Advice on room size for 13a / 15a

[mrjameskent]

Hi all,

This is my first post and I'd value some advice as I look to upgrade from Electromotion ESL's following a house move which I think needs a larger speaker to fill the room.

The room is an open plan living/dining room, measuring 26 feet long by 20 feet wide, with a ceiling height of approx. 12 feet. The speakers would be placed on the short wall and I have space to put them 10-12" into the room and around 20" from the side walls.

I listen at low to mid volumes, as this is a flat with a wood floor over joists - I've used Townshend Isolation bars on the Electromotions to remove a lot of low freq. energy going into the structure (and they also hugely improved the sound). I'd plan to continue with a larger set of Townshend products (bars or podium).

My system is an Accuphase E560 integrated amp + DAC40 card, with a Lumin D2 digital streamer and Transparent Plus speaker cables.

As a fan of the ML sound I'm considering a used pair of the Masterpiece range and I'm guessing the 11a to be too small for my room, but I'd welcome any experience on which size would be best suited.

Thanks,
James

 

[ttocs]

Welcome!
I've got the 13A in a similar volume room, which is multipurpose - Living/Dining/Kitchen. I'm very happy with the 13A in this size room. If I were able to afford more dimensional distance front to back I could justify a pair of 15A, but the constraints of the room-use doesn't allow it.

The 13A woofers can sound great on their own in my room, but I have been using a bunch of subwoofers for several years now and just love the amount of impact they provide with such ease, no strain at all filling the room with an appropriate level of bass and plenty of tactile response and feel.

The wider panels of the 15A will help with providing a larger sweet spot. The larger woofers will also help with filling the room with bass should you be one who prefers not to use subwoofers.

 

[Robert D]

Im using my Prodigy speakers in a similar sized area and they sound great.

 

[Fidji99]

Hi, size of your room is ok for both 13a amd 15a (i have 15a in 32 sqm, so much smaller than yours).

couple of notes - 20in/50cm from side wall is definitely not optimal, you will see significant benefits if you at least double the distance from side walls - this is valid for all electrostats. Also your 10-12 in from front wall (i assume back of the woofer enclosure, not the panel itself) is pretty much on the limit and is considered rather as bare minimum.

I have upgraded from 13a to 15a’s - difference in performance is not subtle, so if you are able to get bit more space around them to let them breathe - go for,it. I would also recommend ARC to get bass under control.

 

[audioxcel]

I can't grok how the speakers are only going to have to be 20" from the side walls in a space that is 20" x 26 feet long.

Is there partial wall between the living room area and the dining room area? How far apart are you planning to place the speakers? If the speakers are going to be placed along a 20" wall, t seems like you would easily be able to place them at least 4' from each side wall and in fact 5' would get them closer together and help your soundstage and imaging be better focused.

I also can't visualize why the speakers need to be so close to the back wall when the space is 26' long including the dining room. Are you saying that the dining room and the living room are both about 13 feet wide (long)?

I lived in an apartment once with a living room that was 16' x 20' and had a dining room that opened behind that space. I placed my MLs along the exterior 16' wall that was farthest from the dining room. The outer edge of the panels were 4' from each side wall and the back of the panels were 4' from the wall behind them. I had a Mirage BPS-400 bipolar subwoofer sitting near the middle behind the sofa and firing toward the two side walls which were about 6-8' away from each side of the sub.

My listening spot was on a sofa the back of which was about 5-6 feet from the partial wall that separated the living room and dining room. This put me when sitting on the sofa about 10 -11' from the front of my speakers. I had a loveseat at along the wall that was closest to the end of the sofa that was nearest to the opening into the dining room. On the wall opposite of the loveseat I had my TV and its small system in a rack that the TV sat on. My audio system was a long rack that ran from next to the TV rack towards the speakers.

It was an awesome listening space set-up and I which I still had the space I had in that apartment. Oh well, life happens and I met my wife. Now, she and I live in a house with the largest room being a just bit smaller but oddly shaped because the master bathroom protrudes into the space on the back end.

 

[mrjameskent]

Thank you for all the advice and sharing some things I hadn't considered, in particular distance from side/rear walls.

Here's a design sketch to show the space - there will be a large media unit (12' wide) that sits on the 20' wall which will impact distance between the 2 speakers. Looking at the plans I would be able to bring them to 100cm from the side walls and further forward, subject to wife approval I can also pull my listening position back as needed.

I'm understanding that I'm not going to be able to achieve a perfect placement, but thank you all again for the advice.