Monitor Speaker Position

[SouthSIDE Glen]

I'm sure Glen will spend at least another 3-4 posts trying to convince you that the improvement you *actually heard* is all in your mind...and that it doesn't make any difference what distance or angles you use

Oh,come on, miro, now you're just being ridiculous. Here's what GuitarLegend is saying, all of which both makes sense and agrees with what both you and I agree with:

When I changed the angle, that is, pointed the speakers inward, I heard one level of improvement. When I brought the farther speaker closer in I heard another level of improvement.

There's no controversy or disagreement that I can see there. He pointed his tweeters in towards him and made the speakers equidistant to his listening position, each of which improved the detail of his sound, which they both absolutely should. So far so good. And I am happy that he did improve his sound those ways, snot only for him personally which is the most important thing - but also because it just confirms and solidifies everything all of us have been saying all along.

Bit he still does not have an equilateral triangle. And he's off by a whole third, not just a degree or two.

And I still have not found, nor can figure out myself, any actual science or math or real-life test that explains WHY that 60° angle is any better than any other for creating a stereophonic image, or actually demonstrates that it's actually true. And I'm still waiting or you to supply it.

And I'll go so far as to bet that more than half of those out there who *think* they are set up at 60° are actually mostly at a wider angle than that most of the time, and don't even realize it.

I'm sitting in front of my home DAW with a tape measure right now, for example. My Mackies are not that wide apart; the distance from the inside edge of one speaker to the other is actually only 38 inches, a pretty typical spread. If I truly wanted to put 38" between the speakers and my head while working and sitting in a physically comfortable position, I have to lean back in my chair in a way where working on my control surfaces and DAW keyboard and such would be awkward and uncomfortable. But when I lean in to actually work, because that 38" is really such a small distance, that lean in put me a good 7"+ closer to each speaker.

That 7"+ changes the angle from 60° to almost 76°. Nowhere near the 95° I sight-estimated last night, and I apologize for that mistake. But still a whopping 26% difference from the alleged "ideal". And yet my ears don't care; I can still hear and manage the stereo space just fine when I lean in to create a more than one-quarter greater angle than the conventional faith believes is necessary.

EDIT: Oh wait, I was right last night after all...

That speaker-to-speaker measurement above was from speaker cabinet to speaker cabinet. If I actually measure from the center of each woofer or tweeter to the center of the other, the distance is 46" That changes the angle at my lean-in position to some 95.7°. A whole 60% difference. It turns out my eyeball estimate last night was almost right on. And If I were to sit 46" away from the speakers, I could barely reach the DAW keyboard.

And I will bet that what I have, pictured below, is not that different from most folks out there who have never had a problem with panning or sound either. I have upgraded much of the equipment since this picture was taken some 11 years ago or so, but the speakers, the desk and the positions of both of those remains the same to this day:

So when the difference between sitting back and leaning in, or from the speaker cab measurement to the center-of-speaker measurement can make a 60% difference n the actual physical angle and not make a difference to one's ability to work, I'd have to say that the real live evidence supports what the math says on paper, in that the 60° angle idea is arbitrary and meaningless.

EDIT2: And now that GL has confirmed that changing his angle from 80° to 60° has made no real difference (below), there is independent confirmation of that fact.

G.

 

[GuitarLegend]

I am happy with the improvement in perceived quality of sound that I am getting now. If I slide back into the ideal position I can't say that I can notice a heck of a lot of difference. It sounds good to me and as I have said before, I got along without this knowledge before. As far as I am concered, I am in front. And again, the discussion has been educational. There are things I will never do again, there are things I will always do in future. It has been useful to me, I hope it has been for others too.

This is a remix of a song I recorded recently with a 14yo femaile singer, untrained in singing and was the lead singer in a student band that I was mentoring. It has had tweaks based on advice from others on this forum but I like the sound with the new speaker position:

Sherry Dawe - Kiss Me

 

[miroslav]

And I still have not found, nor can figure out myself, any actual science or math or real-life test....

Well....ah....keep at it...and get back to us when you have verifiable equations of why it's not right...
...meanwhile the rest of the studio world has moved on with this a long time ago -
- equilateral triangle (60°+60°+60°), optimum side lenght about 5'-6', but relative to your console depth...and speakers toed in *about* 30° to taste.
Google it...it comes up a lot...'cuz it sounds better.

