Are There Improvements that Can Be Easily and Quickly Made Without Buying More Stuff?

Room and speaker placement are, of course, everything!!! Once you get that right, then you can start thinking about tweaks, if you are so inclined. I use tweaks on all my components, but one of my greatest tweaks, for me, which made the greatest improvement on the sound quality of my system were my Bybee Tech Plug-in Speaker Bullets. One of my local audio dealers brought the speaker bullets to my attention about 15 years ago, and I’ve been using them every since. All I can tell you is that the speaker bullets are extremely effective, but expensive. I did try a couple much less expensive (really cheap) speaker tweak alternatives, but none could match the build quality, the science, or the sound quality improvements that the Bybee Bullets made on my system, so I went on ahead and bit the "Bullet" and purchased the Bybee Bullets with no regrets. .

@chayro  How true.  I have a list of favorites on Radio Paradise MQA…and they’re my favorites because I think they sound good.  Listening to them, my system sounds great!

@woofman74 @ghdprentice @jerryg123   Yes, ear cleaning is a regular maintenance item for me.

@chowkwan   Grills are off to see the impact.  I read quite an in depth article about this on audioholics which claims that the frame is the biggest factor on sound quality.  My speakers have a grill which connects to the sides of the speakers, so the effect from the frame is minor.

@waytoomuchstuff   Since the grills were off, I found that the 10 screws on each speaker that were holding the drivers did accept a bit of tightening.  Good idea!  I already fixed a previous issue with a loose RCA connector.

@paradisecom   I don’t actually notice that my room is live - is there an easy way to test it without using a microphone?  I have quite a few bookshelves along the walls, and other similar things around the room, so there are a lot of small surfaces.  I’ll add a rug soon.

@mapman  Based on the comments made I now see that my audio is set up for near field listening.  I’ll try to find tweaks that apply to that situation.  I’m comfortable taking the time and having the patience to move speakers a bit at a time to try to find the sweet spot.

be careful you don't tame your room too much, it's easy to do...

Yeah clean ears to start with for sure.
 

Understand what you are hearing and why. Then tweak tweak tweak the setup within the room accordingly. Set up the speakers just right for your listening position. Maybe add absorption at primary reflection points on side walls. Keep physical space between components and between components and any nearby sources of noise like power transformers, digital devices etc. That helps keep noise levels minimal.

Go get your ears cleaned. 

As others have stated, it appears you have a very live and reflective room that needs taming. All of those reflections are smearing the sound from your speakers and creating a mess. 
 

I would look at adding a large rug as well as some decorative, acoustic panels to the ceiling, first. Like you, I would try to avoid blocking my view of the sea with window coverings.  On the other walls, I’d try adding more decorative panels in different sizes, wherever they could fit. 
 

That could be a good start. 

Remove. Speaker. Grills.

@woofman74 

+1

Check the torque on your speaker raw driver bolts/screws.

This was suggested a while back by a member.  After a quick check I found myself tightening 96 machine screws holding the speakers in place, ranging from “not quite snug” to “suspended in space, not performing a useful purpose.”

Worth checking out.

No. You always need more stuff. And keep it clean by taking it all outside and blasting it with a powerful leaf blower.

I would do a complete cleaning with few affordable things: pipe cleaners, microfiber cloth, electrical contact cleaner & canned air. Step 1 disassemble the entire system and throughly dust and clean the shelves: Then use microfiber cloth to clean the outside of you components. Then clean the outer portion of the rca's with electrical contact cleaner & microfiber cloth: Then use a pipe cleaner and electrical contact cleaner to clean the inside of the rca's. If you have XLR's, the pipe cleaners work great to clean both male and female ends. The you can use microfiber cloth and electrical contact cleaner to wipe all the blades on your power cables. Lastly, you can turn your attention to the speaker connectors at the amp & speakers. The pipe cleaners work great with banana connectors & the microfiber works great with spades. Once all this done, you can reassemble the system. Then final thing to do is to use the canned air to blow out the volume control and all the buttons. This deep cleaning is good for 1 year with minor maintenance. 

