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Uneven soundstage help, please.

I've got a pair of ATC SCM40 v2's driven by a Musical Fidelity A308 (plenty of power) and overall I'm happy with this combination, given my budget, wife, and listening habits. My system is in an incredibly complex large room, with all sorts of variables in terms of reflection, absorption, etc. And these aren't exactly the same from one speaker to another. I have no choice about speaker placement, given the room configuration.
There's a phenomenon that concerns me, though, that I haven't been able to resolve. In order to get the center centered, I need to position the speakers and listening chair in such a way that the soundstage extends all the way to one speaker, but only three-quarters of the way to the other. It doesn't sound out of whack. It's just a narrower field than I had with my older KEF References, and I wonder if it would sound even better if this was resolved.
Has anyone else faced and solved this? What factors are driving it? I've been living with it comfortably, but I wonder.
Thanks ahead of time for any replies.
m
128x128m669326
erik_squires
16,144 posts
 
Hey,

Look, at the point where your placement is so bad that you can't get a decent center stage, I promise you that a decent EQ will be the least of your worries.

If you want to be a purist, get a better room, with treatment.  If you can't do that an EQ is going to be a huge huge improvement by comparison.  I mean, do you want to spend years not listening to a great sounding system because you were worried about tone controls??

Honestly too, EQ's and tone controls are superbly better than they were in the past, so the benefits far outweigh the risks.

The issue you are having, as you point out, is that you need to treat both channels separately, and that's what ARC or a miniDSP will let you do.
erik_squires
16,144 posts
 
I should point out that while an EQ will be better than not in the situation of uneven speaker placement, you still are going to have issues with uneven reflections. 

Controlling the room acoustics is always the best solution, but if you cannot do that, you are getting the second best approach.
russ69's avatar
russ69
3,520 posts
 
"...I have no choice about speaker placement..."

That might limit your available choices for best sound. For a hearing loss, there are things you can do. I have a single sided hearing loss. So I slide over to hindered side and turn my good ear towards the center. A few years ago it was a minor adjustment but now it's a real big one. I don't use a balance control, I feel that messes up the way the speakers work and it makes it worse. Position of the listener works best. 
mapman's avatar
mapman
22,311 posts
 
IF all is the same and only difference is the speakers used, dispersion pattern differences between the old and current speakers would most likely account for differences.

First though I would switch left and right channels to see if that reverses the soundstage. If so could be something different in one channel versus the other somewhere upstream and not the speakers or room.

Wider dispersion patterns tend to work well in more chaotic rooms with strange acoustics. THings will tend to even out better that way. Maybe the old KEFs had better dispersion than newer ATCs? Just wondering.

If it turns out to be the speakers and not the electronics, might consider a change at that point to find something better suited to the room.
m669326's avatar
m669326 OP
330 posts
 
Thanks, Russ. I think my best bet to start with--one that costs $0 and entails the least inconvenience as an experiment-- is to keep playing with speaker and seating position.
I wish I could employ room treatment or switch to another room or buy expensive equipment to fix things, but right now, none of that is practical. For that matter, how about a miracle cure for minor hearing loss? Or a lottery win?

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