Hey man...I know it's a bad day for you...Bears ain't in the Super Bowl...and you've been snowed in for awile...

 

[SouthSIDE Glen]

I HAVE researched the subject. Not by seeing what other audio engineers, most of whom had either failed geometry and physics in high school, or completly forgotten wht they did pass, "say", but rather by looking at the science itslelf and the stereophonic theory as described by those that actually originally developed the idea.

I gave you the math and the real life listening experiments to prove the truth. My job is done. It's your job, if you have the chutzapah to accept the results, to come up with the opposite that supports your contention.

And "what everybody else says" is is not an answer, because it neither explains or demonstrates anything. It only says that you don't know the answer and can't explain why what you contend is actually true, only that you go with the public faith instead of the proven science. You get out of the recording studio and into the engineering labs, and a of a sudden the "everybody" turns into a minority.

G.

 

[Lt. Bob]

As always I'm gonna fail at staying out of an endless debate!


The thing is, I always go by my ears and I hear a discontinuity between the speakers when they get too far apart. Yes , Glen is absolutely correct as far as mixing goes and placing things in the soundfield. Everything is where it's supposed to be and you can mix and accurately place things regardless of how far apart the speakers are.

But I'm also an audiophile and for strictly listening purposes, you get speakers too far apart and they become separate soundsources that tend to draw attention to themselves instead of being a bit more seamless.
It's a pretty well established phenomena in the audiophile world and regardless of how over-the-top audiophools get over minor changes ..... the fact is, some of those guys have serious listening and perception abilities.
A friend in Baton Rouge is exasperating to listen to music with because he does all the extreme audiophile shit ..... constantly tweaking etc.. But the guy has amazing ears and so do very many of them.
It's a common mistake among pro-sound types to just totally discount anything that comes from audiophool-land ....... they shouldn't because there's some good info there and one of the things they obsess over is speaker placement. Moving things by a degree or a half an inch and such.

I used to try out all kinds of placements and speaker cords and such but now I find I truly don't really care anymore.
But I, personally, feel that there is an optimum placement for speakers and it can also vary depending on the speaker.
My Paradigms aren't too picky about placement ................ my monitors are.

No ........... I have no treatise supporting this ................. I don't care ....... I hear it ....... that's the end of the discussion for me.
And I surely could find one on audiophile sites if I cared enough to look ............ but I don't ............... sorry ......... I just don't.

 

[miroslav]

Glen, if you are expecting some AES White Paper to be offered up about the exact measurements and rules for pin-point placement of monitors...there ain't one, to the best of my knowledge.
That said...there is and has been for a VERY long time a tried-n-true, "best practices" or most "optimum" monitor setup configuration that has been adopted by a HUGE studio majority...not just haphazardly or by way of some passed around "myth"...but by actual trail.

What really kills me here and has me laughing my ass off is that you've been counter-arguing against that adopted "optimum" setup but have on more than one occasion stated that YOU would prefer something that is actually very close to the "myth" setup, rather than what you currently have in that studio you currently use, and the only reason you don't is because the room/gear layout doesn't allow it.
Also...(I've pointed this out before) on your own website, you follow and suggest that same 60°, equilateral triangle "myth", but then spend a lot of posts here demanding some "proof" why it has to be an equilateral triangle...???

On your website:
"In order to have an accurate stereo image from our monitors, we should set up our workstation so that the distance between our monitors L-R is the same as the distance from each monitor to the back of our head. In other words, an equilateral triangle with our monitors forming the base of the triangle parallel to the front wall and our head just inside the apex of the triangle."

Like I said earlier...you're chasing your own tail here and I think you're really trying to convince yourself more than anyone else.

There is an optimum (not 100% precise) setup...I stated right at the start of this thread that some personal taste comes into play...but this point you've taken (which actually argues against your own views and admittedly, desired setup), that NOTHING else really matters except that you sit equally between the two speakers....makes little sense, and if anyone needs to prove it mathematically, it's you.
You are the only person I have EVER heard say something like that in the last 30+ years of reading and talking about audio (long before the Internet).
Hey...maybe you're onto something, and maybe you can dispel the "myth" and turn around a lot of folks, but I doubt it.

Like I said...I tried a lot of monitor positions, and was able to hear for myself, and obviously you hear it too, which is why would prefer a different setup than what you are currently using...or didn't you say that...?