+1 for earwax removal.  Sounds silly but once you try it, you’ll understand.
Avoid q-tips whenever possible.  Just use something like Debrox and then shower.
Almost free.   

Great advice from Chayro, I love Graceland by Paul Simon and So by Peter Gabriel, , unfortunately they both sound terrible on any decent stereo I have tried, much, much too bright.  Sorry, goodbye Peter, goodbye Paul.

Only play music that sounds good on your system. Amazing improvements. 

Been busy with all the ideas.

Made a new hole in the back of my equipment cabinet for power cords. All power cords are now separated from interconnects.

Checked and cleaned all connections. Found a loosened RCA connector in one speaker and tightened it.

Moved one speaker and am trying different toe in angles. This could be the key to better sound.

@waytoomuchstuff and @terry9 ​​​​​and @defendert My back wall is 29ft from my listening position, with furniture, counters, cabinets etc. between it and me. My bass and sub-bass is very very good when the recording is good. So that’s not a problem to fix except to change all recordings played to good ones.

@boomerbillone Yes, I regularly clean my ears. I have been missing the highest frequencies since I was in my 20’s. Sometimes with a very high note on a piano I hear the hammer hit the string, but not the note.

@lanx0003 My next step will be to subscribe to a streaming service.

@roadwhorerecords I’ve got the glass of bourbon right next to me.

So far, I think the sound is better. Vocals are more pronounced…the music is more airy…the sound waves from the 2 channels are meshing better…there’s more decay so there’s more of a sense of space. I’ll keep trying little changes in the location and direction of my speakers and my chair height to try to find the sweet spot. I understand that just a few inches or degrees can make a difference.

p.s. - had a grouse walk by the window today while I was changing things.

Thanks to you all!!!

IF your sitting close to the back wall, move your seat forward.

IF you're using a high back chair, move you head forward.  Or, use another chair.

I've heard various accounts of very noticeable improvements to sound quality by moving furnishings around, or moving a piece of furnishing in or out of the room.

My experience with internet ratio is not very positive. Degraded SQ (even with Flac) and the non-interactive mode of music playing are the two areas keep me away from them. I knew with the premium member you could upgrade to hirez music but I still doubt the comparability of the SQ from the streaming service like Qobuz, Tidal, etc. You might want to try the streaming music to sense the differences in SQ.

Secondly, upgrade to a DAC that allows upsampling. There is still a open-ended debate on whether upsampling actually renders better SQ but my limited experience is somewhat positive. You could do this using software (I know you do not want to upgrade the equipment)  I had purposely upsampled 128 kbps AACs to Flac files ten times in size and found the SQ is improved. Not night and day but if you have owned a high-revealing system, the upsampling may bring you surprise.

It may seem silly, be sure your ear canals are free of wax. I have senior citizen friends who never thought abut this and were astonished when they used an ear cleaning kit from the drugstore. Neither he or his wife had ever thought about it. Happy Listening (once you can actually hear)!

I agree with all above, but one low hanging fruit is also component placement and wire management. Keep interconnects away from AC cables, keep amps away from sources, try to remove any switching power supplies from sharing the ac circuit. 

Something just ain't sounding right? Pour yourself a nice Single Barrel over rocks, wait 10 mins. 

Much good advice already. I suggest playing something with a strong bass line. Walk around the room and mark EXACTLY where the bass sounds strongest. Move your sub to that spot. Check for improvement. Repeat with other subs, if any.

Move a bookshelf onto the wall opposite your speakers. This will suppress high frequency reflections, and may make the sound more focused. Keep it that way if you like the effect.

Good luck and enjoy !

Depending upon how long all of the speaker & interconnect cables have been in place, I’ve found that removing them & cleaning both the cable terminations & the jacks on the speaker or electronics & replacing them can make a positive difference.I just use rubbing alcohol & cotton swabs on wooden sticks designed for this. Let any residual alcohol evaporate ( which it will pretty quickly) before re- connecting. I know there are specialty products for this but this seems to work just fine. 

