Bookshelf vs Tower Speakers: Which Should I Get?

[KEW]

This annoyance may come to an end, as I got a call this morning about how to duplicate as closely as possible what they hear here in a Twin Cities studio, that is going to have a rebuild.

Congratulations!
That certainly comes as high compliment!
Can they do it commercially, or does it get down to you doing a custom job for them?

 

[ski2xblack]

Anyone doing towers + subs? If so, I'd be interested to know what the towers are - whether they're theoretically "fullrange" speakers in and of themselves, or have a rolled-off bottom end and use the tower format for other purposes (higher efficiency, better room interaction, whatever).

I've seen people use subs to gently augment the bottom octave of towers in order to improve either the quality or quantity of bass, and I've built towers that don't go very deep as part of a large-scale satellite/sub system.

In the living room we use towers w/ a sub. The towers are solid down to the mid 30's, useful output to the high 20's. The sub is a plain jane sealed Dayton 12", which has similar roll off as the mains down low, with a 80hz lpf. It's all about modal smoothing in our case. Works really well.

 

[fmw]

The more simple answer is that you can integrate a sub with either. What matters is which sound better to you. Towers and bookshelves from the same manufacturer will sound different even if they use the same drivers - and not just in the bass.

 

[TLS Guy]

The newer ATC speakers have fantastic mid woofers. The voice coil on them is pretty much as large as the diameter of the cone itself, 3". I suppose that helps dispersion and power handling. ATC is very pricey though.

All really good speakers are pricey!

 

[KEW]

Can we come away from this thread with any useful information or guidelines?

It seems to me that because of the way this question was asked, the responses (including mine) are pretty much arbitrary because of so many assumptions.

I wonder if the conversation would be different if we broke it down into more useful sub-categories based on budget and/or room size.

I believe the only argument against bookshelf speakers if there are no budgetary constraints would be the argument of flexibility of sub location vs restrictions on placement of full range speakers. High end floorstanders have the cabinet reinforcements to eliminate resonance issues that I have observed in less expensive speakers.

Bookshelf speakers begin to gain better traction as you start looking at price equivalent comparisons (which is the practicality for the majority of us).

Furthermore, I would submit the theory that the benefits of bookshelf speakers increase as the budget decreases.

With budgetary limitations, it seems the biggest argument for floorstanders is dynamics and maximum output especially at mid-low bass frequencies. This is where room size (and desired listening level) becomes a prominent issue. And that cuts both ways - for a smaller room (say 11X13) I could see a full-range floorstander becominging un-listenable once room gain is added to anechoic measured flat bass response!

Are the above statements ones that we largely agree on?

What about the idea that the benefits of bookshelf speakers increase as the budget decreases?

 

[JRT3]

My wife and I - and our cats - bear witness to your condensed evaluation. We moved to our 3 br garden home 2.5 yr back, with the long LR & DR-turned-library as our tower equipped HT and the two smaller BR's (~11' x 12') as her music room and my office. Her stereo uses two Infinity P363 towers while mine used two smaller bookshelf NHT's (S1 2.1's) and a sub, which I did the 'sub-crawl' to position. Our HT sounds quite good - without a sub. Her towers are not properly spaced, due to her aesthetics, and it just doesn't sound good - to me - she loves it. My stereo sounded great but the sub was too much for the room, so I went with larger Klipsch bookshelf speakers (RB-81ii's) and no sub - perfection! I would suggest that approach when choosing a bookshelf speaker for a small room and floor-mounted/towers for a larger room alike - get the largest LF drivers you can afford and fit in the space.

 

[Steve81]

Can we come away from this thread with any useful information or guidelines?

I'll see if I can provide a few useful thoughts.

First, one should keep in mind that bookshelf vs tower is a bit of a misnomer, as some larger bookshelf speakers can really blur the lines, while some towers aren't much more capable than a small two-way bookshelf speaker. Ultimately, the question is this: how much extension and output should one purchase?

Extension is the simpler part of that equation, and obviously the key point is whether or not your crossing over to a subwoofer.

The question of output is a bit more complicated, and obviously depends on your listening habits. If you're looking to turn things up to 11, power handling, sensitivity, and volume displacement all matter. Even with the benefit of an 80Hz XO, reference levels are extremely demanding, and realistically beyond what you can expect a run of the mill 2-way 5" speaker to deliver cleanly. To put some numbers to it, consider the throw required to deliver 100dB at 80Hz at 1m for a 5.25" driver vs 2x6.5" drivers. The single 5.25" would need to be quite stout indeed, as it would have to move a little over 6mm one way. The pair of 6.5" woofers would be loafing along by comparison at 2mm one way. You'd also have a power handling advantage given that the power would be split between a pair of voice coils.

 

[jsrtheta]

Not enough discussion of room size and shape. One of the biggest mistakes I see is small room systems with oversized floorstanders. Floorstanders are simply not flexible enough for most small rooms, and will almost always sound worse than appropriate monitor-sized speakers on stands. Or bookshelves.

