Modern home appliances and electronics equipment come in so many different forms that it can be incredibly easy to get lost in all the variety.  When it comes to putting together a first rate home theater and stereo system there’s no exception: a million and one different models and brands clutter the market, and buyers are left scratching their heads for a good long while before making what is in most cases a fairly arbitrary and random decision as to what to buy (well, some people surely do their research and make more informed decisions, but they are by no means the majority).  What a lot of such buyers don’t have in mind when they go ahead and buy the various hardware components that will make up their theater and audio systems is that they will need quality furniture to make everything function properly: to house their equipment neatly on the one hand and, more importantly, to ensure that the audio quality emitted by the equipment is no less than optimum.

Considering the fact that the average home stereo system today forms part of a broader home theater system that includes a lot of different gear, such furniture needs to be spacious and have the ability of adding on new extensions to accommodate future purchases.  Hence, keep an eye out for models that have the capacity to expand, with apertures that will serve for adding new shelf space and which can stack up and out.  This will mean being able to accommodate a variety of different items with varying heights inside, so if you change a given audio console out for another after a new purchase you won’t have to go and buy a new furniture item to house it.

For the housing of your main audio consoles, such as the pre amp, the audio sources, radio equipment, tuners, and so on, you will want a modern high performance audio rack (also known as a Hi Fi rack).  This is the item described above, which should ideally be able to be expanded and modified in a variety of ways.  In addition to this particular feature (definitely a priority), you will want to make sure that the rack is nice and sturdy—important not only because the equipment inside can be quite heavy, but furthermore because there should be minimal to zero possibility for the audio vibrations to affect the equipment’s functioning.  This idea is really taken to the extreme in some models of Hi Fi racks where each shelf is rendered completely independent of the rest through ball bearings and the inclusion of some variety of synthetic, high density material such as polyurethane at the contact points that further eliminates vibration interference.  These features collectively deaden and dampen vibrations, and they are absolutely fundamental to the proper functioning of your main audio hardware.

As the TV is the natural and necessary complement to any audio system, you will want to consider furniture for it as well.  Of course, if your TV is mounted on the wall there isn’t much to discuss here, and the audio racks mentioned above can neatly be tucked beneath such a wall-mount arrangement to create a tidy entertainment section of the home.  However, for those that don’t go the wall-mount path may want to look into investing in a TV stand that will furthermore likely be able to house some if not all of your audio equipment (depending on the size of the stand and the amount of equipment you have, of course).  There is a model of stand to meet whatever needs you may have and whatever model TV you may have: there are models that are nice and wide to accommodate big screens yet that don’t protrude far from the wall to match the dimensions of a flat screen set: then there are other models that are more apt for use with a normal tube TV.  The amount of shelves beneath varies greatly, with some offering enough space for all the other audio consoles as mentioned.  If this is the option you choose, you will again want to make sure that the shelves are very strong and resistant; this is especially true if your TV has built in speakers that will be used, as the vibrations emanating from the speakers will have the ability of providing vibration interference as mentioned above.

One of the easier and more affordable ways to improve the audio performance of your home system was discovered back in the ‘80s—simply elevating the speakers off the ground, that is.  This again implies the necessity of appropriate furniture in the form of speaker stands.  Such stands come in a variety of models and prices, and the best (also the more costly) are incredibly sturdy, again to eliminate vibration related problems that detract from audio quality.  The preferred materials for such stands are either steel or thick glass though a few other varieties may be found, some in plastics.  In addition to the strength of the stand shaft itself, the two crucial points to be optimized are at the top and bottom, where contact with the speaker itself and the floor occurs, respectively.  Good stands will come with appropriate rubber pads or similar isolation measures, however there are many accessories to be bought that can help you improve these problem areas on your speakers stands.

For example, there are accessories known as floor spikes that help deaden any vibrations being passed on from the speaker stand, and these floor spikes will differ depending on the kind of flooring you have installed in your home—carpeting will require a different kind than wood or laminate floors, so be sure you get your hands on the right item. 

Another very interesting product is high density filler for your speaker stands.  This is a generally synthetic product which you apply to your stands to load on mass, giving the stand more weight and reducing the chance of vibration issues, available in a variety of colors. 

Watching movies at home has become very popular over the last decade, especially now that people have the ability to setup some very sophisticated home theaters. It doesn’t make much sense to go to the cinema and sit for two hours in an uncomfortable seat with dozens of other people, when you can enjoy the movie in your home in great comfort.

