# Nearfield surround sound - help!



## symphonic1985 (Aug 18, 2009)

Because of space constraints in my apartment it makes the most since to have my projector set up in the unusually large entrance/lobby. The front door is on the top of an L, and the bottom right of the L is the corridor leading to the other rooms. The entrance area is about 2.5 m x 3 m, with the screen on the long part of the L. The neighbors are behind the screen. We lie down in the corridor, which is about 1.7 m wide.

At the moment we are using headphones (Audiotechnica AD700 for me and Pioneer something for my girlfriend) with Dolby Headphone. That's pretty nice but not ideal. Without the bass feeling in your body realism is lost a bit. And lying down with large headphones is not particularly comfortable. (Hard to cuddle too.)

I'm going to test headphones with a subwoofer to see if that helps a little bit, but I'd also like to add a near field speaker setup. I'd like to be able to hear things loud and clear without disturbing the neighbors at all. Plus with near field I don't need to worry so much about the dodgy room dimensions.

How close can I set my speakers and still get decent sound? I have some Magnat Monitor 100 bookshelf speakers. I am planning to put LCR at my feet (lying down) and then find a way to make the rears sound diffuse enough that they can be near to my head but not distracting. My g/f did not care last night that she had her headphones on with L/R switched the other night, so I can safely build the sweet spot just for me.

I then thought that I could take advantage of the corridor to do some sound treatment/absorption - like surround sound in a car. I am a little bit inspired by things like the surround sound egg chair.

I'd love to hear any advice that you guys can offer.


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## mechman (Feb 8, 2007)

I can't offer up any advice. :huh: But I hope you keep us updated on your progress. :T


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## symphonic1985 (Aug 18, 2009)

Thanks for the support mechman. The last week and half I have been on crutches and unable to do much, but I do have 4 channel sound in place at the moment. I'm going to test without a center channel at first.

Today I've been doing some experiments at my PC, using my headphones and speakers simultaneously. It really adds a lot of depth to the sound stage, depending on how loud you put the speakers. Combining the two seems like a decent option for neighbor friendly movie watching. The headphones can bring out more detail and help with the voices while speakers can add a little ambiance. 

I may try headphones plus a fairly centered speaker to see if this helps with the in-head feeling. Maybe headphones with one front and rear surround could work well. My experience is that your eyes pick up extra space in the sound field when the speakers are already quite low. I'm thinking is that the headphones could also be used subtly to center the sound stage in a near-field speaker setup, widening the sweet spot a little.

I'm going to buy some Koss KSC75s to experiment with this.


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