Hi-Fi and the search for the holy grail audio experience
Part 1 – The listening space
In our intro we talked about you! I hope you have reflected and asked yourself the right questions. Let’s not build a le-mans car for the easy Sunday drive with the family and kids, right? Now it’s about the listening space? Where do you listen to your music?
What kind of audio system do you desire? What should it sound like? What kind of music do you like? What kind of music is mostly played?
The listening space: The single most important parameter to work on is the listening area. Please make sure the audio system has the right value in the listening room. You can have the “best” speakers in the world, but if they are set up incorrectly, you will be surprised how miserable they can sound. Take time to align your speakers, give them space, take care that cables are correctly connected, make sure you have dampening through the right placement of carpets, curtains or acoustic panels. Test your room with the clap-test and see if it sounds like a church or more like under the blanket- this is what it should sound like. We can discuss this for days and a lot can be done in minutes. Start with the listening space and then build from there. Generally said, match the size of the listening room to your speakers. A bookshelf can easily and mostly better fill a small room than a 200lbs floor-standing speaker. If you need to move air, because the listening space is big, mostly a bigger speaker will be more satisfying. Whatever your listening space looks like, take time to place the speakers and the listening spot. With today’s microphones and digital equalizers, a lot can be corrected, but if the foundations are good, it is more than a good start. I could now post pictures of stereo triangles and the perfect pitch. However, this varies from speaker to speaker, room to room and personal taste.
Take time to invest in the listening space, try out the equipment in this listening space before you buy and enjoy.
The next blog post will be around your first Hifi investment. The speakers.
January 31, 2021, 9:49 am