Lack of depth problem


Can someone please give me suggestions on how I can improve the sound depth of my system? I recently upgraded my speakers to Focal JMLabs Alto Utopia, but they still lack of depth. They have wide and tall sound stage though.

The room is about 15' wide by 9' tall, and 23' long. The speakers are 5' from their rear wall and the seating area is 17' from that wall. The room is lightly treated with sound panels.

Thanks in advance.
vett93
Vet, Looks like you have pretty decent stuff, a decent sized room and dimensions, as well as appropriate damping, for a good sense of depth of image. BUT, in considering advise (and giving it) we should be mindful of how YOU define depth of image.

Some feel great imaging has a sense of airness, like looking at the stars at night. Very clearly defined bright spots of light against a dark background BUT I would see that as closer to 2 dimensional.

What I call 'depth of image' is more holographic, a sense of being at the event, a sense that you could walk in amoungst the players. Front to back depth of image, with the front plane being just slightly behind the speakers and the depth extending backwards from there and the performers/instruments have a sense of body. Hard to imagine sometimes until you have actually heard it (and you do need that on the recording!).

Assuming that you would like to have the second type of imaging that I described, I would suggest that you simply move your listening chair forward until your ears are between 9 and 10 feet from the speakers (inches make a difference, BTW). I would also suggest you fiddle with toe in as you fiddle with listening distance. Its the combo you're looking for. Different speakers have different radiation patterns so its hard to predict, but a couple of my favorite toe in set ups, depending on speakers, sidewalls, and ceilings, are with the axis of the speaker crossing just in front of the listener position or with the axis crossing just behind the speaker head. Doing this creates a, sort of, near field experience with pin point imaging, and while it may not get you to absolute holography due to other considerations, it would probably help a lot with a sense of front to back depth.

Hope that helps a bit.
Vet,

Your JMLabs tend to have a dip in the upper midrange off axis - if you trust these measurements - so this region will be particularly weak from your seated position: well back where you likely get quite a lot of reflected energy of which a lot less will arrive from the upper mid range.

A vocalist (normally placed out front in a mix) may appear more distant becuase of this feature. Conversely percussion may jump out at you because your speaker is quite strong in the 5K to 10K region (where you get the "slap" as stick hits skin). Since drummers are normally placed further back in a mix then this may bring the drummer perceptively forward. Drummer forward and singer backward = might mean perceptively less soundstage depth on most mixes.

Reverb is the other aspect of depth perception - if too much side wall refelctions are interefering with you hearing the reverb off the recording then this might be a factor in reducing depth.
Vett93, You should also make sure you eliminate ground loops in your system. This is a typical reason to have less than optimum depth. Try grounding just your preamp and floating all other components.
toe in and loose the sound pannels. these are great speakers, and should give a pretty balanced presentation without much fuss.
Given the full range of the speakers, you might want to try bass traps in the corners behind the speakers. If you use ASC, point the seam kitty corner (45 degree angle). If you stack them, do NOT point the second trap in quite as far: you will kill the sense of ambience even as you tighten the bass.
First reflection points, but also floor (I have 2 half rounds on the floor in front of the speakers, reflective side TOWARDS the speakers). Also, try the "clap" test in your room. Simply walk from one end to the other and see if you have slap echo. If you do, damp it. You can put up anything, but preferably something with folds in it (this is per Alton Everst, in the Master Handbook of Acoustics: Mr. Everest posits that sound is damped better in folds than something without folds). I don't know if you can do this in your room.
I recently put a half round on the ceiling and found the effect rather...effective. I had 2" fiberglass on the ceiling (it's still there), but the shape of the half round scatters reflections considerably better. It also increases height and the sensation of the harmonics drifting upwards.
I also have Real Traps, but find the tuning of the Tube Traps easier, as you can turn a trap to absorb some bass and reflect at the same time.
The room you have sounds great, dimension-wise, but unless you've done something to it that you haven't mentioned, you'd be surprised how too much upper-bass can murk up the sense of depth. What room treatment DO you have??