monitors: horizonal vs vertical

[starber]

I see monitors used both horizontally and vertically. Preferences? Reasons?

 

[rfarris]

I see monitors used both horizontally and vertically. Preferences? Reasons?

It depends on the application. I have a Samsung 191T+ that swivels, and if I'm doing something document oriented I swivel it to the portrait mode.

On the other hand, if I'm editing with a wavefile editor, I change to landscape mode, which is the natural orientation for that task.

Having said that, I spend most of my time with my main monitor in portrait mode.

I suppose I should admit that I actually have a three-monitor setup. Portrait in the middle and landscape on each side.

-- Rick

 

[apl]

Are you talking about speakers or displays?

 

[starber]

oops, my fault!

I was refering to speakers in a control room environment.

 

[Harvey Gerst]

I was refering to speakers in a control room environment.

"Most" pro studios (but not "all" pro studios) place nearfield speakers on their sides, with the tweeters on the inside. Lotsa reasons why, but it gets technical.

 

[HangDawg]

"Most" pro studios (but not "all" pro studios) place nearfield speakers on their sides, with the tweeters on the inside.

Really? I thought that they were supposed to be upright but if they had to be on their sides, the tweeters were to go to the outside. Man was I wrong.

 

[vestast]

"Most" pro studios (but not "all" pro studios) place nearfield speakers on their sides, with the tweeters on the inside. Lotsa reasons why, but it gets technical.

Harvey - could you explain than more ? Everything I've read has said that the tweeters should be on the outside. I know enough about you to know that if your saying that then there might be a reason behind it..

Thanks

 

[Cyrokk]

I think it has to do with how the sound is dispersed from the speaker, which is in turned based on how the monitor is constructed by the manufacturer. The instructions that came with my Tannoys went into quite a bit of detail as to why this particular brand of speaker should stand vertically. I imagine the others have similar tailored instructions.

 

[LooneyTunez]

Unless a speaker is specifically designed for horizontal placement, then it should be vertically placed. Most two-way nearfield monitors are designed for vertical placement because the drivers are aligned vertically. Yamaha's old NS10's are a good example of speakers designed for horizontal placement, because the tweeter is offset from the woofer in the horizontal plane.

The somewhat technical reason for not placing a vertical speaker on it's side is because of comb filtering (peaks and dips in the frequency response) that will occur by having the sound of the woofer and tweeter crossing each other as it travels to your ears (For example, if the tweeter is on the outside, the sound of the tweeter will have to travel through the sound of the woofer on it way to your mixing position). If the two drivers are offet (Like the NS10's - tweeter above the woofer), this comb filtering is minimized.

Let's hope Barefoot (Thomas) can chime in, as his technical explaination will be much more - um - technical.

 

[Harvey Gerst]

When you have the nearfields vertical, the speaker usually has maximum horizontal dispersion. However in the nearfield, the width of the "sweet spot" is less of a concern, compared to imaging and detail. Putting the cabinets horizontal (with the tweeters inside) provides maximum detail without the woofer modulating the tweeter, but at the cost of decreased dispersion and increased reflections off the console and the ceiling.

Vertical placement requires positioning the speakers so that your ear is level with the space between the woofer and the tweeter, but often, you sit too low for that positioning. Horizontal placement allows you to rotate the speakers easily to achieve that positioning. Finally, vertical placement is simply too easy to knock over.

Bottom line: Is it an audible difference? Sometimes yes, but sometimes other problems will mask the differences. Try them in different positions and see if you hear a difference. If not, use them in whatever position you find the most esthetically pleasing.

We aligned our NS-10s with a low-powered laser pointer at the speaker position, aimed at the engineer's ears. Once they were positioned above the meter bridge, we cut the wood supports in such a way as to insure we'd always be able to get them re-aligned quickly, even if they got bumped.

Was the laser alignment stuff overkill? You bet your ass it was, but we had a lot of fun playing with the laser, and the studio cat really enjoyed the whole procedure.

 

[turnitdown]

Aren't studio cats great???? (Except for the shedding of course...)
I like mine so much, I bought a matched pair!!!!!

 

[vestast]

Some very cool info in this thread. My monitors came with instructions that said they could be used either vertical or horizontal, and to be honest I always thought they sounded better horizontal, but never left them that way because I was always worried that I would miss things in the mix. I might have to try a few experiments this weekend.

Thanks for all the info (even though I didn't start this thread !)

 

[darrin_h2000]

Im happy to see that Harvey uses NS10 monitors too...and all this talk about them being shit

 

[Harvey Gerst]

Im happy to see that Harvey uses NS10 monitors too...and all this talk about them being shit

They are shit, but they tell you a lot about what's going on in the midrange of the music, kinda like watching TV with a magnifying glass focused on one part of the screen; worthless for the big picture, but great for detail in one part of the screen.

 

[ds21]

Though the explanations above where not exactly correct, what matters is the environment and how they will sound in it. They might even sound good upside-down as the Mission studio monitors are designed.

 

[Harvey Gerst]

Though the explanations above were not exactly correct, what matters is the environment and how they will sound in it. They might even sound good upside-down as the Mission studio monitors are designed.

