Cardas Speaker placement..

According to Jim Smith, the listening position, rather, than a speakers placement, has more profound effect on the bass perception.
I can concur his findings in my room.

My listening position is a little greater from the speakers then the speakers are apart .This seems to be the over all best position..but the bass is not there..

I found Jim Smith's book "Get Better Sound" the best source for the info on system set up.
I used to have the same "problem" with "no bass", until I followed his system.
The bass is always there, you just have "to find it"

Personally, I have never found the Cardas Golden Cuboid method to work well in any room I've tried it in; I actually prefer the Vandersteen placement method in most instances and it still falls woefully short in most cases. Each room is unique based on size and construction, and to properly understand what needs to be addressed, measurement is essential. I would recommend some recent Floyd E. Toole publications: the book 'Sound Reproduction: The Acoustics and Psychoacoustics of Loudspeakers and Rooms' is excellent, and dispels many myths about loudspeaker performance in rooms. For help with bass integration, I would recommend visiting the Harmon website, and looking for the whitepapers under the Technological Leadership section. There you will find an excellent three-part paper by Dr. Toole, discussing acoustical modes and their associated nulls and peaks. In my room, this paper was invaluable at optimizing the position of both myself and the speakers in my relatively new room. Be sure to download and use the room mode calculator as well. Good luck.

Hi Spaz,

After reading this thread I have looked at you system. It look glorious!

We just moved to a new home and in the last 3-4 months I too was looking for the bass in my new music/study room.

Firstly, since also other speakers exhibited the same behavior in your room, i.e. lack of bass, it is very likely that there is nothing wrong with your speakers. Your room "excels" at bass cancelation. Secondly, since you say that behind the speaker plane you get good bass there should be possible to find a position for the speakers that will give you good bass at the listening position. (This is also the proof that your speakers can produce good bass.)

I would suggest you the following:

1) Since your room is wide enough try placing the speakers along the long wall (so they fire perpendicular to the direction of the long wall). It is my experience that this always yields better results (not just with bass but also with imaging and soundstage) than placing the speakers along the short wall.

2) Buy a good subwoofer (or two). I recommend the top of the line RELs, e.g. Stentor or Studio. However, others have reported here very positive experiences also with other brands, e.g. Velodyne, and/or lesser RELs. There are two main advantage of adding a subwoofer: A) as you know very well by now, the speaker position in a room that yields the best midrange spectral balance and stereo image almost always is different than the positions that give the best bass, B) a subwoofer will give you full range sound also at very low listen levels.
It is an old and incorrect believe that a subwoofer is detrimental to a stereo system.

3) If step 1) fails or is impractical for whatever reason, you may want to hire a specialist (e.g. acoustic engineer) to help you get things right. Like with the addition of a subwoofer, hiring a specialist will cost a fraction of the price of your system and has the potential to elevate the performance of your system to a whole new level.

4) Be patient and no not despair! When I first placed the system in my new room , I had no bass what so ever even though I've cracked the volume of my REL half way in a room of only 4.7 x 3.7 x 2.4 meters!!!.

Good luck and keep us posted.
Paul