How close can you sit to 604s?

[martyh45]

I am working on a new listening room layout and I would like to use my 604C/Es in the room. I?m sort of constricted by the layout of the house and am looking at an 8 ~ 10 foot distance from speaker to ear unless I make compromises in other areas like left, right symmetry. So, will they work well sitting this close or should I try another layout? What about other systems like the 19, would they work at this distance?
Thanks,
Marty

[boltupright]

The 604 is better suited for short distance than a model 19, that is for shure, 8-10 feet is closer than I like, 16 feet would be ideal.

[GM]

Greets!

AFAIK the 4 ft/dB SPL half space efficiency reference is from the average listening distance to a soffitt mounted mono studio monitor and for stereo it's an equilateral triangle with the 'sweet spot', so these would be the minimums. Once you move the speakers out away from the walls/corners, you have to choose the distances based on room modes since these will dominate the system's LF response, so ideally you'd design the room to suit the desired listening layout, but this will probably make it too big if non parallel walls and a sloped ceiling isn't an option.

WRT layout symmetry, if you can't slope walls/ceiling, then offsetting the system at an angle to the back wall and left/right is a good plan since it averages out standing waves between the speakers and near boundaries as well as helping to rapidly decay reflections from the back half of the room.

GM

[martyh45]

Thanks for the advice guys.
What do you all think about tuned absorption in small rooms? I have two sets of parallel surfaces in the current layout so those modes are easy enough to calculate. The third set (front and back) are non parallel so those and the oblique and tangential modes are beyond my meager abilities to work out. I?m leaning towards built in broad band absorption in the range of the modes I can calculate and then tuned absorption for any remaining modes. I don?t have the equipment to measure rt60 so that will need to be tuned by ear.

[GM]

Greets!

You're welcome!

Works for me, though it's easy to over damp them. If they're non-parallel enough (>9 deg IIRC), they're not an issue.

GM

[RonSSS]

I have 904's with the CD horn in the middle. Think late 604's. Like the -8K's.

I love sitting in the near field. Very intimate like large headphones, but way better.

Speaks about 8ft apart, toed in with me in the sweet spot about 6ft away.

The speakers completely dissappear.....with just the musicians left to enjoy. Takes good recordings though. The simpler the music the better.

The 19's will do the same, but need to be a bit further apart.....still not quite as good though.

To me, near field removes the majority of the room from the equation. And I think a dead room is best. You have seen my room.

Ron

[martyh45]

GM,
Strangely enough, assuming untreated walls the rt60s of the room look pretty good with the exception of the area around 500Hz. The more I get into it, the more I think designing the ultimate room is every bit as impossible as designing the perfect speaker.

Ron,
I?m a fan of the near field myself. I don?t know if it is habit or what but I have been cursed with c-r-appy rooms for years and have had to be close. Now I find myself moving my seat closer when I visit audiophile friends for a listening session. I prefer a short sided equilateral triangle to a seat farther back. Headphones with depth is the sound I am after, I want a closely mic?d singer to be close but not inside of my head.