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Listening Height Adjustment -- Is This Why Two People Don't Hear the Same?

Just wanted to pass on a recent experience, and surprise, in my system

My room (https://systems.audiogon.com/systems/5707) is set up for one person to listen. I have a medium height arm chair at the listening position and had always assumed that it left me with my ears broadly in line with the tweeters in my Magicos (i.e. 42-43" off the ground)

Well I checked and I was actually at 38-40" depending on how upright I sit. Wondering how much of a difference getting it just so would make I purchased a set of add on feet, each 3.5-4" tall and added them to my chair -- not a good look!

But wow, what an improvement in sound. Tonally the speakers take on a very different balance, upper mid range and vocal intelligibility is substantially improved, bass is lighter but better defined and overall integration across the frequency range is much much better than before

The odd thing is that I don’t have the tweeters pointed directly at me -- they’re angled about 2’ off to either side, so what would a couple of inches in the vertical make such a difference assuming the tweeter drop off is uniform in all directions? Is it more a matter of driver integration?

This experience leads me to wonder
a) how many of us have actually measured and adjusted our set height to optimal/tweeter level, and do we do this every time we audition a new speaker, and
b) if two individuals are not the same height do we adjust for the difference in height between them sitting -- say a 5’6 vs 6’ person that’s probably a 3" difference sitting -- unless your chair has adjustable feet the experience of the two individuals may be completely different
128x128folkfreak
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erik_squires
16,049 posts
 
It's not so much the height but the relative angle... this means you can do this adjustment by tilting the speakers themselves if you can. :) 

Speakers do sound different on angle. Some makers specifically recommend you not toe the speakers in. This is often due to how the tweeter or mids perform. Some makers specifically design for the mids to be the central focus, you often see them with tweets physically UNDER the mid-woofer. Looks weird, sounds good. 

Also, as a speaker maker, though I have designed speakers for on-tweeter axis, sometimes they do sound better closer to the mid-woofer. 

What's important is your long-term listening pleasure, but use manufacturer's recommendations as guides. 
david_ten
5,480 posts
 
@folkfreak Good point and question. I’ve experimented by moving myself around (quite a bit) before picking a spot that works for me.

This has led me to move further back and sit in a higher chair. My speakers are elevated by approximately 2 inches (due to isolation), which in my case, and for my speakers and preferences, means an (ideal) ear to floor distance of 51 inches.

Since I have the Tekton Design SEs, that puts my ear at about 2 inches above the topmost ’tweeter’ in the tweeter array, and just below center of the topmost 'mid-range' driver.
folkfreak's avatar
folkfreak OP
1,349 posts
 
@erik_squires surely tilting causes all sorts of other issues however by changing the relationship of the mid range and bass drivers to the floor -- it also doesn't help if you have more than one listener and need to adjust quickly between the two
bdp24's avatar
bdp24
9,788 posts
 
This is one reason I prefer line source speakers to point source.
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