Anyway...I'm done with this tennis match...this is basically my setup, and one that is pretty much on target with what most studio types use/recommend, with minor adjustment for personal taste and room/gear considerations:

 

[SouthSIDE Glen]

The thing is, I always go by my ears and I hear a discontinuity between the speakers when they get too far apart. Yes , Glen is absolutely correct as far as mixing goes and placing things in the soundfield. Everything is where it's supposed to be and you can mix and accurately place things regardless of how far apart the speakers are.

Thank you. Now was that so hard?

But I'm also an audiophile and for strictly listening purposes, you get speakers too far apart and they become separate soundsources that tend to draw attention to themselves instead of being a bit more seamless.

Which, is also true. And is also completely irrelevant to the debate. The question at hand is, what is needed to accurately reproduce the stereophonic field, and is there some angle at which "holes" develop in that field?

The answer to the first question is, you need two ears in a line parallel to the line between two speakers, and those two speakers need to be equidistant from the listener They do not need to be the same distance from each other as they are from the listener, however.

And the answer to the second question is, no, there are no holes.

Yes, if you spread the speakers two wide, they do tend to draw more attention to themselves, because they are more obviously discrete sources. But that's both irrelevant to the above answers as it does not change them, and mostly irrelevant to the task of mixing. Whatever attention they may draw seems to disappear abut two seconds after one dives into the mix and starts listening as a mix engineer and not an audiophile.

If you want to listen in your living room for audiophiliac entertainment, that attention matters because it doesn't go away as easily. And I think that's where much of the bias comes in. But in the CR or at the editing desk, it's my experience that it just doesn't matter.

G.

 

[SouthSIDE Glen]

Glen, if you are expecting some AES White Paper to be offered up about the exact measurements and rules for pin-point placement of monitors...there ain't one, to the best of my knowledge.

And there ain't one because there's nothing to it. But there is plenty on how stereophonic playback actually works, and nowhere is there anything that actually even suggests that 60° has any preference over anything else.

That said...there is and has been for a VERY long time a tried-n-true, "best practices" or most "optimum" monitor setup configuration that has been adopted by a HUGE studio majority...

Again, that actually says nothing other than that's what's been adopted. Look, it's not like I'm saying that 60° is bad or won't work; it's perfectly fine. And very few have ever questioned that for that very reason. It works, and it's easy to remember, and easier to say than to have to explain that, well, 60 is nice, but it's not necessary to be exact (or even close).

It's no different than saying one should average their recordings at -18dBFS. That's a good, concise, description that almost always works just fine, but technically, it's really only a ballpark, and the exact answer can vary by quite a few dBs either way, and even then, one does not have to even have an exact answer. Its the same way with the idea of the equilateral triangle. Yeah it works, and it's not a bad ballpark to throw out without having to take a paragraph to explain, but it has no real meaning beyond that.

What really kills me here and has me laughing my ass off is that you've been counter-arguing against that adopted "optimum" setup but have on more than one occasion stated that YOU would prefer something that is actually very close to the "myth" setup, rather than what you currently have in that studio you currently use, and the only reason you don't is because the room/gear layout doesn't allow it.

And what kills me is no matter how many times I explain that apparent discrepency as not really being one, you just ignore the explanations and keep going back toyour original charge in a cheap college debating team tactic.

Also...(I've pointed this out before) on your own website, you follow and suggest that same 60°, equilateral triangle "myth"

Like I said earlier...you're chasing your own tail here and I think you're really trying to convince yourself more than anyone else.

Nope, I'm not trying to prove anything to myslef, I know the answer, and have known it for longer than you've even been aware of the question.

You're right, I am probably badly perpetuating the myth with what I say on my website. I made the same over-simplification mistake that everyone else makes by keeping it simple to the point of inaccuracy. I will change that, because I am wrong to leave the suggestion that it is "best" to have a 60° angle, because it isn't. Thank you for driving that point home for me; I will change it in the next couple of days.

but this point you've taken (which actually argues against your own views and admittedly, desired setup), that NOTHING else really matters except that you sit equally between the two speakers....makes little sense, and if anyone needs to prove it mathematically, it's you.