To have a theater experience in your own home is simply a matter of a home movie theater system. Here are a few tips to help you create your own cinema movie experience right in your own home.

• The first step in setting up your home cinema will be to choose an appropriately sized room. The room will have to be large enough to accommodate the size of TV you have, and your seating.
• You will then need to setup the basics for your home theater. The basic components of your theater system will be speakers, a TV or projector, plus a DVD player and a multi-channel amplifier. You will also need cables to hook your components together.
• The next step will be to place your TV in the appropriate place; the dimensions of the room will determine where you will set your television. It should be set up on a TV stand where it will set at eye level while you are seated. You will also need to ensure that it is far enough away from the room’s seating for comfortable viewing. A general rule is that the seating should be about five times the length of the screen from the TV.
• Once you have setup your TV you will next place your speakers. You will place the front speakers first. These speakers should be placed to where they are pointed toward the viewing area. You will also have a center speaker; this should be placed close to the TV screen. The rear speakers to your home theater system will have to be placed at the back of the room, or behind the viewing area. This speaker setup will bring the best stereo sound to your home theater setup.
• The furniture you use in your home cinema should be comfortable and fit nicely in the room. You can use sofas, love seats, and recliners. There is also special furniture for home theater seating if you would like to invest in this type of furniture.
• The lighting in your home cinema is also important. You will want indirect lighting in the room. For this reason you will want to install dim lighting on the walls as apposed to having lighting coming from the ceiling. If the room is too bright, or the lighting is coming from above, this can diminish the viewing quality.
• Decorating your home cinema is a matter of personal taste. Some people prefer that it resemble a normal living room while others like their home theater to resemble an actual cinema.

With some effort and the right equipment, you can create a fantastic home cinema that will actually be more enjoyable than going out to a theatre to watch movies.

Before it is really possible to understand how speakers work, it is first necessary to understand how sound works.

How Sound Works

Humans are able to pick up sound due to a very thin piece of tissue in their ear that is commonly known as the eardrum. When the sound waves reach the eardrum, it vibrates and sends signals to the brain, from there the brain can then interpret the vibration as sound.

Although sound vibrations can travel through liquid and solid objects, it most often travels through air, which is how people experience sound from speakers. The way this works is that the sound waves vibrate air particles; at this point the air particles move particle disturbance through the air. The vibrating air particles send a fluctuating wave of pressure through the atmosphere until it reaches your eardrum. As the eardrum vibrates, it sends the sound signals to your brain.

How Speakers Work

When sound is recorded with a microphone or other recording device, is works much like the eardrum; it picks up the sound vibrations and converts them into electrical signals, and then either records it as data, or sends it to the speaker.

When electrical signals are sent to a speaker, what is happening is that the speaker is converting those electrical signals back into physical vibrations that will create sound waves. If the system is working correctly, the sound that comes out of the speakers will be nearly identical to the sound that went into the microphone or recording.

The speaker translates the electrical signal when it rapidly vibrates a flexible cone, and a signal is sent through the voice coil. To amplify the sound, it is constantly fluctuating the electrical current between a positive and negative charge. This moves the voice coil back and forth, which then vibrates the cone to recreate the sound waves that reach your ears.

Because the different speakers create difference sound frequencies, to recreate high quality sound it is necessary to have different types of speakers; this is why you will find that most good speakers have a woofer and a tweeter, all within the same compartment.

When looking for high quality speakers, it is important to pay attention to the design of the speaker enclosure. The design of the speaker enclosure will influence the final output; you will want an enclosure that provides good quality sound reproduction.

The most popular is the sealed enclosure, which is completely sealed and forces the sound out from the speakers into the room. The disadvantage of the sealed speaker enclosure is that it is not as efficient as some of the other designs, and requires a boost in the electrical signal to produce good sound, as there is no method of equalizing the air pressure.

Other speaker enclosures, such as the bass reflex enclosure, or the passive radiator enclosure are designed to overcome the air pressure by redirecting it out of a small port that is built into the speaker.

At Atacama, we take the idea of ‘audio geek’ up a notch. For a stack of information on audiovisual technology, home cinema equipment, TV racks & speaker stands, please feel free to visit our website.

