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Room layout and speaker recommendations


wilbucd

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forumsMy basement room dimensions do not appear to be a good match for my Khorns. I will not say that they do not put out good bass because enough people have said if the conditions are right they are very capable of strong bass output. The bass is really strong if you stand in the yellow shaded part of the room. The center listening position is not so good. The speakers are where they have to be so moving them around is not an option. My ceiling is 7' 7". I know it's kinda low.

My question is would I do better with a pair of LaScalas or Belles or some speaker that isn't so dependant on the room itself for best performance?

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Can you move the love seat forward or back? That might improve the bass at least at that one position. But if you're mainly concerned about an overall lack of bass throughout the room, you may want to add a good sub or two. I'd hate to part with the k-horns if you like them other than the bass issue. At least they are tall enough to project over the pool table and couch toward the sweet spot.

Another option might be to put the horns on the wall with the door; the right sidewall in the drawing. I know you said moving them is not an option, but looking at the picture, I would think that might be a possibility.

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That bottom right corner is actually a doorway to the laundry room so it's not an option. I was playing with the drawing just to learn how to use Visio and haven't included that doorway yet. Yes I would hate to give the speakers up. A sub might be an option. I really wanted to just keep it 2 channel simple since I only play music downstairs. I have a home theatre upstairs and am constantly adjusting the sub depending on the media being played. A pain in the butt. I imagine the same nagging adjustments would have to be made switching between LP's and some overly compressed CD. I would appreciate some advice on adding a sub to this room. What size, more than one, name brands? Thanks.

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Speakers in recessed portions of rooms doesn't always work well in my experience. I wish you had a way to bring them out into a main portion of your listening room. The stronger bass when you stand in that part of the room suggests that is a prime issue. Also, is that recess actually 24' wide? That's plenty wide enough to benefit from a center-channel LaS or Belle. One advantage of the K's is that the treble horns are high enough to clear the pool table and sofa.

LaScalas and Bells are limited in the bottom active that K-horns are good for. However, K's often sound like they don't have a powerful bass in the octave above that, strangely enough. That's why Cornwalls are preferred by many, especially for jazz. Are Cornwalls a possibility?

Your room arrangement looks very nice aside from acoustic issues.

basement%20floorplan.jpg

Are those sliding windows or doors on the wall behind the plane of the speaker, and are they argon double-glazed? Windows are a huge escape hatch for bass in a room, but I don't really know if double-glazing or perhaps the heavier argon is better for bass.

Sorry I don't have a solution for you.

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While the Khorns "should" usually be placed on the long wall, in your situation I think you would do better to move one to the lower right hand corner where both speakers can better project into the room. Also, the other things you have placed in/near/in front of the listening area (ie pool table) certainly interfere with the quality of sound. So does the low ceiling. The tweeter is reflecting sound off the ceiling ~ short delay concurrent with the direct sound from the speaker ~ can cause loss of definition/coloration. Those other objects are also somewhat acting as low frequency absorbers and diffusors ~ in precisely the wrong location(s).

IMHO, even if you went with different speakers I think the right-side wall would work better for the whole room as well as listening. With all that other stuff in the room, obviously some conpromise has to be made in sound.

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Moving each of the listening chairs, couches, etc., forward or back might help, in case they happen to be at bass cancellation points.
Belles or La Scalas would give you less very low bass (low 30s to about 50 would be nearly absent with them, but the Khorns are capable of producing that range if it is not being lost somehow). As to the windows (and walls, for that matter) especially between the Klipschorns, they must be rigid. I doubt very much if argon would help, although some manufactures use that as a selling point. Double glazed windows (ISUs) with the pane toward the inside at least 1/4" thick (thicker might be better) might help. Before incurring that expense, try it with firmly mounted plywood .... if it brings back the bass, then spring for the ISUs.
In our system, we had a RSW-15 (a 15" sub by Klipsch) supplementing the bass for a while. After experimenting a long, long time, we decided the sub should cut in only below 40 Hz, because the Klipschorns were fine down to 40. The Khorn bass is so clean that we finally decided to use the sub for movies only, and a very, very few CDs.
If worst came to worst, there are diagrams for artificial corners available from Klipsch that would allow you (and King Kong) to move the Klipschorns around until you find the ideal locations. The portable corners can have fine hardwood skins on the plywood and can look as elegant as the Khorns.
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I have a home theatre upstairs and am constantly adjusting the sub depending on the media being played. A pain in the butt. I imagine the same nagging adjustments would have to be made switching between LP's and some overly compressed CD. I would appreciate some advice on adding a sub to this room. What size, more than one, name brands? Thanks.

Adding a sub or two would probably cure the bass issue, but whether you want to deal with the muss and the fuss, that's up to you. Personally, I think that once you get subs dialed in, you shouldn't have to be tweaking them all the time. It's crucial to not set the crossover or level too high or else they will call undue attention to themselves sometime.

With klipschorns, the rule of thumb when it comes to adding subs is "get the biggest and best you can". Of course if you don't really play the system very loud, then you could get by with smaller subs just as well. Or with one sub instead of two. I would try one good quality 12 or 15 inch'er to start. And I'd start with the lowest possible crossover point. As for brands, there are many good ones these days. For maximum value, I think SVS, Outlaw, Hsu, Rythmik, Dayton and AV123 are good places to start. I also like Velodyne for their remote control and built-in EQ. Of course, Klipsch has some good solid contenders too.