Because that's the absolute truth. All one needs is to be able to trust that the speaker placement isn't giving one side or the other a sonic "advantage" by having one speaker closer to the listener than the other, as that will shift the balance to one side or another. That's all there is to it. Whether the speakers are 50 or 60 or 70 or 80 or 90 or 100° apart has absolutely ZERO effect on that balance. Send 3V of signal to the left channel and 3V to the right channel, and your ears (assuming both channels and both ears are working equally efficiently) , and the phychoacoustic effect is that we hear the sound coming from a point exactly halfway between the speakers. The angle of spread is nowhere even to be found in that equation.

Hey...maybe you're onto something, and maybe you can dispel the "myth" and turn around a lot of folks, but I doubt it.

Oh for christ's sake, I'm not "on to" anything. This is old hat to those who actually understand how the real world actually works. Just because you've never actually covered this subject with anybody who actually knows and understands the answer from first principles themselves until today doesn't mean that there aren't hundreds of thousands of them out there. It's not that I'm "calling it" a myth, it's not my personal belief. It IS a myth, because it is different from the real, log-ago proven scientific truth, and there's a whole lot more than I who know that.

Like I said...I tried a lot of monitor positions, and was able to hear for myself, and obviously you hear it too, which is why would prefer a different setup than what you are currently using...or didn't you say that...?

What I said, and you can go back and look it up, is that that preference was and is a bias that turned out not to be reflected in reality.

You keep ignoring the numbers and the real physical evidence and falling back on semantics; you're just trying to score debating points instead of actually debating the actual ideas behind the words. How can one explain why I said 60° on my website, but measured 95° on my home system? Because I was wrong on my website and wrong in my bias. Words do not trump reality. The reality is my speakers are actually much wider than I thought they were - and I say there's a good chance that yours are too when you're actually buried in the mix - and that extra width makes no audible difference to me when it comes to my ability to mix and comfort in mixing. This has been reinforced many times over by the real-life observations of four other experienced musicians and engineers at Product Recording in a setup alos pictured that obviously does not even come close to the equilateral rule, and finally by guitarlegend's own multiple tests and observations here.

But IMHO...the BEST, most absolutely perfect stereo monitoring position would be this:

I dare anyone to argue that it wouldn't be!

I'll take that argument (oh, don't be so surprised ). I think that's lousy placement. I'ddtake those phones and put them on my head. Not only would that give me an unobstructed view, but it would also help me not hear what she has to say about it .

G.

 

[Sky Blue Lou]

I think that's lousy placement. I'd take those phones and put them on my head. Not only would that give me an unobstructed view, but it would also help me not hear what she has to say about it .

Sorry, miro. Glen wins that one hands down, er up. Whatever.


lou

 

[SouthSIDE Glen]

LOL. My hands out, Her's down, I would think

G.

 

[NYMorningstar]

What really kills me here and has me laughing my ass off is that you've been counter-arguing against that adopted "optimum" setup but have on more than one occasion stated that YOU would prefer something that is actually very close to the "myth" setup, rather than what you currently have in that studio you currently use, and the only reason you don't is because the room/gear layout doesn't allow it.

Thanks for sittin in for me while I was away Miro, lol. It's gotta suck to have to mix in a little room but that's where near fields have their advantage. Personally, if I'm going to be that close to a speaker I might as well use headphones .
Your optimum setup makes alot of sense because you want to be in the direct field of the system when making panning decisions and the 60 degree angle tends to decrease the strength of wall reflections. Setting back aways also allows for the bass waves to develop before you hear them. As always treating the walls with sound absorbant material is needed for the spillage to minimize the reverberant field. Folks too have to be careful of thinking that moving speakers closer to you sounds better because it may simply mean it is louder.
Wherever you choose to have you monitors it's important that you compare your decisions on other systems and adjust as needed.

 

[miroslav]

This is old hat to those who actually understand how the real world actually works. Just because you've never actually covered this subject with anybody who actually knows and understands the answer from first principles themselves until today doesn't mean that there aren't hundreds of thousands of them out there. It's not that I'm "calling it" a myth, it's not my personal belief. It IS a myth, because it is different from the real, log-ago proven scientific truth, and there's a whole lot more than I who know that.What I said, and you can go back and look it up, is that that preference was and is a bias that turned out not to be reflected in reality.

Sorry...got sidetracked with some ice removal the last few hours...