When it comes to setting up electronics equipment, there is a certain art to the procedure that people in the know can practice with differing results, and there is a science as well that is necessary (and not easy, for some people) to understand in order to accomplish good results.  Knowing how to set up audio equipment is a good example: it is very common for people to buy speaker systems, take them home, and then have absolutely no clue how to properly arrange the speakers, connect them, and configure the most remotely complex audio system—no matter how many times over they read the manual.  Between understanding what the difference between a subwoofer and a tweeter is and comprehending what causes sound interference and what a crossover is, there is a lot to learn for the average person looking to properly configure their home speaker system.

There are a few things that need to be understood about speaker equipment for someone to be able to have the foggiest clue of where to put things and what is necessary.  First of all, if what you’re looking for is truly high fidelity sound with plenty of amplification capacity, you need to go with a 4-way system—and what does that mean?  Sound travels in waves, and in order to reproduce certain bands of frequencies (high, middle, and low) in high fidelity a speaker needs different drivers to do so, each driver specializing in reproducing a certain band of frequency levels.  Hence, a subwoofer is responsible for reproducing very low frequencies, a woofer low frequencies, a mid-range speaker middle frequencies, a tweeter high frequencies, and a supertweeter for extremely high frequencies.  Subwoofers have the largest dimensions (specifically the biggest diameter), and a supertweeter would have the smallest dimensions.  When a cabinet contains two such drivers, it is referred to as a 2-way speaker system.

It is possible to buy a cabinet (structure housing one or several drivers) that houses many if not all of these drivers, or it is possible for each of them to be stand alone units.  Having these different drivers spaced correctly from each other, and creating a rich sound environment in a room is basically the most important aspect of properly setting up a speaker system.  To make sure that your speakers are being used in the most ideal fashion, you need to have a crossover system in place, which is a device that divides the audio input into different frequency bands (which, as we will see, can be exactly configured in certain crossover systems) and routes each of these bands to the driver that is most ideally suited to reproduce that range of frequencies.  Any speaker system using more than one driver has a crossover, though these are usually passive crossovers, which do not require an additional power source and are relatively built-in to the units.  More complicated systems use active crossovers, which do require an external power source and are a often a separate unit: these active crossovers can achieve higher amplitudes (which can break certain drivers of inadequate size or poor construction materials), can be more precisely configured, and separate the audio input into separate frequency bands before amplification, not after as passive crossovers do.  Having an active crossover will allow you to be able to fine tune your system a lot more than a system with a passive crossover, though of course not using an active crossover properly would be worse than simply listening through a passive one…so be careful of what you choose, and be honest with yourself about how much you really are able to do!

Now comes the important part—knowing where to position things.  It is incredible how much frequency interference there can be inside a room, and the best way to avoid this is by having each speaker (or rather, each driver) positioned properly.  First, a few definitions: in the room you will be setting the speakers system up in, the back wall will be the term used for the wall behind the speakers, and the side walls obviously the ones to the left and right of you as you sit there listening.  The optimal set up will inevitably require a significant amount (aka time) of tweaking with the arrangements, the spacing and all, but will be achieved if you are patient enough.  To begin to have an idea of the relation the speakers should have with you in the listening position, imagine yourself and the two spots where you will put your main cabinets (ideally containing a 3- or 4-way speaker system) as the three points of an equilateral triangle.  Make the distance of one side of that imaginary triangle equal roughly six to eight feet.  Now, make sure that the speaker cabinets are positioned at equal distances from their nearest side wall, which is to say that when you look forward at your speakers playing in your direction, the space to the right of the speaker on the right is the same length as the space to the left of the left speaker.  Try to vary the distance between each main speaker cabinet and the back wall, with one of them two feet from the back wall and the other three or four feet from the back wall.  Angle the speakers slightly inwards (i.e. facing slightly in towards each other, not away from each other), more or less pointing at the center point of the room (or wherever it is that your most common listening position will be, like a couch, for example).  Maintaining these general guidelines, fidget with the precise values, changing them a bit every few days and comparing the listening experience between the different orientations.

Generally, try to make sure that tweeters are positioned higher up on shelves or mounted to the wall, and keep subwoofers and woofers lower down to the ground.  Nonetheless, try to keep cabinets elevated to roughly the height you will be in when listening to your system, with tweeters (assuming they are independent units, which they may not be) slightly above the height of your head.  A great way to ensure optimal set up is to invest in some high quality speaker stands.

