7.
Angle
the speakers toward the listeners.
It’s natural to assume that a speaker’s primary axis of sound emanates in a
straight line from the front surface. This isn’t always true. Speakers often
emit the most sound (or just better sound) at some angle up or down from the
front surface. You might get better sound from your speakers if you adjust their
angle toward the listener either vertically, horizontally or both.
You
can play the pink noise generated by your surround-sound processor to find this
primary axis, but will likely have better results if you use what’s called
“full-frequency” pink noise found on the 5.1 Audio Toolkit DVD. Don’t be shocked
if this primary axis is directed towards the floor. Once you find this axis, you
can direct it toward the listening area. Test the system with music your
familiar with. You may find that pointing the primary axis toward the listening
area makes the treble frequencies sound brighter than you’re used to. Adjust the
angle to suit your taste.
8.
Move
the speakers around the room.
There are several facets of speaker and listener placement that are important
for different reasons. While I refer to speaker placement for the remainder of
this section, the same principles apply to the listening position, as well. In
general, moving speakers several inches one direction or another can have a huge
impact on sound quality. The closer your speakers are to room boundaries (walls,
floors and ceilings), for example, the greater the bass response of the system.
The distance between the speakers, various room surfaces and the listener can
also affect the quality of sound, as can the position of the speakers and
listener relative to the various room dimensions. It can be difficult to keep
track of all the variables, just explaining them would take a whole series of
articles, but if you experiment with different placement options, you are bound
to find something that works well.
Start
by moving the speakers toward or away from room boundaries. This will increase
or decrease the quantity of bass. Multiple boundaries (i.e. corners) create the
greatest output. Moving speakers or listeners closer to a wall or corner can be
a good thing if your speakers are small and lack significant bass response.
Increasing the main speakers’ bass response may help fill in any gaps between
them and a subwoofer, as described in step 5. Larger speakers may not benefit
from this bass boost and may in turn sound boomy or thumpy.
