Anyone use an HC-1 as a bookshelf?

[aps1ngh]

I was perusing the HC-1 owner's guide and I saw a section that said that many users put the speaker upright and rotate the tweeter to use it as a bookshelf speaker. It would essentially be an HB-1 with an additional 6.5 inch woofer at the top.

Has anyone actually tried this configuration and care to comment on its sound signature in comparison to the HB-1? I own the HB-1's and they are amazing, but I am also considering an 2 channel HC-1 configuration.

I am having a lot of trouble finding impressions of this configuration elsewhere. Anyone care to comment?

[Pete_Hsu]

This would work well provided that one rotated the horn 90 degrees, and provided that one was listening with tweeter at ear level. The drawbacks vs using the horn bookshelf speaker are higher cost, larger enclosure size, and vertical lobing effects, while the benefits are wider dynamic range and lower distortion.

[shadyJ]

I use a pair of the HC-1's for a stereo setup, they work terrifically. They replaced a pair of HB-1 speakers. I didn't compare them that closely, but they sound mostly the same. I think the differences would only become noticeable if you turn them up loud, then the extra woofer becomes an advantage. I think the HC-1's should have better low frequency extension, but I am not absolutely certain on that, since I mostly have always used them with subs.

If you intend to use the HC-1s vertically, you should be aware that the bottom of the HC-1 has these circular things screwed on where you place it on the stand. They can be removed but it leaves a couple of unpainted stripes if it were standing up. This can be made to look better in a few different ways, but I don't think there is a way to make it look perfectly smooth. Anyway, it's a small flaw, and can be made to look unremarkable pretty easily. Also, as Pete mentioned, removing and rotating the tweeter is very easy to do, it only takes a small phillips head screwdriver and 5 minutes.

It might have been a good idea for Hsu to make and market a kind of HC-1's as left/right fronts. Take a look other companies who have success with that kind of MTM design: Ascend's CMT-340's, SVS's SCS-01, Elemental Designs' A6-6T6 MTM. All it would take is a couple minor changes: the tweeter already rotated and the subtraction of the horizontal stand parts.

Anyway, I don't think there is a dramatic difference in sound, and I didn't expect there to be when I received mine, but I bought them because I wanted a system that was a more unique configuration, and also because they looked cool. They still sound great though, if anything they are better, at least to my untrained ears.

[aps1ngh]

This would work well provided that one rotated the horn 90 degrees, and provided that one was listening with tweeter at ear level. The drawbacks vs using the horn bookshelf speaker are higher cost, larger enclosure size, and vertical lobing effects, while the benefits are wider dynamic range and lower distortion.

Awesome. Thanks for this answer Pete. This is exactly what I was looking for.

How severe is the vertical lobing and does it create a significant change in the sound signature (ie peaks/troughs at certain frequencies)? My decision to experiment with these speakers as bookshelves really depends on how significant these lobing effects are.

Also, if these speakers suffer from vertical lobing when placed vertically, does this mean that they have the same horizontal lobing effects when used horizontally as a center channel speaker?

[Pete_Hsu]

Yes, the center speaker oriented horizontally will have lobing effects in the horizontal plane, but the speaker still sounds quite good, and one needs to get well off-axis of the woofer to notice a large difference.

Note that we've had several customers that I can recall who have used the HC-1 MK2 vertically, with excellent results.

Sincerely,

[INFRASUB]

Hi everyone, I'm new to the forum and very interested in the HC-1 also. Has any one tried a virtual center speaker? That is one above the screen and one below each equal distant from the listeners ear? It would seem that the sound would be very centered to the midpoint between them if you remained seated. Any ideas on how this might work, I dont have a center speaker yet but would be interested in getting one(or two) soon.

[richardbk]

Hmm, I'm no expert – but it sounds like you're trying to solve a problem that doesn't exist. Just one center channel speaker is all you need. Placed and adjusted properly, voices will seem to come right out of people's mouths, even though the speaker is actually above or below the screen. So why complicate matters?

Just my 2¢. :)

[brandtc]

Hello! I'm a long, long time HSU customer and browse the HSU forum occasionally but haven't felt the need to chime in until now. Thought I'd share my experience with the HC1-MK2 center channel speakers. My listening room is approximately 18 X 20 and I run 7 HC1's. 4 of them are the MK1's and 3 are the recent MK2's. 6 with the tweeters rotated 90 degree's, the center horn tweeter isn't rotated, obviously. After going thru multiple sets of high end speakers (klipsch, bose, aperion to name a few) I settled on the HC1's. All 7 speakers are powered with 200 watt Emotiva amps. These are joined by 2 MBM-12's in the rear of the room and 2 VTF3's w/ turbo's in the front EQ'd by 2 antimode 8033's and 1 SMS-1 (the room has plaster walls, cathedral ceiling and italian tile :eek: )

I can honestly tell you that the HSU system is by far the most incredible sounding system I've heard to date. Jaw dropping to put it mildly. I spent years trying to get a sound system this accurate and wasted thousands of dollars in the process of getting to this point.

So yes, you can use HC1-MK2's for surround, fronts, center, anything you wish and they are fantastic. Also, there has never been any customer service as good as you'll get with HSU, or Pete Hsu for that matter. Hours and hours of time spent on the phone and Pete never flinches! The guy is an audio knowledge bank. :cool:

[Deromax]

I intend to do just that, use an HC-1 upright. I have an acoustically transparent front projection screen, so will use the HC-1 upright, behind the screen. I may later do the L/R that way too.

But all this is more distant project! I need to start with the surround channels, which are the weak link in my system now and I will use a pair of HB-1.