Correct, Sound Quality will have more to do with the quality of the system and speakers more than the size of them. You could have large or small speakers that can sound crappy to you no mater what size room you have them in.
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"Big speakers in small room is bad," myth or reality?
- Thread starter Kreshna
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Yeah,! Some small speakers produce big enough sound for large rooms too . It’s common too see the white van vintage speakers or modern bic America that are big but drivers are super low quality.
I’ve not heard real high end stuff my magnolia I. Akron best speakers were b & w and I cannot afford those . I’m looking for job but I’m Always so tired I just fall asleep doing job search , typically before I finish the app.
SterlingOne
Super Member
When I shopped for speakers back 1986 I did not think at all about how big they were relative to the room where they would be located. I only thought about how big they were relative to getting them into the trunk of my car. I suppose that would still be my mindset today if I were buying speakers from an outlet with no delivery/installation service. I cannot contemplate any problem with big speakers in a small room. The appeal is realistic volume, which does not equate to loudness. One more thing, there's no substitute to woofer and subwoofer size in presenting bass violen, cello and other acoustic, or electronic instruments which dig into the lowest octaves, so, small speakers even in a small room may not satisfy without a subwoofer taking up some space too.
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If you have a dedicated audio room that is properly treated you will have a lot more freedom in speaker choices. If you add dsp room correction after optimizing speaker placement and the above room treatments almost anything is possible. That is what I am working toward.
Kreshna
...but I have to know.
How about small speakers with a sub or two, in a small room? How about small speakers with sub? Wouldn't such configuration yield similar bass overlapping problem?
Interesting. Although in my case, Cardas speaker placement is out of the question, even small speakers. You see, my desk will be placed about the center of the room, while my employee will occasionally sit facing me, across my desk. As such, even small speakers would be obstructing. Thus, the speakers --whether they're big or small-- will be placed against the wall in front of me, across my desk. So if I have to talk with my staff, he will sit facing me, between me and the speakers.
darkblue94
The Devil made me do it.
If you have to talk with your staff I would surmise that turning the music down or off would allow you to focus on the conversation better than having the music competing for your attention.
Kreshna
...but I have to know.
No, I mean the placement, not the volume.
See, if I apply Cardas placement, then the speakers would be placed between me and my staff (who will be sitting across my desk, facing me). Even small speakers would be kinda obstructing. Well, my PC monitor will be obstructing as well, but I'll be using PC monitor arm (like this one) to mount my PC monitor on, so I could easily swing the PC monitor aside when I need to talk to my staff.
Loudspeakers are more difficult though (except if I use very small monitor, like NHT SuperZero, that can be arm-mounted alongside the computer monitor). So, the easier solution is to put the speakers against the wall.
twiiii
Lunatic Member
The only problem with a big speaker in a room is for me has the sound from the multiple drivers integrated into one sound by the time the wave front reached my ears. I can work around room placement and traffic patterns if I have to. But three and 4 way speaker systems that are efficient and there fore rather large with the drivers spresd across a baffle need time and distance to congeal. People who pull there speakers way from walls to reduce room coupling just increase the number of reflections in the room making the sound less defined which means they have to sit closer to the speaker where the direct near field can over power the reflected sound of the room. The softer the room acoustically then the fewer reflections and a greater listening distance. Larger speakers have issues with the size of the front baffle and how it effects the emissions of the drivers mounted to it. Some positive but more often than not negative if you are wanting a minimum of interference with a point source driver. If you are using a highly directive driver the baffle has very little influence. So there are give and takes. It all depends on what. type of sound guilty you want and how efficient you need your speakers to be. Speakers in the middle of the room are less efficient than that the same speakers placed in a corner. Same speaker in a corner with the same listening distance will be louder . The frequency response may be better or worse depending on the design of the speaker and the acoustics of the room.. Speaker designers have to choose how to measure their speakers. They choose anechoic chambers because the measurements are repeatable and predictable. How a speaker performs in a chamber is totally different in how it performs in home listening room. So speaker specifications are just a casual guide when selecting a speaker. Some speakers were designed to be placed on floors against walls. Some prefer corners. And some prefer to be out in the middle of a room. You wouldn't place a Magico M3 in a corner and you wouldn't place a Klipschorn in the middle of the room. Are two extreme cases. Choosing the correct system for your space is your choice, there is no one simple answer. I prefer large speakers for their dynamcs, greater listening distance and in my case firm bass. I detest speakers that can't reach below 40 HZ and there are a lot of them out there especially when placed in the middle of a room..
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GaryM
G.A.S. man
So true! Then along came the Internet and changed everything we thought we knew.
My music room is a small bedroom with Cerwin-Vega AT12 speakers. I struggled with making them sound great. Then I learned that they sound best played loud. So, I crank them up and leave the room. The house shakes with glorious music.
As others have indicated, proper driver blending is the biggest challenge using larger speakers. The guy who I purchased the Acoustat 1+1s used them in a small room and listened nearfield. Which is not a problem when using full range panels.
With any speaker, however, you're still facing inevitable room modes in a cube.
With any speaker, however, you're still facing inevitable room modes in a cube.
Kreshna
...but I have to know.
I see.
Driver blending has never become a problem with JBL 120Ti, perhaps because its drivers are packed close to each other.
fill35u
Super Member
But the 120Ti isn't exactly a large speaker. Maybe just a little too big to be "bookshelf" - it's not like there's an exact definition.
The 120Ti's drivers aren't really packed that closely. They're certainly not coaxial.
I'd guess a two foot minimum listening distance for most speakers of the 120Ti's size. Not hard to achieve in a room bigger than a closet.
My experience with big speakers in a small room taught me a lesson.
A pair of Klipsch CF4's (two 12" woofers flanking a large Tractrix horn) in a 12'x13'x8' room were much too much. Not enough room to maintain clearance from the sidewalls and the front wall to the speaker.. Nowhere enough room to maintain a reasonable distance from the speaker to the listeners ears. You had to be a fan of nearfield listening, and while that's OK with smaller speakers it was totally unenjoyable trying to listen to these monsters from three feet away.
These problems naturally disappeared when I moved these Klipschs to my 15'x31'x12' great room. My HT system (at the time) really liked them.
So based solely on my personal experience I would strongly advise you not to do it. You can find some great smaller speakers and then supplement with stereo subs if needed. You'll thank yourself if you do.
A pair of Klipsch CF4's (two 12" woofers flanking a large Tractrix horn) in a 12'x13'x8' room were much too much. Not enough room to maintain clearance from the sidewalls and the front wall to the speaker.. Nowhere enough room to maintain a reasonable distance from the speaker to the listeners ears. You had to be a fan of nearfield listening, and while that's OK with smaller speakers it was totally unenjoyable trying to listen to these monsters from three feet away.
These problems naturally disappeared when I moved these Klipschs to my 15'x31'x12' great room. My HT system (at the time) really liked them.
So based solely on my personal experience I would strongly advise you not to do it. You can find some great smaller speakers and then supplement with stereo subs if needed. You'll thank yourself if you do.
Kreshna
...but I have to know.
Indeed. And it's not hard to achieve either in my small, 3 meters x 3 meters room.
Everything is relative I guess.
The biggest challenge I've found with vintage three way JBLs was the choice to drive the midrange beyond its optimum range for consistent directivity. Current models like the LSR6332 cross the 5" driver almost an octave lower.