"were not exactly correct"? Where exactly did I screw up?


And yes, if the tweeters are too high in relation to your ears, inverting the speakers (putting the tweeters at the bottom) would be a possible solution. I think I covered this point when I said, "Vertical placement requires positioning the speakers so that your ear is level with the space between the woofer and the tweeter." Obviously, if the speakers are inverted, that might satisfy that requirement.

So what wasn't "exactly correct"?

 

[ds21]

The modulation I belive your refering to , is actually "time/phase alignment", and related is "lobing" just setting the speakers on their sides will not effect either depending on where it's measured form and what reflections there are, I guess to get the point across modulation is as good a term as any.The dispersion is actually the "power response" of a speaker, basically the same thing as the polar response of a microphone. So it's the relationship to it's surrounding and the listener, and not the orientation of the speaker that makes the difference.

 

[Harvey Gerst]

The modulation I belive your refering to , is actually "time/phase alignment", and related is "lobing" just setting the speakers on their sides will not effect either depending on where it's measured form and what reflections there are, I guess to get the point across modulation is as good a term as any.The dispersion is actually the "power response" of a speaker, basically the same thing as the polar response of a microphone. So it's the relationship to it's surrounding and the listener, and not the orientation of the speaker that makes the difference.

No, there's also a "modulation effect" when the weaker, limited dispersion treble response has to pass thru the wider dispersing, more powerful bass response to reach the listener's ears. "Power response" in speakers usually refers to the differences between the response at 1W@1m and the response at higher levels.

Polar response, (or "off-axis response") would be the correct terms, but dispersion is the most recognized description of the effect. There are also edge defractions and changes in response whenever the sound reaches any nearby surface or boundry that is not on the same plane as the speakers.

"Time/phase alignment" is different (and pretty much out of the end user's control), since you're talking about the actual distance from the voice coils to the end of the radiating surface to align the phase response at the crossover point of both drivers, which is a function of the manufacturer's choice (and positioning) of the active speaker elements. That was all covered in Ed Long's paper on time alignment, back in the 70's.

Your statement, "So it's the relationship to it's surrounding and the listener, and not the orientation of the speaker that makes the difference" is misleading (especially in the case of nearfields), since the orientation of the speakers can dramatically change the relationship of the loudspeakers to the listener, when the speakers are only a few feet away from the user.

As I said in my first post on this subject, " Lotsa reasons why, but it gets technical."

Respectfully,

 

[ds21]

"Power response" in speakers usually refers to the differences between the response at 1W@1m and the response at higher levels.

"The total energy radiated by a speaker in all directions is called its "Power Response". The Home THX Diffuse Surround Speaker is required to have a flat power response. This means that the total energy radiated by the speaker (in front, above, below, behind, and to the sides) must together average a flat frequency response. With the total speaker energy being flat, a listener anywhere within the surround speaker's null area will hear flat frequency response."

This is directly from the THX website. Just one of the first one's to come up.

(or "off-axis response") would be the correct terms, but dispersion is the most recognized description of the effect. There are also edge defractions and changes in response whenever the sound reaches any nearby surface or boundry that is not on the same plane as the speakers.

"Off-axis response" is different from "power response" and is a more common term in speakers design but not the same.

"Time/phase alignment" is different (and pretty much out of the end user's control), since you're talking about the actual distance from the voice coils to the end of the radiating surface

this is time-alignment, yes, but the acoustical center of a driver (which is what you want) you have to measure where it is, for instance, you can't just say it's center of the voicecoil. The end-user and the relative position from woofer and tweeter will have a direct effect on the time-alignment of the speaker, as you said it is the "actual distance" of the A.C. of the drivers that's why Theil speakers for instance have sloped baffles, if you aim your speakers so the tweeters are further away than the woofers then you can get closer to time-aligned, BUT I'M NOT SAYING TO DO THIS.

"align the phase response at the crossover point of both drivers, which is a function of the manufacturer's choice (and positioning) of the active speaker elements. That was all covered in Ed Long's paper on time alignment, back in the 70's.

A speaker can be time-aligned but not phase-aligned.

Lobing is very commonly talked about, do a search.

After toying and designing speakers (not as a Professional) for over 20 years, I've learned a few things, if you look things up and do research and find discrepancies in my terms let me know, I'm always willing to admit I'm wrong if shown the facts.

P.S. on one of the speakers design forums I frequent, they where just talking about the NS10 and saying that's the reason certain recordings sound so bad, you know all the things people say when they don't know the benefit of them, or when and what people use them for, I tried to let them know but they just didn't want to see.

 

[Harvey Gerst]

Apples and oranges. Apparently, "power response" (in the sense you are using it) is a new term to describe integrated response curves in the entire room and using eq's to compensate for various response anomolies. It seems to be a home theater term to describe the integration of speakers in a 5.1 surround sound system.

A nearfield speaker (by definition) should be close enough so that room responses are not considered, because the listener is close enough to the speaker to not have the first reflections unduly alter the sound. Unlike your definition of the THX power response effect, the room is taken out of the equation.

This is straying far from the original question. The simple solution for the original questioner is try it in different positions and see which position sounds best in his situation.