How do I get the best soundstage?

It's all about the room itself, the position and angling of the speakers, and acoustic room treatment.  Spend the $ on Advil and start moving stuff around.

In your past experience have you once been satisfied with the soundstage afforded by the Volti spkrs?

lewm I can’t say that I am totally satisfied with the soundstage but, I’m not sure whether the culprit is the Voltis themselves, the room treatment or speaker placement. I have experimented with placement but not to the inth degree nor with an expert. Some recordings are better than others. Definitely have a lot of left - right going on with vocals in the center but, that’s not “soundstage”.

Firstly for the Volti speakers get rid of the Pass integrated - it is as dry as a bone - look at tube power amps.

Secondly for analogue front end, in my view you should prioritise a very good phono stage, the best you can afford - you can always upgrade the cartridge later.

I'd rather have a great phono and modest well designed cartridge than the other way round.

You’ll have to fine-tune speaker placement and, depending on the size of your room, tame side reflections as well.

Other than that, a good phono will help you get more out of that nice TT setup you have.

Instead of compromising, consider buying an outstanding pre used -- a CAT with phono for example

Speaker placement and room acoustics are primary factors affecting soundstage.

@hysteve - I finally achieved an oustanding soundstage (image) once I installed extremely good cables. Up to that point I had never experienced what a truly good image sounds like.- not even in some very good audition rooms in those high end audio stores, having a plethora of room treatments

What I am now hearing is

• the speakers have completely "disappeared"
• the walls of the listening room have also "disappeared"
• the sound evelopes the whole room
• there is the impression of height and scale of the venue
• even traffic noise from ouitside the venue is easy to hear, which is not something that is desired, but is an indication of the details now being heard

So don’t scrimp on cables, they are the arteries of your system and require great cables - like those from

• Zavfino - outstanding products at reasonable prices
• In-Akustik - utilize extremely good cable geometries for a refined sound
• Hijiri (if your budget can stretch that far) takes cable refinement to a whole new level

The best image is achieved by installing cables that transfer extremely fine micro details and for that, your cables need a serious design approach, including...

• solid UP-OCC silver wire for the interconencts
• solid UP-OCC solid copper for the speaker cables
• UP-OCC copper wire for the power cables
• Advanced cable geometry
• adavanced insulation
• high quality connectors
• Low mass RCA and speaker connectors

The three companies I have listed above above utilize these attributes to varying degrees and I have listed them in order of capabilities - the best being Hijiri

I have implemented excelelnt cables on systems ranging from a $200 mini system to $70k high end system, all with the same result - i.e. a significant improvement in audio performance but most of all Imaging

Installing good cables will help tremendously with finalising speaker placement and room treatments

Hope that helps - Steve

What i have found to work is:

Rack well behind speakers or away. If closed cabinet surely far away.

Speaker placement.

Room treatment of any kind (absorbers, diffusers, resonators)

A well designed rack and not tall enough.

I'd like to know specifically which Volti speakers you own as well as interconnects and speaker cables?

Looks like you have very good audio equipment and I don't think an upgrade in equipment will make much difference. I totally agree with those that suggest it has more to due with speaker placement and room acoustics.

lak the speakers are Volti Razz; interconnects are less loss xlr ($950); speaker cables are Audioquest Granite (pretty old but sound decent)

Hysteve, The Volti speaker get a lot right, but getting them set up correct is key. Call Greg and ask him what he thinks. Also, can you download a picture of your setup to your equipment page.

Hysteve, I have not digested all of the posts that came after my original one, wherein I asked whether you have ever been able to experience what you feel is "excellent" sound staging with the Volti spkrs. My unspoken point was that a friend of mine owns a pair, and in his house, in his smallish room, I always felt that the music appeared to emanate from an unnaturally flattened source, like all the musicians were down on the floor with their instruments. I also felt I could hear the treble as separated from the bass and mids. The owner of that system eventually raised his spkrs up on stands by about 6 inches or a foot. As I recall, this was even recommended by Volti. That helped a lot to achieve a more realistic "concert hall" or jazz club experience, where usually the musicians are either raised above the audience or on the same level as the audience. I cannot recall whether that maneuver also ameliorated the sense that bass/mids and treble were separated from one another. But he was a lot happier. He was using very high end components, a Dohmann Helix TT, Durand Telos tonearm, TOTL Lyra cartridge, driving a Ypsilon phono stage via either a Ypsilon or EMIA SUT, into an EMIA amplifier. Also, bear in mind that I use very tall planar full range spkrs at home, so I may be hypersensitive to multi-driver arrays.

I see above that Volti make more than one spkr.  These were their top of the line models, costing more than $20,000, I think.

No, I have not experienced an excellent soundstage yet. I bought the Voltis at Greg’s place in Tennessee last year in March and we went over his placement recommendations at that time. He had a much bigger room though and was using really an inferior DAC, at least in my experience. I started out with a DAC (border patrol) exactly like the one he demoed the speakers with and since then found a much better one (Ayre QB9 twenty). Granted the fact that he may have been using better speaker cables than what I have and a better set up otherwise. I’m not aware of the place to load a photo of my system but I will look into it and see if I can. Thanks! Steve

Get Jim Smith's book titled "Get Better Sound."  Read it, then sweat the small stuff.

@hysteve :

I’m not aware of the place to load a photo of my system but I will look into it and see if I can.

You can post pictures of your system (and info) here: https://systems.audiogon.com/

Then everyone can see what you have by clicking / tapping in your username hyperlink

Azimuth, azimuth, azimuth. Correct azimuth provides maximum separation, the critical step in sound-staging. Small adjustments can be heard.

All these folks are telling you many things including how to spend your $$. Fact is, if it doesn’t come off the disk properly it will never be at its best. A VPI set-up will provide a means for adjusting azimuth. Set if first carefully by eye. But learn how to make small adjustments in it and set it by ear. A VPI Dual Pivot Assembly will make that far easier, improve tonearm handling and even SQ. That’s the very best way. You really don’t need expensive set-up stuff.

@hysteve you said...

I have a better than decent digital system. I.e. Pass integrated amp, Innuos streamer and USB reclocker, Ayre DAC with Less Loss power cable and firewall, Volti speakers. I’m my dedicated listening room the digital system is sonically superb to my ear - Except that the soundstage is ok but not the best.

Adjusting the amount of Toe-in might help or perhaps tilting the speakers back a little?

I think your interconnects and power cables should be fine

I’m still thinking it’s the speaker cables

• I have used similar types of speaker cable and by comparison to more modern cables that employ a significantly better cable geometry, that style of speaker cable will not perofrm to the level you are seeking
• I would look at Zavfino, or In-Akustik speaker cables

Regards - Steve