Guide to stereo speaker placement

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Speaker placement is hugely important to how your system sounds in your room. So important in fact that I have chosen to tackle this issue before anything else. Within reason, budget speakers placed well can outperform much higher quality speakers that have been placed with little care. I know there are other speaker placement guides but having read pretty much all of them, this is still what I do and it can get you very close to optimal placement in a very short time. 




Speaker placement is one of those things where there is no substitute for getting to know your speakers and your room; it really is that variable. It can mean the difference between knowing whether some bass boom is caused by the speaker being too close to the back or side wall for example. 

Where do I put my speakers then?

A basic starting point is always to look in your speaker manual for guidelines. As speakers are often designed and tuned within a certain set up, it doesn't hurt to try to match that as much as possible.  


Failing that this is what I do:


1)        Start with speakers against the back wall and a decent width apart pointing straight down the room (not at your sofa). If you have the manufacturer’s recommendations then use them as a starting point.

Control quantity and quality of bass

2)        First try to get a ballpark back wall distance. While listening to something with prominent (not necessarily heavy) bass, move both speakers forward while listening for the quality of bass.

I find using something with double bass useful as it is easier to listen for a natural string bass sound than second guess what a synth bass was originally intended to sound like. Go for naturalness and snap over weight and boom.

Once you’re happy you have your back wall distance, make a note and try to keep this constant through the following steps.

Use a track with centred vocals to fine tune back wall distance to get both speakers the same - works better by ear than by tape measure.

Control width vs density of soundstage

3)         Next, I'd look at the speaker width. One way is to get something playing with a nice clearly centred vocal and pull the speakers apart symmetrically from an imaginary centre line until the vocals get thin and start to sound a bit hollow.


You can then bring them closer together a touch (still staying even both sides) while listening for the most natural sounding vocals. Too close and it will sound congested and too centre focussed, too far and it will fall apart.

Control image focus

4)        Finally you do your toe-in. I always start with the back of the speakers parallel to the back wall to start with and they normally don't go far from this position to be honest. I know some people have them toed in at some really extreme angles but this has always sounded a bit unnatural from an imaging point of view particularly but this is probably just me and my speakers.

Working symmetrically as always, angle them both in tiny fractions at a time aiming to get the best focus you can. Really this part is personal preference in my opinion. Go for what sounds best. I will do an article later on setting up using LEDR test tones which are probably the best tool in fine tuning the focus. 

Troubleshooting

If you feel that the soundstage is mainly left of centre and everything else is mostly symmetrical, it may be that your left speaker is slightly closer to you than the right. Shift it back a bit and give it another listen. Quite small differences can, over time, lead to a nagging feeling that something is off.

It may also be that the layout of your room (especially beside and behind your speakers) is different for each speaker. Having it open to the outside of your right speaker but in a corner to the outside of the left will leave it sounding off.