What can I do to improve my 2nd system?


My 2nd stereo system is in my 14 ft x 18 ft bed room. The system is placed on the short side as shown. The sound path is laptop/CD/SACD player -> DAC -> power amp -> speakers/subwoofer.  All the details including the placements and cabling are shown in the picture.  The subwoofer is connected from DAC to sub. line-in and line out to power amp thru a build-in HPF fixed at 80Hz 12dB/Octave, which I found the best way for integration bet. the main and sub. The bookshelfs are slightly toed in.  After adding the sub., I like the almost full-range sound out of this system but wonder what else I could do to further improve it.  Any advise is appreciated.   

lanx0003

one sub can work fine, if you have a single listening position, and the flexibility to place the sub where it needs to go...

Remove any flexible footers from under any and all of your speakers. You want the speaker to be held firmly in a fixed physical position. Otherwise energy put into the speaker by the amplifier is partially being used up to move the speaker, rather than to move the speaker cones. This results in smearing. I know there are many who like to put cushiony devices like Springs and sorbothane, etc pillows under their speakers, but in my opinion this is plain wrong. The practice is encouraged by dealers and manufacturers, because of course it sells product.

The above principle is another reason to get better speaker stands, and when you get them make sure your speakers are firmly anchored to them. I’d even put some lead weights on top of the speakers.

@lewm that is an interesting position on vibration isolation for speakers. As more and more high end speaker manufacturers are using devices like the ISO Acoustics Oras as standard equipment for isolation.

I will stick with what the QLN and Magico engineers built into their product. Also can not deny the science in the Townshend ISO platforms.

May be the case for ELS speakers and ribbons..