The knowledge involved in properly setting up any of the many different home electronics components is not something that everybody possesses. In fact, most of us need to have a pro (or more savvy elder sibling, or what have you) install our video and audio systems, so as to avoid the frustration that inevitably follows a failed attempt on our own behalf (something which usually takes many more hours than it should). One aspect of a good home entertainment system that many people don’t have the foggiest clue about would have to be the speakers system: where to arrange them, what kinds of stands to use, etc.

Speaker stands are nothing more than physical props upon which to rest a speaker, with the intention of improving the audio dynamics in a given room—that is to say, to reduce destructive interference, achieve better sound depth, balance, and clarity. Speaker stands weren’t always a common item in home entertainment systems or even as part of the stage set up for major musical acts. It wasn’t till roughly the 1980s that musicians began to notice that when they propped their speakers on other items, raising the speakers higher up into the air, the sounds were much, much better. From there, further research and perfection has led to the products that we can easily find today at any audio store.

Professional speaker stands are made out of special materials that deaden vibrations as much as possible, able to resist the vibrations of the sound waves being emitted by the speakers. If this were not the case, the speaker stands would absorb part of the noise being produced by the speakers, and the improvement over having these placed on the floor would be negligible to nonexistent, and we would be back at square one. Hence, whenever buying speaker stands, verify that they are made of non-vibrating material. The need for specialized materials was made evident after experimentation with ordinary home furniture equipment, which proved too susceptible to the vibrations and performed rather poorly. Nonetheless, there are some ordinary household items that have proven to serve fairly well as converted speaker stands, such as the base of an adjustable fan (the adjustability of the height is indeed a key quality that has made this item a popular one among audio enthusiasts).

The alignment of your speakers is crucial, and along with deadening vibrations this is the main function of speaker stands. Research has shown that, for best results, the speakers in a room should be more or less on the ear-level of the person(s) listening—hence, when arranging the speakers for your home theater system, use the level of your ears when you are seated on the couch, or whatever article of furniture you sit on when watching the tube. In particular, the tweeter (the driver in a speaker system that is responsible for reproducing high frequency sounds) should be roughly at, if not slightly above your ear level; tweeters, when built into a multi-driver speaker cabinet, are usually installed in the upper portions of the cabinet (looking at it in the upright position).

All precautions need to be taken to minimize resonance of other surfaces, especially those surfaces close to or in contact with your speakers. Even if your speaker stand equipment says that it deadens vibrations with maximum efficiency, try to take a few extra steps to guarantee that this really is the case. For example, put rubber pads on the bottom of your speaker stands, isolating them from the ground: the rubber will minimize and possible vibration between the speakers themselves and the stands. Always look for the sturdiest possible speaker stands, and feel free to use the reliable “shake test” to verify their quality…if you hear or feel something moving around when you shake them, they aren’t as good as they say they are! In general, thick glass and steel stands will perform above and beyond the quality of most other materials.

When buying your speaker stands, make sure you get enough to really round out your home theater system. Use separate stands for your large and mid-size speakers, your satellite speakers, your center channel speaker, and any other ones you may have. Speaker stands aren’t the only option, of course; there are a variety of wall mounts that can serve your purposes perfectly well.

Knowing where to position speaker stands is perhaps just as important as knowing what to look for in a speaker stand. Read the manual that came with the speakers themselves, and ask at the place you buy your speaker stands from if they have any recommendations on distances and arrangements for optimal sound quality in the room you are setting your system up in. The dimensions of the room (position of the walls and furniture) will be the determining factor in this. Basically, you need to think of yourself and your two principal speakers (or speaker stands, since they occupy the same space) as the three angles of an equilateral triangle; make the distance of one side of that triangle roughly equal to 8 feet, or less if your room isn’t that spacious. Have your speakers pointing towards you (the third angle of the triangle), instead of pointing straight back to the far wall (the one behind you, or in front of the speakers, however you want to look at it). Remember, as said earlier, that your speaker stands should be adjusted so that the speakers themselves are roughly at the level of your ears.

To recap, don’t settle for speaker stands made out of inferior quality materials, like ordinary furniture wood, cheap plastics, or thin metals or glass. Sturdiness means reliability when it comes to speaker stands! And make sure that the contact between speaker and stand, and stand and floor, is such that no resonance is occurring, with contact at the most minimal levels possible. From there, it will take some time experimenting with different positions for your stands to achieve the best arrangement possible—and you will know when you get there.