I'm not looking to continue the debate about what I think is *optimum* (key word) monitor placement VS what you think it is, though honestly, in all this discussion, I don't think I once heard you give your *optimum* placement suggestion, other than what's on your website...which now you say you will remove/change.
How about it?

However, I would like to address the statement you made above by saying that very often, you seem to take the position that most of us here get our audio info from elves in the forest, while you have access to the real audio reference library...or some such attitude.

Glen...I've been reading the same shit you have (what else has there been) long before the Internet...and with the Internet, we both have access again to the same info - good or bad.
So like, get off this high horse where only YOU got your finger on the pulse, and the rest of us are just wingin' it, to include all those pros who according to you have been just buying into some bias/myth.

Look…I’ll give you a nod for a lot of technical stuff, as I tend to focus on that only up to a point, and the rest of my attention is more on music creation/production…
…but don’t take the position that you always know shit no one else knows…it just doesn’t fly.

I know I can name a lot of pro designer/engineer sources that generally follow the *optimum* monitor layout I described (heck, that’s where I got it)....but since you scoff at all that, how about YOU provide just 3-4 top studio designers and engineers that pretty much say the same thing you do.
It's not just about following the pack..but man, if you're going to go off on your own direction and claim that there are "hundreds of thousands of them out there" who know what you know...if you want me (and others) to buy in…gimme just a few, don't tease.

 

[miroslav]

No one can deny that if you increased the distance between them...the center of the image would collapse.

 

[GuitarLegend]

Well I can say that I am not getting conflicting information from you guys - I like ALL these headphones

 

[miroslav]

....though honestly, in all this discussion, I don't think I once heard you give your *optimum* placement suggestion....
How about it?


......


....but man, if you're going to go off on your own direction and claim that there are "hundreds of thousands of them out there" who know what you know...if you want me (and others) to buy in…gimme just a few, don't tease.

Hmmmmm....
OK....I guess not.
We'll just take it on "faith".

 

[SouthSIDE Glen]

As usual,we're arguing not because we disagree, but because we're talking about two different things. I'm trying to argue the requirements for stereophonic imaging and nix the idea that there is something special about the 60° placement, and that when you go wither it creates "holes" in the image. Both of those are contentions are untrue, period, no matter how many people you claim will say otherwise, and I have provided you not only the mat, but three real-live situations involving six different people that bear that out.

And as far as one's allegedly chasing their tail, you have also ostensibly contradicted yourself about the 60° thing on a couple of occasions, where you said that there is a matter of taste involved that can change that, and that there is a lot of movement in the listener's position which, as I have demonstrated mathematically, can actually in a typical setup, change a "perfect" 60° angle by as much as one-quarter to one-third without a loss in stereo image.

With all that, I have repeatedly asked you to explain just WHY the 60° angle is supposedly a magic angle for providing the perfect stereo image, and why that image fails, and you have not even *tried* yet to answer that question. I suspect that you haven't even tried thinking about it yourself yet; as evidenced by the answer "because that's what someone else says". That not an answer, that's ducking the question.

So I would ask again;

Why do the two speakers used to create a stereophonic image have to be the same distance from each other as they are from the listener or put another way, why does the angle of incidence have to be 60° for stereophony to work without "holes"?

What causes those alleged "holes" to appear, when you do move off of 60°

How far off of 60° must one go for the stereeophonic image to fail? I think we both agree that an image of 59° or 61° doesn't really matter. So, just how much of a margin of error is there really? And why?

You, OTOH have taken the position of trying to argue not what is required for stereophony, but what is an "optimal listening position", which is a much larger and different question. But even there, I challenge you to tell us why an equilateral triangle is "optimum", and why, say just for example. a 70° angle is not.

And again, I don't what to hear what your - or especially someone eles's - opinion is, I want the science behind what the triangle has to be equal on all three sides, and not just two.

You asked for my answer on what is "optimum"? I've given most of that answer in this thread already in so many words, but here's how I'd explain it directly:

- First, position the speakers at a distance from your listening position so that when you send an equal signal to both speakers (mono center pan), you actually hear the image where you expect the center of the image to be.*

- Second, within the constraints of the first, spread the speakers in a width to your personal listening tastes, while keeping the away from both the back and side walls , and the corners of both, as much as possible. A 60° spread is often cited as an optimum position, but the reality is that anywhere from 50-100° can not only work fine for most folks, but often will wind up being the actual working angle because of natural changes in the actual position of the listener's head.

