"As long as the tweets are at ear level, it probably shouldn’t matter much" -- that's what I was kind of thinking. If tweeter is at ear level whether right side up or upside down, then either way the same output should reach your ear from each driver at the same time, with the only difference being the direction from which the mid/woofer sound wave arrives at your ear. But sonics aside, I was also wondering if there is any non-sonics-related reason I shouldn't try this -- for example, would it be bad for internal parts to have gravity pulling on them in the opposite way. (Thanks for the replies, everyone.)
odd question about stand-mount speakers
Is there any reason you shouldn't turn stand-mount speakers upside down and listen to them that way, as long as you use some kind of vibration control/decoupler between the speakers and the surface they're placed on? The reason I ask is because, at least in a near-field setup, I would think having the mid/woofer ABOVE the tweeter would enhance image height/size -- assuming the tweeter is kept at ear level. (A couple of asides: I don't currently have bookshelf speakers, otherwise I would experiment. Will likely be buying some in the near future though. Also, I know that there are some stand-mount speakers that place the mid/woofer above the tweeter, but the vast majority do not -- most of the ones I'm interested in do not.)
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This is a pretty strong point. If a speaker is well designed, it is run through many paces. Many things are considered in positioning tweeter and woofer. Of course, that makes assumptions about your listening position, but they factor that in. The effects of upending a speaker are variable, because of the factors mentioned above and which speaker you're upending. Listening is surely a good thing to try. Do you like it better? Damn the torpedos! Using an analyzer such as Room EQ Wizard is another path toward understanding what is happening when they're upside down or even on their side. |
@waytoomuchstuff LOL |
One of the speakers I'm interested in is the Graham Audio LS8/1 ($10k), designed by Derek Hughes, the son of the engineer who designed some famous BBC speakers. The LS8/1 got a very positive review in TAS (if anyone's interested, the review has a lot of fascinating info in it: https://www.theabsolutesound.com/articles/graham-ls8-1-loudspeaker/). So I emailed Graham Audio and got the following reply directly from Derek: There is no reason why the speaker could not be used upside down, it will not harm it. Interestingly, the BBC often used to used their BC1 speakers inverted when they were used near field, so yes that should be fine. |
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