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Double glazed windows (ISUs) with the pane toward the inside at least 1/4" thick (thicker might be better) might help. Before incurring that expense, try it with firmly mounted plywood .... if it brings back the bass, then spring for the ISUs.

wilbucd,

One of my K-horns partially blocks off an unused outside entry doorway. Until recently, the door was an old "full-light" that had single (not double) glass panes from near the top to about 1' from the bottom. I replaced it with a "half-light" with a solid bottom half and double-glazed insulated glass panes (air, not argon) making up the top half. The switch brought about a substantial increase in bass.

Are those things between your K-horns windows rather than doors, how big are they, and are they double-glazed (dual reflections from a bright object held next to them)?

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To answer a few of the questions above, yes there are two sets of double sliding doors between the speakers. They are brand new and cost a fortune so replacing them with anything else is not justifiable at this point.

As far as replacing the speakers I would consider it yes but I still enjoy the K's even with less bass. They still sound better than 90% of the rest of the country's speakers. I just can't leave well enough alone which I imagine is the same as the rest of the people on this board.

I have temporarily replaced my Adcom GFA-555 amp and GFP-565 preamp with an Onkyo receiver which sounds pretty nice. Once the Adcom gear sells I plan to buy the Outlaw RR2150 receiver. I will try harder to sell it after the holidays. After just completing a three year project to finish the gameroom and then buying the K's, the pool table, the bar, the pinball and arcade games I don't really want to push the new gear at the moment. I've pushed my luck as it is. I can't afford the gear I would like to play with and still stay married so I plan to keep it simple with the Outlaw.

I realize some compromises must be made unless you have one room dedicated and built for perfect accoustics. I am very happy with what I have. I will experiment with some subs and see what that does for me.

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My guess is that those sliding glass doors are O.K., and not responsible for your bass problem, since new sliding doors are pretty firm, have fairly heavy glass, and they seem to be more than 5 feet away from the Khorns, Many windows (as opposed to doors) have very springy glass (particularly older style ones).
It won't help the bass, but the Khorns may be more articulate if you determine the first reflection points on that low ceiling (have someone on a chair move a mirror along the ceiling, right against it -- the first reflection point is where you can see the reflection of the midrange and the tweeter in the mirror from the listening position -- then put some highly absorbing material on the ceiling there. Not too much ,,,, you don't want an overly dead room. See Artto's post for the reason.
Unlike most on the forum, I like tone controls. I use them on some CDs and movies. I punch up the bass from 2 to 6 dB on a minority of CDs. Most are O.K. without this.
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My question is would I do better with a pair of LaScalas or Belles or some speaker that isn't so dependant on the room itself for best performance?

Short answer: I wouldn't count on it.

If the problem is the acoustics of your room, then changing speakers won't change your room. Different speakers might let you place them differently, which will change how they load the room, but you're usually better off just moving the listening position.

I would be surprised if your problem was due to your room not sufficiently completing the flare of the khorn bass bin, but if that's the case, then false corners should be a consideration.

Does it seem like you're missing extreme low bass extension, or more missing the punch and fullness of instruments?

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While the Khorns "should" usually be placed on the long wall, in your situation I think you would do better to move one to the lower right hand corner where both speakers can better project into the room. Also, the other things you have placed in/near/in front of the listening area (ie pool table) certainly interfere with the quality of sound. So does the low ceiling. The tweeter is reflecting sound off the ceiling ~ short delay concurrent with the direct sound from the speaker ~ can cause loss of definition/coloration. Those other objects are also somewhat acting as low frequency absorbers and diffusors ~ in precisely the wrong location(s).

IMHO, even if you went with different speakers I think the right-side wall would work better for the whole room as well as listening. With all that other stuff in the room, obviously some compromise has to be made in sound.

I agree with this assessment. In my experience, low bass issues are usually a function of the geometry of the room--relative dimensions and absolute length, depth, height dimensions.

Your low ceiling certainly doesn't help, but the likelihood that you are sitting at unfavorable position(s) in the room (i.e., N-S & E-W) has been my experience with bass-shyness. I would try to take as much widely dispersed sound-absorbent material out of the room as possible for the listening tests and try the right side wall, as Artto recommended. I'd move the listening position back and forth (i.e., left and right on your diagram), and use source material with sustained LOW bass (i.e., not 80 Hz and above). The low ceiling usually results in over-emphasis of higher frequencies (due to larger perceived areas of reflection from the ceiling)
resulting in perceived bass shyness. I'd use a low-shelving filter
boost on the extreme low end to rebalance the tonal balance due to the
ceiling/floor bounce of the midrange horns. You could also selectively de-emphasize frequencies above about 300 Hz.

I've found that a relatively high RT60 (reverberation time constant) below about 150 Hz brings out the deep bass in a room the size of yours. If you have carpet now and it is able to be lifted up, try rolling it up for
the listening test, away from the Khorns. But I'd try no carpet near
the base of the Khorns and make sure the speakers are tight in their
corners-on the floor. I've found that bass booming issues usually are at higher bass frequencies. I'd use bass traps in the back corners to deal with any 120-300 Hz issues.

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There is no wall to complete what would be the right-hand corner if the speakers were moved to the existing right-side wall! Unless I missed something, it is actually open to a utility area. So, as was originally stated, moving the speakers to the right-side corners is not an option.

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Have a closer look at the far right-hand, bottom of the picture - there is a corner shown.

I stand corrected. I missed the second response.

Too bad, because I believe that was a good answer for his issues.

Chris

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