Less than about 50° can work, but the stereo image can get so contracted (or "smooshed together", in the technical parlance ) as to make discerning small changes in stereo panning harder to resolve.

Greater than about 100° can also technically work, but many find that when the stereo image get too spread out, that it starts to sound a bit more "unnatural" (for lack of a better term), and therefore a bit outside of their comfort zone.

*Assuming both loudspeakers are matched in efficiency, and both ears are matched in sensitivity, this mean each speaker is equidistant from the center of the listener's head.

Now, I and others can be forced by sticklers for semantics to have to type or paste all that out every time, or we can just (over)simplify it by saying, "set up an equilateral triangle", which particularly works in today's ADHD, pocket phone-sized screen, keep things short world.

The second option is often used - including, admittedly, by me, but then falls prey to that other phenomenon of the spread of knowledge through the lengthy chain of the public echo chamber, rather than by first-person learning from first principle: the morphing of over-simplification into technical fact. Before you know it, not only is the simplified equilateral triangle explanation worded as setting up a 60° angle (because, that is, after all, what an equilateral triangle uses), but that 60° angle is taken as a scientific preference or necessity, which it never was.

60° works nicely in most situations - there's nothing wrong with that value or even with using that as a recommendation for something that works. What is wrong - or mythical, as I prefer to call it - however, is the morphing of that recommendation as one that works into one that's optimal - let alone one that's required. It's neither necessarily optimal or required. It's just an easy simplification recommendation that's easy to both say, explain and remember.

G.

 

[Harvey Gerst]

I couldn't believe the improvement in sound quality when I made the small change of pointing my monitor speakers (DB Technologies L160) towards me. They were in the right place, the right location but neatly parallel to the back wall.

While reading a manual on another speaker brand, the Adam A8X, they strongly recommended pointing the speakers toward the listener in an equilateral triangle configuration. I already had that configuration but I simply turned the speakers in. Amazing difference. I just never knew...

Tweeters are very directional. As the frequency goes up, the dispersion decreases. By toeing them in to where they're pointed at you, you finally heard a flatter response and more high end - it's that simple. If you toe in any speaker so that the tweeter is more or less pointed at you, you'll get more accurate sound. Duh !

Now the reason for the 60 degree angle and the "near field principle" is also pretty simple. Near field speakers are designed to provide a more accurate picture in the near field (i.e., pretty close, usually less than 6' from you). At close distances, the sound from the speakers reaches you first, before the reflections off the walls. This is a good thing and it allows you to make more accurate adjustments to the overall mix. Sitting dead center between the two speakers puts that "phantom center" exactly in the middle. That's why the "equilateral triangle" is most often suggested as the easiest way to set up the near field speakers.

Larger speaker, or speakers that are further away, will interact more with the room reflections. Unless the room is well setup, this can give you an unrealistic picture of your mix and you end up chasing your tail, compensating for room influence, rather than hearing the mix accurately.

While ignoring the equilateral triangle ain't a big deal (as long as the speakers are kinda aimed at you), too large an angle might cause some problems with the high end of your mix in the center, IF the speakers are really far apart. It's caused by high frequencies not traveling very well over longer distances. Again, no biggie, but if your mixes sound a little too bright on other systems, that could be the cause. Solution: turn up the high end on your speakers a bit.

 

[miroslav]

As usual, we're arguing not because we disagree, but because we're talking about two different things.

Well that may be so…and could explain the difficulty we are having coming to some “agreement”. I really have no idea what you're trying to argue about..who the "six" people are that agree with you...or where the "math" is that supports whatever argument you're making. I have been and continue to talk ONLY about:
M-O-N-I-T-O-R
S-P-E-A-K-E-R
P-O-S-T-I-O-N
...as in, what the title of this thread is about.

I see Harvey Gerst chimed in, and while he too doesn’t provide a mathematical/physics treatise… …he does say it as plain as can be...and I know that Harvey knows MUCH more than I do!!!
If you need me to provide more "names" AFA who follows the same way of thinking as I do, I'll be happy to (it's a few quick Google searches) but I think you will contend that MANY folks in the pro studio world use the equilateral/60° setup for nearfield monitors...which is how I came to it.
You mentioned "thousands"...so name a few pro studio types that pay no attention to their speaker position other than to sit equally between them....???

