other faithful owners. These discussions would be so much more helpful if we could just try to leave personal baggage at the door and avoid pissing matches. If I were an outsider looking in at one of these threads I'd be really turned off.

Hey, I'm not an outsider and I'm still turned off.

These questions aren't about US and OUR agendas.
Another trick that has worked fairly well for me in terms of tuning the downward bass port is placing a 11"x11"x3/4" piece of maple under each Druid. I tried fiddling with the spikes provided by Zu, but I can't seem to get them screwed in far enough to get the speakers base down to the 2 CD case height (about 3/4"). Also, I don't really feel like spending another $200 on Audiopoints or other spikes plus floor protection discs at this point. Anyhoo, the maple boards seem to do a good job of filling out the lower end, thereby, creating a more even presentation from top to bottom. I bought a couple of 5-1/2" wide 3/4" think maple boards, cut'em to size, glued two pieces side-by-side and voila! About $30 in materials.
Mike, you're right. I will try my best to keep it to principles before personalites...I mean that...warren :)
It's just that not long ago, some of those here dominated almost every thread about one kind of speaker. Now they're enamored about another one as the does-all, end-all, last word in excellence.

No doubt they'll be another epiphany soon, and we'll be forced to endure more endless threads about how there's nothing better, etc.

Zu and Tyler. Enough already. Even DK Design finally went away. Time for a life, you know?
Kirk,

Floor material is unimportant. On Druids, you just have to set the floor-to-baseplate gap correctly. On Definitions, no issue here at all. Definitions also have a vertical dispersion pattern that minimizes floor and ceiling effects.

You will likely want some toe-in for best imaging, but not always. Experiment. Both my Druids and Definitions systems have speakers toed-in. Druids will give you a sweet spot about the width of 3 listeners at 7 - 8 ft, more from further away. Fall-off is gradual. No practical problems there. Definitions project a soundstage sufficiently dispersed to provide a wide arc of home theater viewers a fully enjoyable sonic experience with dialog anchored to the lips of actors on screen, so on music you'll find the sweet spot ample.

Both speakers can be used in close proximity to back and side walls with no trouble. Depending on your room, the depth dimension of the soundstage may slide forward some, as you get closer to the wall, but this is highly variable person-to-person and room to room. Both of these speaker designs give you considerably more room placement flexibility than the majority of speakers.

Phil