Vinyl endures

From vinyl to cassette to CD to digital, music formatting has come a long way.  Each advance has certainly changed the way we use and listen to music, and each has contributed something to the medium, but it doesn’t mean that each advance has necessarily been an improvement, or that older forms have been rendered irrelevant.  Although they seem like ancient relics compared to new technologies, vinyl records have not lost any of their cool.  Just like a 1960 Cadillac is never out of style, vinyl still has a firm claim on cool, even now in the 21^st century.  What is it that makes this dated technology so timeless?

First and foremost among reasons that vinyl has remained so magnificent is the sound quality.  The sound of a vinyl record cannot be matched by any newer technology.  The jumps and crackles lend such a pure authenticity to music, especially as compared to over-produced studio music that sounds listless and lifeless.  A flawless recording has no spirit, but vinyl is raw and real.  It is interesting to note that some digital music players have an option to add those rough vinyl sounds to digital music.  Of course, these digital attempts do not produce the same quality as the real deal, but it does go to show that raw sound quality is something lacking in CDs and mp3s, and that this has not gone unnoticed by music producers.

If you are not convinced on the grounds of sound quality alone, don’t forget about the physical aspect.  A vinyl collection is a tangible treasure hoard.  Each record is lovingly tucked into its sleeve, carefully organized amongst its fellow records.  You know each disc, its grooves, and the weight of it between your finger tips.  There is something visceral about vinyl, a connection that doesn’t exist with a shiny CD or an intangible mp3.  Having a physical attachment to a favorite album is nothing to scoff at.  It is the same as the difference between your beloved, beat up old copy of Charlotte’s Web, and reading the same text on an impersonal, glaring white computer screen.

The physical aspect is not just about emotion, it is also about the appearance and presentation of an album.  Those big, square covers have lots of room for great artwork, which you come to associate with the music itself.  And there are the gimmicks. – do you remember the Rolling Stones Sticky Fingers album?  Designed by Andy Warhol, the cover features a picture of a man’s crotch in tight jeans, and had a real, metal zipper that could be pulled down to reveal cotton briefs.  That sort of thing is simply not possible in other forms of music.  The Sticky Fingers CD was released with the same image, but the zipper is reduced to part of the photograph, and the whole physical appeal is absent.

One further aspect related to the physical is the actual act of shopping for records.  When shopping for records you tend to find yourself among like-minded people who also grasp the coolness of vinyl.  You might head out to used stores, flea markets, or garage sales, and there you browse through piles of records, looking for the one that will brighten your day.  Sometimes you find unexpected gems forgotten in these dusty bins, other times you buy something on a whim and end up discovering a great band or album that you didn’t know before.  When you buy music online, you go straight to what you were searching for, pay money for something you can’t see, and don’t have the opportunity to make those leisurely meanderings that result in so many great finds in record stores.  There is something deeply satisfying about the search and discovery process of shopping for vinyl.

There is another subtle feature of vinyl that makes it so classic and cool in the face of digital music.  It is the fact that a vinyl record is a complete album, recorded just as a band planned.  The tracks are presented in an intentional order, and the album as a whole represents a significant period in that band’s career.  Much of this is lost with modern music formatting.  People tend to know hit singles and download just these individual songs.  Listeners are less familiar with entire albums, and thus their understanding of the evolution and growth of any band is limited.  The shuffle feature on iPod is the epitome of this loss – one song follows another with absolutely no relation, no plan.  Artists, eras, genres are a chaotic mess of random play.  In contrast, an album is premeditated; there is harmony and purpose in the flow, and vinyl records perfectly capture this intention.

We are not here to say that vinyl doesn’t have its drawbacks.  The players are not portable, so you can’t listen just anywhere.  The discs are fragile, prone to scratches and easy to break.  They take up way more space than cassettes or CDs, and obviously more than non-physical digital music.  Yet it is these qualities that add to the timeless charm and appeal of records.  The fact that they aren’t portable means that listening to records is more of an event, a personal moment in your home.  The fragility is also what gives vinyl its powerful, raw sound.  And the fact that they are physical and take up space is what allows us to become attached to them, to know and love each one like a dear friend.

Music is too important to take for granted.  When you sit down and listen to vinyl, you are experiencing the music, rather than being an accidental eavesdropper.  You have a connection to the music, both emotional and corporeal, and you listen to an album from start to finish.  Technology marches on and we will never go back to just vinyl records, but the march of progress will has not stamped out the enduring popularity of vinyl.  In fact, the contrasts just go to show why vinyl is and always will be so cool.

Please visit our speaker stands page to find all of our products that compliment vinyl.