Klipsch RF-3II placement (1 Viewer)

[JasonWaddington]

I noticed the RF-3II manual says that they should be 6' apart. How would it effect sound if they were only 4 ft apart? or for that matter, 8 ft apart? Why is 6 recommended?...just curious.

 

[Michael R Price]

How far do you sit from them and how wide is your room? I have no idea where they got the 6' number. A general rule of thumb would be to keep the speakers about the same distance apart as you are from them (forming something like an equilateral triangle). Also, see if you can keep them away from room surfaces like walls and big TVs.

Moving the speakers closer together will shrink your soundstage but might help reduce room reflections. Wider = larger soundstage, but you don't want them too close to your side walls.

 

[DanaA]

Jason,

My RB-5ii's are recommended for 6'-15'apart. I can't imagine that it would be different for your Klipsches. Setting them 4' apart, I would feel would take away from the soundstage considerably and lesson the sweetspot. I would only think that if they were eight feet apart, the performance would be better than if they were only 6 feet apart. But, that might not be true in smaller rooms where your listening position is closer to the speakers. Mine are only 7 feet apart, but the room they're in isn't that big.

 

[JasonWaddington]

Well my listening position is only 6ft away....so maybe 5ft is a good separation.

 

[DanaA]

Wow, you are pretty close. I would never think you'd never get anywhere near cranking up that nice AVR520 all the way. It's almost imposing to think of sitting so close to speakers that powerful. Given you're that close, I'd experiment both with the distance you separate the two speakers and how much you toe them in. I also would recommend that you not think at all about what Klipsch stated in their manual. Who knows, you might even try setting them 4 feet apart and working outward from there. By the way, I think you have a really nice audio system going there. How do you like that Cambridge. At first, I thought it was made by Cambridge that makes the speakers, but recently came to be aware that it is another company entirely. It gets absolutely great reviews, especially for the price, which I remember being between $400-500. I've been to their website and found that the nearest dealer is about a 100 miles away from me, but I'll probably still take a drive down. I wish they made a CD changer though, as I like to program songs from several discs and sit back and relax.

 

[Chris Tsutsui]

The general placement I recommend for Klipsch reference is stuffed inside a closet filled with clothes.
I'm just playing around.
If you separate them by 6 feet, then it forms an equilateral triangle between you and the speakers. I tend to like this as a start, especially with a little toe-in.
The wider the speakers, the wider the soundstage is gonna be. If you place them 1 foot apart, the soundstage is gonna sound like mono and all sound will come from a pinpoint. If you place the speakers too far apart, the mono sources that are supposed to be centered in the soundstage sound too wide and not pinpoint.

 

[JasonWaddington]

Yea, I think Klipsch are supposed to be spread apart a fair amount because they have a naturaly pin point sound to them. i think i'll put em 6' apart. thanks for the info guys!

 

[BenK]

This is what Dolby labs recommends depending on music or movie priority and listening/viewing distance.

 

[JasonWaddington]

Well thats good news. I actually sit exactly 6.5' away and the speakers are roughely 5.5' apart. According to dolby that is right in between the movie/music speaker placements.