Floorstanders designed to be against the wall?

Hi Tvad, the T-1 has a 20Hz cutoff, the T-3 a 22 Hz cutoff (although I had mine made up to cut off at 20 Hz), the T-5 cuts off at 32 Hz and its hard to say what the Hartsfield does, since it is so woofer-dependent. I've seen it doing very well down to 25Hz with the right set up.

The T-1 and T-3 both have a down-firing and a front-firing woofer so they tend to not have a lot of proximity effect when near the rear wall. That makes them very easy to set up in a room, even very small ones.

I use a KEF reference 203 with 6" from the wall now recommended is 9"

Having researched this question a couple of years ago, I discovered that there were a few speakers that were deliberately designed to be placed against the wall as opposed to speakers that "can work somewhat" close to the wall. The ones that were designed to be placed against the wall included a number of British companies - Linn, Naim, and Audio Note to mention a few. I am currently using my Zu Definition 2s within 4" of the wall; they were not designed for this placement, but they do work quite well.

Gsm 18439, this is exactly my point. I have been told on numerous occasions by dealers and mnufacturers that speaker x and y work just fine against the front wall - but they never do - imaging suffers - so my question is which speakers are specifically designed for that purpose - which brings to mind very few modern speakers. Appropos that, has anyone tried/heard the North Creek Kat Revelator, which was designed for this purpose?

ROOM COMPENSATION
While conventional speakers must be perfectly positioned in the room to maximize their low-frequency performance, the Vandersteen Model Fives As and either Wood or Standard Quatro's can be positioned in a convenient location and then tuned to the requirements of that particular placement. The subwoofer amplifier incorporates multiple unique adjustments that allow the speaker's low frequencies to be matched to its environment and the preferences of its owner. Model Five,and Quatro design owners can adjust the sensitivity of the subwoofer section and contour the subwoofer's response. The sensitivity adjustment increases or decreases the overall level of the bass without changing its character. The low frequency contour control adjusts the Q of the subwoofer to accommodate different rooms, listening tastes, or system modes. In subwoofer engineering terms, system Q is the product of a complex mathematical equation derived from driver, electrical, and enclosure parameters. In practical terms, it relates to the character of the bass response. A low Q subwoofer sounds very tight and controlled. A high Q subwoofer produces a full, warm bass with more energy in the most audible bass range.

Each speaker also has eleven, adjustable compensation controls that modify the subwoofer's response to precisely counter room and placement induced non linearities. When the speakers are initially set up by dealer in the owner's home, the Vandersteen Warble Test test CD is inserted and compensation controls then adjusted for the most linear bass response at the listening position. Once set these controls will not need to be readjusted unless the speaker placement or listening position changes significantly.
Having installed hundreds of pairs of Vandersteen Five and Quatro series we are consistently reminded after each tuning of how versatile,adaptable this design is even when speakers were only inches from the wall.
Best John Rutan