@mikelavigne Stunning room and system!!

By comparison, it makes me want to turn my room into my insurance company for vandalism.

Well played (literally), sir.  Thanks for sharing.

A few things that I can add to the equation:

When the sub-bass is good on a recording, it sounds really, really good.  I think if every recording was as good as the best ones I’d always have tremendous sub-bass.

I’m listening to MQA on Radio Paradise. My SMSL M400 DAC shows that it’s playing at 44.1 kHz.

My speakers are powered so my amplifiers are plugged directly into the wall.

My listening position is 10ft from my speakers - is that considered near field?

As a lot have said positioning speakers  will help. Also, take the system apart clean all the contacts, components etc and reassemble. A general housecleaning can sometimes do wonders. Good luck. 

It also makes a difference on you sitting position from the rear wall.  Sitting close will boost bass. Another idea that i have done lately is replacing the plugs on my power cables to furutech silver coated. Which help with mids and highs. Rhodium coated helps to give more bass.

#1 Independent electric only for Audio?

I believe it's not hard.

#2 And  outlets usage order: analog first, then digital. 

Try #2. 😁😁😁

I really appreciate all the suggestions. It gives me a lot to work with.  This forum has been a great resource for advice.

@joshua43214 

On isolation, my 2 subs are sitting on thick recycled rubber pads made to be used for outdoor patio blocks.  Each of my speakers are sitting on four rubber feet that were made for a big commercial espresso grinder.  All are on a concrete slab with no basement below.

@wturkey 

The speakers are powered and plugged into wall outlets.  Same for the 2 subwoofers.  I did a bit more cable management as you suggested.  But I could drill out another hole in the back of my cabinet for power cords to separate them from interconnects.  Good idea and free!  I’ll also open the speakers and make sure that all fasteners are tight.  All my cables are tight.

@immatthewj 

Everything is on 1 circuit, using 4 different wall and floor outlets - since all the speakers and subs are powered and in separate locations they each have their own outlet.

If a high current amplifier is being routed through a surge protector, bypass the protector and plug the amplifier directly into the wall outlet. 

Ensure routing of wires is neat and tidy. If power cables must intersect with signal cables, make it at a 90 deg angle for as little interference as possible. 

Make sure speaker wires are tight. Check that all woofers, midranges and tweeters are tight in their respective locations and that none of the mounting fasteners have rattled loose. 

IMO the best way to improve your sound is to upgrade the parts in your existing components.  Most parts are average at best.  Simple replacement of power supply caps from the old blue caps to Nichicon will improve your sound beyond most cables or power cords, room treatment or AC products.  Upgrade output capacitors to V-Caps another level.  Upgrade resistors to Takman, Amtrans, Audio Note, etc.

Happy Listening. 

@ mikelavigne.  My God, your audio setup is incredible!   Good for you.

If using Roon and have a fast computer with at least 500 gigs of dedicated space 

HQ player is built into the back end for powerful DSP that can make your digital much much better sounding.

Without spending ANY money?

I'm stumped. Moving yourself or the speakers/subs positions is all I can think about. But I would think you already should have tried that. If money is available then move on to improving your room acoustics. Once you get that right, and only then, move on to equipment and accessories upgrades.

There are some things that cost very little that might be worth doing.

Try experimenting with speaker and component isolation - this can be tested for very little cash. I know the debate spikes vs isolators is ongoing, but it is cheap to test.

Get some big cork furniture glides at the hardware store and put them under your speakers. If they help, then better ones will help more and you can plan for the expense. In my case, isolating my speakers was a huge improvement (suspended floor and very heavy speakers). A better alternative is a cork pad meant for it

These are knockoffs of the original version

Vibrapods are inexpensive and surprisingly effective. Get a some and try them, they did nice things for my old DAC, but nothing for my new DAC.