Now...just to clarify, since you seem to be stuck on the 60° thing.
There are two angle considerations...
1.) The three angles of the triangle, which have to be 60° each IF you are going to use an equilateral triangle to PLACE your two monitors and your seating position.
2.) The angle for the toe-in/out of the speakers at the apex of the two points of the equilateral/60° triangle. There can be a few degrees adjustment to the toe-in/out as per personal taste and to aim the speakers in front of you, at you, or right behind you.

Here's three images that show these options:

Those are the *optimum* placement choices.
The distance of 67.5" was not my own, but something I got from Carl Tatz Design (http://www.carltatzdesign.com/) ...he was/is adamant about the 67.5" sides, with exactly 30° toe-in of the monitors, which places them right ON the same lines as the equilateral triangle...or if you measure their angle from "inside", they are also at 60° angles (60° + 30° = 90°)
...but as it turned out, after a few different setup tryouts, I ended up with 60.0" sides, BUT I used the third image setup --- I toe-out the speakers by a few degrees...so they end up firing at the same spot as if I had used 67.5".
I ended up with this purely from lots of trial error, moving things by a few inches and a few degrees, and using my ears.

Anyway...these optimum positions provide the best image --- Left/Center/Right & Front/Back. I don't need math to prove that...simply try it and hear for yourself. I have, and obviously many others have, which is why the equilateral triangle setup has become the tried-n-true choice for nearfield monitor positioning.

Can you still "hear" stereo with some whacky w---i---d---e spread and very hard toe-in…?
Sure...stereo just needs two sources, basically…but that's not going to give you the best image from the monitors.
Also....the further apart you go and further in you sit in-between the monitors...you totally fuck up your listening sweet spot. One little move in any direction, and your image falls apart a lot easier/faster....
…which is another reason the equilateral triangle setup just.............works.

*************************************************************

Now....on another note of interest, since we talked about him a few months back...

I just found out that Roger Nichols is very ill, with 4th stage pancreatic cancer, and has been fighting it the last year...and apparently his funds/insurance is drying up, and he is looking for $$ donations.
Not to sound cold about it...but I think for a 7-time Grammy winner and all those albums he did for Steely Dan/Fagen and for others…albums that made the record companies and artists LOTS of $$$$$...it's sad that they are not covering his medical tab without question.
Maybe some of them are helping, I don't really know...I'm just saying they should pick up the whole tab and not have Roger asking for donations....

Here's the website/info:

Roger Nichols CD mastering & Master Class

 

[GuitarLegend]

At the end of the day, the listener is probably not going to have the *ideal* setup in their car, they are not going to be equidistant from their speakers although they will have access to their fader and balance controls. Is the positioning of the speakers in the studio going to affect the way the end listener hears the recording in whatever listening environment they know and love?

I may be just getting into this, if 80+ recordings can be said to be "just getting into it" but I was able to do it without ever coming up against an argument for optimum speaker placement. I did say they sounded better when I toed them in and they sounded better again when I ran out and bought a stand to facilitate the placement of a speaker that was a touch more distant than this discussion had suggested. But I am sure they would also "sound better" if I bought $3000 of monitor speakers instead of the $600 set I currently own. Does the fact that I don't have a $3000 monitor speaker system completely destroy the quality of the recording any more than having the speakers 7' apart as opposed to 6' apart?

But then my audience has never been a highly critical group of audio engineering wizards. Don't get me wrong, I value your opinions highly and hope to gain at least some of the knowledge you have aquired over the years. I was just thinking that no matter how perfectly you set up your own personal listening environment, you have no control over the end listener's setup.

And I am willing to be educated on that point...

 

[miroslav]

It's NOT important how the audience chooses to listen. People try chasing after that ghost, and never catch it.
There are TOO MANY variables with the audience.

As the mixer/engineer...it IS important how YOU listen. If you have an optimum setup, it means your mix will be heard properly by you as you mix it. What happens after you are done mixing it...no one can control that.
And yes...the more you "up the ante" with your gear and your room...the more improvement you will make, otherwise, if it made NO difference, there would not be multi-million dollar studios and everyone would just work on cheap computer speakers in their makeshift basement studios, next door to the laundry room.