Right, new stereo sound setup has been bought, your thoughts...

[peteruk]

Hey everyone,

For those who have been involved, I decided to create my first stereo setup from scratch using my PC. My first thread where I asked for recommendations and discussed the basic concepts of stereo can be found here .A big thank you to all who posted there, and also to my *3 for £1* copies of 'What HiFi Sound and Vision', which have also been very handy.
So, here is my final bill for everything I’ve got so far:

Mission M72 (nearly new) £51, postage £18, total £69
M-Audio 2496 Sound Card (nearly new) £44, postage £7, total £51
Sonic T 5006 Amp (new) £11.10, postage £14.90, total £26
Atacama Nexus 6 Speaker Stands (nearly new), £30, postage £15, total £45
2 x 2.5m QED Silver Anniversary XT with ‘screw-on’ terminations (nearly new) £20, postage £3, total £23
van den Hul The Name (new), £25, postage free, total £25

Total Spent: £239

Yep, as you can tell, I’ve probably over spent on some of the more trivial components, but I’d like to think this was more future investment than waste.

That said, comments on the selection more than welcome.

Anyway, shock over, as you’d expect, I’ve got a few questions after beginning to set it up.

I’ve assembled the speaker stands and placed the M72s on top, but have noticed that although the speakers have little pads underneath, the top plate is not large enough for the pads to be in contact. In other words, the pads fall outside the top plate’s area. As a result, the speakers have nothing between themselves and the top plate. Although I’m sure they’re not going to fall off in a hurry, due to the low-friction contact, they might ‘wobble’ (you can tell I’m not a pro ) in use, which I’m assuming will ruin the output. If this is the case, do I need to get something to go in between?

Secondly, soon as the parents saw the ‘huge’ spikes that came with the stands, it was a ‘no Peter, they are not going in the carpet’ situation . I’ve been told ‘isolating’ the speakers is rather important, so looks like I’m going to have to find some parent-friendly feet for the speakers. Now I did happen to bump into these (not competiting, so I trust this is allowed, apologies if not), but they’re rather pricey.

That’s all that comes to mind at the moment, your thoughts please.

Many thanks to all who post,
Peter

 

[peteruk]

Also, when I got the speakers they had foam 'blobs' in the rear base ports.

I take it this is for when you're standing them close to a wall, but I'm guessing it reduces the bass output, and it's better to take them out and move them away from the wall. Thing is though, how much difference does taking them out make?

 

[fish99]

The 'bungs' should be removed unless you're forced to use the speakers against a wall, much better to just have the bungs out and the speakers 30-40 cm from a wall (experiment to find the ideal positon). Of course if you're in a situation where your speakers have to be against a wall, it's best not to buy speakers with rear bass ports, but that goes without saying.

Blu-tac should secure the speakers on the stands. Try five small blobs. Best not to use too much, it gets very sticky after it's been in place a long time and could pull the vinyl veneer off. Stands with large top plates are quite rare these days.

As for spike shoes, they won't be ideal on carpet since the stands will wobble. They're actually designed to protect wooden floors from the spikes. If it's a downstairs room with a solid floor under the carpet, you should just use the spikes on their own, they do very little damage to carpet. They won't leave a visible hole (unless they carpet has no pile).

If it's an upstairs room with floorboards, the spikes can sink into the floorboards (especially if your stands are mass filled and the floorboard a bit soft). There isn't an ideal solution. Shoes under the carpet, shoes ontop of the carpet, some people use 2p pieces, under or above the carpet. It's even worse if your floorboards are a bit loose. If you figure anything out please let me know

 

[DRZ]

The spikes wont damage the carpet at all but they *need* to be there! You simply cant stop them moving any other way that isnt daft - a HUGE marble slab will probably suffice though That will do MORE damage to the pile though

Blu-tack should be used to stick the speakers to the stands

If you are on a space budget, use the foam bungs to reduce boom else remove them at once If you do need them in, be aware of how loud you are turning the volume up - once the foam bung has been sucked in its a real pain to get them out again

 

[peteruk]

OK, thanks for the advice, but there have been a few developments...

Several people have recommended putting 2 pence coins under the spikes for piece of mind. Drilling a lil dent in them makes this easier. Think I'll have to take this course of action, as I'm on the ground floor, and apparently there are asbestos tiles under the floor , so erm don't want to take any chances.

I would like to know why stopping the speaker from wobbling is so important though. I'm not being cinical or anything and believe you, but don't quite understand. Does minor shaking of the speaker prevent it from working properly? Or perhaps makes the resulting sound more directional? I had originally thought as long as the speaker doesn't fall off, no problem .

