Questions about room size and speaker choice

I have worked with small and large rooms because I have moved a few times.

The good:

All in all a small room is not total death to a system and it can still sound good. What most people seem to not fully understand is room boundaries are the issue not volume of the room. The shortest distance will make the biggest issues. These are of course side and front wall. But here is the kicker... people forget the ceiling!

Many large rooms (say 15X25+) are in the basement and have still have bass issues because of the low ceiling. If you have a 8 foot or less ceiling you will almost always have some bass boom some where below 100hz.

So my point is don't take negative comment to heart to much and use your own ears (and a db meter).


The bad:
The sad truth is your system will never sound as good as it could in a larger room, no if ands or buts.

Suggestions:
Use a good bit of toe in and buy speakers where the drivers are close together and mesh well. Near-field can be great but you need the right speakers to pull it off. One of the best near-field speakers I have heard are Magnepan 1.7s. I would try putting your seat so your head is 10" off the rear wall and move your speakers off the front wall more. The difference from your head being 10" and two feet off the back wall will be very small. But the advantages of having you speakers off the front wall will really help bass boom and sound stage. This will put your speakers (measured from the front baffle) two feet of the front wall and your ears 8ft from the speakers.

All in all it is your room and people on the internet can not tell you how it sounds. I have shoe-horned large speakers into small rooms and put monitors in BIG rooms... it was all a leaning experiance some better some worse but always fun. I have found the most important factor for any room is understanding how your speakers disperse their sound and adjusting the speaker and seating location accordingly.

Thanks James for your wise advice! Just so I understand correctly: the speakers are currently 3.2 feet from the front wall (measured from the front baffle) and a little less than 2 feet from the side wall (measured from the center of the speaker). Are you suggesting that I put them more into the room and move my chair back?

No, 3 feet off the front wall is plenty and the magic number where improvements happen. I thought you had them a good bit closer. I have found that distance from the speakers is important for driver integration which translates to better imaging and soundstage.

The totems may work well at only 7 feet but it seems pretty close. Try moving your chair back a little and see (leaving the speakers). The driver integration maybe better. There maybe a bass node at the back of the room you will here if you get to close (may not be there either).

It is best not to sit close to the back wall but I would trade a little more rear wall reflections for better driver integration... you may not though. Give it a shot and see, it should be a pretty easy test.

Last question I wanted to ask: there are many acoustic treatment products available for reasonable and ridiculous prices on the Internet. However, I find it all rather confusing; absorption vs. diffusion vs. bass traps vs. soundproofing and combination of any of the above. Does anyone have any experience with acoustic treatment and could give me some advice as to what would work best in my listening room? Thank you.

Actusreus, what is ridiculous prices? Where do you draw a line for what is ok and not?
You can use many large speakers in fairly small rooms, IF, i say if, you keep the bass peaks under control. Next factor is probably how well the speakers work in nearfield.

Do you have any pictures of your room?

I am no expert, but i can help you and tell you what i have tried in my room. The acoustics will determine more than you think, i swear on that. It is far too much to print here. You can change the whole aspect of how it sounds with acoustics. I would say, start off with this if you can. No room is perfect. They do not need to be, but by addressing acoustics your system will sound so much better. Later on, you can decide if it is good enough, or if you wish to work more on the acoustics.