 

[Bucknekked]

Not enough discussion of room size and shape. One of the biggest mistakes I see is small room systems with oversized floorstanders. Floorstanders are simply not flexible enough for most small rooms, and will almost always sound worse than appropriate monitor-sized speakers on stands. Or bookshelves.

At least you are consistent across posts. Here is my reply from your other post with the same myth.
js
There are a number of myths in audio. Floor standing speakers require more room than bookshelf is one of them. I have a dedicated listening room. That's the good news. Its small (10x10x10) that's the bad news.
Most people would think bookshelf sized speakers because "floor standing speakers need more room".
My old set was bookshelf, a set of Klipsch.

When I wanted an upgrade to my system I did the AH forum thing and solicited opinions and gathered up my candidates. Salk audio was at the top of the list. I called Jim Salk and asked him about my small listening space and which of his speakers would do the best job. He recommended the Salk Songtowers. They are big girls and that wasn't what I thought Jim would say.

Long story short: they sound glorious in my dedicated little cave. They dominate the room. They kick my ass every time I listen to them. Myth busted

 

[jsrtheta]

At least you are consistent across posts. Here is my reply from your other post with the same myth.
js
There are a number of myths in audio. Floor standing speakers require more room than bookshelf is one of them. I have a dedicated listening room. That's the good news. Its small (10x10x10) that's the bad news.
Most people would think bookshelf sized speakers because "floor standing speakers need more room".
My old set was bookshelf, a set of Klipsch.

When I wanted an upgrade to my system I did the AH forum thing and solicited opinions and gathered up my candidates. Salk audio was at the top of the list. I called Jim Salk and asked him about my small listening space and which of his speakers would do the best job. He recommended the Salk Songtowers. They are big girls and that wasn't what I thought Jim would say.

Long story short: they sound glorious in my dedicated little cave. They dominate the room. They kick my ass every time I listen to them. Myth busted

For you.

 

[MrBoat]

FTW

 

[Audiosaur]

FTW

Love it!

MrBoat, I'm curious...As a boat builder, do you have your own boat? And if so, do you have an audio system in it?

 

[MrBoat]

Love it!

MrBoat, I'm curious...As a boat builder, do you have your own boat? And if so, do you have an audio system in it?

I have my own boat that I built of wood, but I don't have audio in it. And I make others that go with me turn off their phones too. I get most of my music fix at home.

 

[MR.MAGOO]

IMHO, tower speakers are merely bookshelf speakers on an expensive pedestal.

 

[2channel lover]

At least you are consistent across posts. Here is my reply from your other post with the same myth.
js
There are a number of myths in audio. Floor standing speakers require more room than bookshelf is one of them. I have a dedicated listening room. That's the good news. Its small (10x10x10) that's the bad news.
Most people would think bookshelf sized speakers because "floor standing speakers need more room".
My old set was bookshelf, a set of Klipsch.

When I wanted an upgrade to my system I did the AH forum thing and solicited opinions and gathered up my candidates. Salk audio was at the top of the list. I called Jim Salk and asked him about my small listening space and which of his speakers would do the best job. He recommended the Salk Songtowers. They are big girls and that wasn't what I thought Jim would say.

Long story short: they sound glorious in my dedicated little cave. They dominate the room. They kick my ass every time I listen to them. Myth busted

It varies with each speaker, but most floorstanders I have demoed or owned and that includes my new Salks...at lower volumes (say 40-50 db spl) the sound at about 6-8' away from the speaker is better than it is at 11-12' away.

 

[3db]

IMHO, tower speakers are merely bookshelf speakers on an expensive pedestal.

Without the bass and most times without the ability to play as loud as there tower brethren. Those pedestals must be magic for those two abilities to shine through.

 

[3db]

At least you are consistent across posts. Here is my reply from your other post with the same myth.
js
There are a number of myths in audio. Floor standing speakers require more room than bookshelf is one of them. I have a dedicated listening room. That's the good news. Its small (10x10x10) that's the bad news.
Most people would think bookshelf sized speakers because "floor standing speakers need more room".
My old set was bookshelf, a set of Klipsch.

When I wanted an upgrade to my system I did the AH forum thing and solicited opinions and gathered up my candidates. Salk audio was at the top of the list. I called Jim Salk and asked him about my small listening space and which of his speakers would do the best job. He recommended the Salk Songtowers. They are big girls and that wasn't what I thought Jim would say.

Long story short: they sound glorious in my dedicated little cave. They dominate the room. They kick my ass every time I listen to them. Myth busted

I agree with you that its a myth. Just because towers have the ability to over power a room when cranked doesn't mean they can't be used in everyday situations at comfortable volume levels without over powering a room.

 

[MR.MAGOO]

Without the bass

that's what subwoofers are for.

 

[3db]

that's what subwoofers are for.

Most book shelf speakers require a sub but many towers do not so I fail to see your comparison . Must be magic pedestals again.

 

[William Lemmerhirt]

IMHO, tower speakers are merely bookshelf speakers on an expensive pedestal.

Huh, gotta disagree mr magoo. I agree, some towers are just bookshelf’s with stands built in. But real towers are anything but.