I have to confess, however, I have come across a really noobish problem I should have seen coming . My analouge interconnect, The Name, uses phono to phono connection; my Sonic T needs a 3.5mm jack input .

Arggh, what do I do? Would an adaptor lower the quality? Should I swap the cable for the right sort?

Your thoughts please.

 

[tom_nieto]

You want the driver to move the air in front of it rather than moving the cabinet on the stand. Not very technical I know, but surely anchoring the speakers would give you more peace of mind too.

I think an adaptor would degrade the signal quality further. 3.5mm jacks aren't that great anyway and if you have a soldering iron it might be worth fitting some phono plugs to the amp. Alternatively you could just get the right cable.

 

[peteruk]

Alternatively you could just get the right cable.

Lol, that really highlights my stupidity.

Thanks for your advice though.

EDIT: What would you recommend for a phono to 3.5mm interconnect that is on par with my 'The Name'?

EDIT 2: And out of interest, what makes you say 3.5mm isn't great anyway? Could you quantify please?

 

[Mercutio]

I would like to know why stopping the speaker from wobbling is so important though. I'm not being cinical or anything and believe you, but don't quite understand. Does minor shaking of the speaker prevent it from working properly? Or perhaps makes the resulting sound more directional? I had originally thought as long as the speaker doesn't fall off, no problem .

If the speaker is moving the parts inside it are moving too. The thing making all the sound is a cone on a magnet, rattles make it move and can badly distort the sound.

 

[DRZ]

If the speaker is moving the parts inside it are moving too. The thing making all the sound is a cone on a magnet, rattles make it move and can badly distort the sound.

Depends what you mean by "distort the sound". Distortion as in the typical definition of distortion ie square wave clipping then no, it isnt going to "distort" the sound. If you just mean unwaned signal alteration, then I will let you off, but not for the reasons you state

When the speaker cabinet moves, energy is lost from the system that is supposed to be producing the sound to the cabinet, which in turn radiates energy by moving in various ways. This is generally termed box colouration and is "bad". By making the cabinet as vibration/movement free as possible, you minimise this colouration.

Firmly affixing the loudspeaker to something "immovable" like the floor, you stop it from rocking back and forward. The most noticeable difference this will make is bass transient response tightness. Instead of moving the speaker cabinet backwards, the driver will move the air forwards - you have better, more punchy, more controlled bass. This is true for all frequencies but the energy per Hz at higher frequencies becomes too low to move the entire cabinet and then you are into the realms of cabinet resonances and other factors unaffected by loudspeaker isolation

 

[peteruk]

Right, now I'm continuing testing having not changed a great deal. At the moment, I'm using a reasonably basic phone to jack interconnect between my PC and Sonic T, and I'm only using basic speaker wire whilst testing.

I have, however, come across a problem. There seems to be little bass coming out of the speakers. Now I know the stands aren't mass filled or on spikes yet, and they have to be driven well to appreciate the bass but I'm still suprised. Maybe it's just me .

I had the idea of using the Audiophile's hardware equalisier to compensate, but I'm not actually sure it has one, but more to the point, apparently that is not the best thing to do, and I most probably have a problem somewhere.

Seemingly it could only be a problem with the Amp or the card. If it was the card, the only thing I could think of was that I'd installed the drivers wrong, but I followed the instructions carefully. If it's the Amp, then I'm not sure what I've done wrong there. I'm currently running it off a power unit without any batteries inside, but I doubt that would cause some as specific as low bass. Maybe one of the Sonic experts could help?

Your thoughts please.

 

[fish99]

These sort of stands need to be mass filled and they need to be on spikes. If you're not going to mass fill them or use the spikes, then you've wasted your money getting them.

My Monitor 3's on Atacama SE24 stands were awful until I got the stands three quarters sand filled - that really brought out the deep bass and stopped the sound resonating in the hollow stands. Then they got a good deal clearer when I bought the spikes for the stands.

Kiln-dried sand is dirt cheap btw, a few pounds for all you need. So to hear the difference and decide for yourself will cost next to nothing.

I've never heard any Mission speakers, but from what I've read they're supposed to have plenty of bass.

 

[Codmate]

Maybe you have wired the speakers up out of phase?
Make sure the + terminals on the amp are wired up to the + terminals on the speakers.

Also bear in mind that many systems you hear will have too much bass. We're kind of conditioned these days to expect vast amounts of artificial bass.
If everything is set up and working correctly it could just be a case of your ears getting used to it.