Other than that, I agree with all the others about speaker and seating.

Are you running your stuff on more than one dedicated circuit?

I was, but I recently read a thread that prompted me to try  ’all-on-one’ and to my surprise I truly think I like it better on one.

in the "old" days, Pierre at Mapleshade, had you start on the floor, and add a big city phone book, one at a time until "perfect" listening position achieved...was interesting and fun

I’m out looking for “Get Better Sound” by Jim Smith.  It sounds like a source of information to keep working on.

@jl35 

My listening chair is quite low, so it will be a good starting point.  I can try raising it in increments as one variable.  Good idea!

And thanks to all the forum responders which resulted in my past upgrades: Node, power supply, cables, DAC and router.

If only @mahgister was around...he could give you quite a few "tips" on what to do while spending little money.  Your room may look like a mad scientist's den when you're done but you'd tick the not cost much box.

I would try using the Sumiko Setup on your speakers. They often end up at different distances from the front wall and non-matching toe-in but it works when you don't have a perfect room. Here's the instructions I use: https://www.audioaficionado.org/showthread.php?p=979168

listening position height...start low and try higher and higher...

As others have already mentioned, speaker placement and listening position placement.  For my room it was moving my speakers close to positions that were recommended by Vandersteen (intersection of points in the room that are 1/7th or 1/5th or 1/3rd of the width and length of the room) and then moving my listening position from center top of equilateral triangle and back from there.  Soundstage opened up and everything just sounds that much better.  I've also started to learn how to use REW and am able to measure some of the changes to understand the different areas of my room.  Lastly, adding absorption to side wall first reflections was another game changer for me (not free but DIY wasn't that expensive) and also added DIY bass traps to front corners.

You are correct not to spend any more money with that room. The only free thing I can recommend is bring the chair closer and use a nearfield setup to minimize speakers/room interaction. 

totally. credit card, Crutchfield, Amazon, Safe & Sound

I focus too much on bass. :) The other issues besides avoiding room modes are avoiding early reflections, so having enough space to the side and rear walls is important, but so is getting the _right_ toe in and tweeter angle for your speakers.

Audiphiles tend to use laser pointers to point the tweeter right at their ear canals. That’s actually not usually right. Lots of speakers like less toe-in, like Focal or Magico, and many sound better at the mid-range axis or below. B&W for instance.  Often 2-way speakers sound much better below the tweeter axis too.  Only way to know is to listen.

Really gorgeous space and tremendous view you have tcotruvo but that room is very live that means lots of hard reflective surfaces and little absorption. Things that could help in the room, a thick rug and heavy curtains. Or a carpeted alternate room might be a good idea.

Speaker placement. Check out the room mode simulator at AM Acoustics. Avoid placing your speakers, subs or listening location from being in any of the lowest room modes. Same for your listening position.

Of course, I am always advocating for good room treatment, and EQ where necessary or desired, but those cost money!

Thx for the comments!  I do have a carpeted space upstairs with only 1 regular window that I could move to.  But then I would have to “do music” as a separate, stand alone activity.  If I did that, I would listen to music much less.

Windows and light are a blessing of our house.  When inside, I’m still connected to nature.  Even living in a city, we daily have deer sometimes coming a nose away from the glass.  And fox and bobcat in the winter.  With a 180deg view of the largest lake in the world 50ft away, curtains would shut out more that I would gain in sound quality.  If I had them, I’d probably rarely use them.  Maybe after sunset in the winter…no, not even then as the moonlight views out over the lake at night can be stunning.

So for me, I’m trying to do the best I can in this context.  Of course, it would be tempting to set up a separate audiophile space with an entirely new system upstairs, and keep what I’ve got here for regular use.  That’s a future prospect.  I’d still want to optimize what I have now.

I would say go through the virtual systems of other members and get ideas about room setup and placement. The other thing is to look at the recommended dolby placement guidelines for your setup re: the angles and dial those in exactly as you can. The other thing is all of the glass, can you get curtains?