Soundlab owners - room placement question

Hi,

I've got a room that's smaller than yours and I'm using A-1 PX panels in it. It measures 18' x 13' x 8' with a bulkhead around the upper edge to break-up the bass. The speakers are within 1" of the bulkhead. Bass traps in the rear corner, diffusion on the sides and absorption and diffusion on the back 1/3 of the room. RIVES did the room and it works very well.

I've tried the speakers out into the room with the speakers sitting at around 6' and the listening position at about 3'-6" from the front and rear walls respectively. They were 9" from the side walls. The toe in is pretty much center of the panel to each ear and measured very closely.

Now, recently I've moved the speakers back to 3'-6" on the advice of RIVES and the listening position forward to 6'. I moved the speaker away from the side walls to about 13". This really improved the sound dramatically for me but I think the major shift was in swapping the listening position with the speaker position. I tried 3'-6" for both listening and speaker and that didn't work as well. For those that are counting I think these are the 1/3 and 1/5th points in the room.

I've ordered a pair of SALLIE diffusers for behind the speakers as I'm told by RIVES that some diffusion behind the speaker regardless of position is desirable. I can't use the RPG diffusers because of a fireplace on the rear wall so the SALLIE is a good solution for me. It will also allow me to move around the rear diffusors to experiment.

It pays to play around with them and keep moving them. They are really easy to move on the carpet glides and you can switch to cones if you like, once you have them dialed in. It's pretty hard to go wrong in that, from my experience, Soundlabs sound fantastic wherever you place them however, some moves make them sound even better!

Ya, I am still playing. Right now mine are 7 feet from he wall behind them and they are about 3-4 feet from each side wall. My listening position is about 2 feet from the back wall behind me. My toe-in is very, very little.

So far I have found the closer I am to the wall behind me the better the bass and overall fullness of sound. If I toe them in so the centers hit my ears the sound is far to bright or aggressive for me.

I have a combination of diffusion and absorption behind the speakers (6 ft Ficus trees/sound panal. Behind my listening postition I have sound absorption.

Pretty good so far. Still looking for more body.

It sounds like you are finding what works for you. Generally the closer you get to the rear wall the greater the room will boost the bass for you. At 7' you are very close to the 1/3 point of the room so that should work quite well.

As for the body issue, that's a little tougher. Are you looking for more body in the bottom end or throughout the range of the speaker? It's my belief that the speaker is what it is with respect to body however, because it's such a transparent speaker, you can add body further upstream and hear it. There are limits of course so it depends how much you are looking for.

I don't really have a body issue with mine but I have a larger speaker in a smaller room driven by massive tube amps. You have 3,552 cubic feet and I have 1,872 cubic feet. Everyone says they need room and space from the walls and I think this is correct however, few pay attention to the pressure you are trying to create in the room. Speaker and amp combinations and how they interact with the room might be as important if not more for proper spectral balance and body.

If it's mainly the bottom end body you are looking for, then you could experiment with a sub but that's really difficult. I haven't tried a sub in years and never with my Soundlabs but I would think if you had a small, extremely fast sub that you kept as low in frequency as possible, you might gain the body you are looking for without messing with all the other things the Soundlabs do so perfectly. This wouldn't be my first choice though. I'd go the room route first.

I am actually looking for more overall body and not so much more bass. My tube preamp and CD player have good body and warmth.My amps are SS and perhaps tubes would give more body. I am going to play more with room placement and perhaps power cords for the speakers.

The tube amps might give you what you are looking for. If you can borrow a pair from someone or try one a dealer in your area might have then go for it.

I've heard the Soundlabs with both tube and SS amplification and each has it's strengths. I do think you get more body with tubes but at the expense of that extreme bottom end bass slam which doesn't matter much to me. Mine go plenty low and are very balanced with the rest of the frequency range. I think it sounds very natural even if it doesn't "rattle the windows".