Even though they are called bookshelf speakers, it isn’t ideal placing them on one. Your setup’s sound performance can be negatively impacted if you decide to do so. Bookshelf speaker stands can be a good investment and enhance the overall audio experience of your setup.
Going cheap and using a makeshift stand from tables or cupboards is a bad idea. Your ears deserve the best audio experience, especially after spending your hard-earned money on a good pair of speakers.
Speakers should be placed on stands as doing so can improve the output quality by a significant amount. This is because frames are designed to reduce vibrations and audio reflections.
Additionally, stands can be used to easily adjust speakers to different angles, elevate speakers off uneven and porous surfaces, and keep your speakers safe from possible hazards.
Are Speaker Stands Practical?
It is not exactly practical to place every type of speaker on stands. Small speakers are great for putting on stands as the sound is usually not distorted when placed on them; this is not always the case.
Speakers are designed to produce the best audio for listening at ear level from a short distance. If you elevate your speakers to a different height level away from ear level, the speakers’ audio quality can suffer as a result.
Using more prominent speakers such as floor standing ones that are significantly tall, to begin with, should not be placed on stands that are too tall as that can lead to more inferior audio quality. It’s still OK to put them on short stands, though, as long as they are at a decent height, near ear level.
Do Speaker Stands Make A Difference?
You might be wondering, just how big of a difference do speaker stands make exactly? Well, the answer is that bookshelf speaker stands can make a significant difference depending on your setup.
Speaker stands can boost overall quality by helping reduce sound reflections, providing mechanical isolation, positioning speakers at the optimal ear level, and serving as solid anchoring for your speakers.
Decreasing Early Sound Reflections
Having your speakers sitting on solid surfaces like tables or near walls produces reflections of the sound waves made by your speakers. This can interfere with the sound image and add unwanted color to the audio being produced.
One of the essential benefits of stands is that they can help reduce these “early reflections” and help create a much clearer sound with much less echo and reverb. By helping to decrease these potential after-effects from reflective surfaces, stands can help provide clearer audio overall.
This way, speaker stands can make a substantial difference in the audio experience and help your setup work at its best.
Better Mechanical Isolation
Additionally, speaker stands provide a means to isolate your speakers from the floor mechanically. This decoupling is vital in stands, and high-quality stands offer many features to help separate your speakers better. Each part of the speaker stands has a crucial role in enhancing your speakers’ mechanical isolation.
Many quality stands have spiked or rubber feet to help anchor them to different types of floors. The base plate as well helps in decreasing vibrations and reduces the risk of your speaker falling. Support column often features a compartment for sand and another room for wires. Lastly, the top plates help improve the overall decoupling effect.
Serves As Anchoring For Your Speakers
Bookshelf speaker stands can serve as solid anchors for your favorite speakers. Good quality stands can withstand and absorb almost all of the vibrations produced by the speakers.
Speakers produce vibrations, which can travel to the floor and make it shake, especially if the base is made from something like wood. This can lead to your speaker bouncing about whenever it’s playing something bass-heavy, which over time can result in damage to your speaker and its components.
Stands help manage all of the pressures and vibrations speakers generate. Therefore it can put a stop to most of the unwelcome movements of the speaker.
Better Sound Positioning
Speakers work best when they are placed at ear level towards listeners. This kind of positioning provides better audio quality for listeners due to the sound waves having a straight path from the speakers to our ears with proper directionality, without bouncing or interfering on its way to our ears.
The quality of sound you hear from tweeters is explicitly substantially improved when they are placed at ear level. This is because high frequencies tend to be more directional than midrange or low-range frequencies.
Tweeters, which produce high frequencies audio, don’t allow for much omnidirectional radiation. In essence, tweeters have a much more conical range of audio, i.e., treble.
You could very well place speakers on the floor and have them tilted a bit towards your ears, but that means you will lose out on directionality. The sound you hear will be coming from the floor and will be unusual to attend as a result.
Should Speakers Be On Stands?
So, the answer to the question, should speakers be on stands? In a word, yes, they should be placed on shelves if you want to get the best possible performance out of your speakers.
True audiophiles and music enthusiasts always recommend investing in a speaker stand. Expensive and high-end speakers aren’t the only way to improve your audio setup; peripherals are also essential! A good quality stand can be the cherry on the top and build upon a good set of speakers to help them perform at their best.
All in all, if you care about audio quality, speakers should never be boosted using random items present in your houses like a table or bookshelf. Speaker stands are the best thing to elevate your speakers and help provide an excellent foundation to reduce unwanted vibrations and sound pressures to give you a genuinely sublime audio experience.