Nearfield placement

I'm making some changes to my studio - moving actually, so some pretty drastic changes! I use trusty HS80s with a KRK Rokit 10s. Actually, I have a 5.1 setup (all HS80s) but I of course mainly work in stereo. 

I know it's bad to have speakers near walls, but I really want to mount them on the wall! Is there something I can do to achieve this without significantly compromising the monitoring environment? Of course, a well balanced listening position is still priority - the room will only be used as a studio.

Not sure if it will effect the answer, but I use the Blue Sky MKIII bass management controller, so everything below 80Hz is redirected to the sub.


Thanks!

Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but those particular speakers are probably among the worst for siting close to a wall, because they are rear-ported.

A local acquaintance was using the same speakers in his studio and was having problems with bass translation. I suggested pulling the speakers out further from the wall, which resulted in a measurable improvement. (We were using Ethan Winer's stepped sine test for measurements.)

Coincidentally, he was also auditioning a pair of Mackies that day, which a friend was offering for sale. The Mackies were such a big improvement that he ended up replacing the Yamahas with them. Although the two sets of speakers are very similar, the main difference is that the Mackies are not rear-ported.

One thing that might partially mitigate the effect a little is to raise your crossover frequency on the sub and carefully position the sub away from walls.

I say "might", because chances are you won't want to raise it higher than 80Hz or so, which really doesn't get you out of the problem frequencies. I know that my sub is less linear than my mains above 70Hz, and therefore performs better when the crossover frequency is set to around 50Hz (that's where my main speakers start to wimp out). Unfortunately, the bass buildup you'll be fighting will encompass the entire bass range, up to 300-500Hz.

You can't fight it with absorption/bass traps, either. You'd need a 3'-thick chunk of 703 behind the speakers to make an appreciable difference.

BTW, I've been through all this myself, having tried speakers on a wall-mounted shelf. I had lots of problems with bass translation until I moved everything around and got the speakers away from the wall.

If I were keen enough to replace my HS80s with monitors more suitable for wall mounting, are there any available that are designed specifically for that method of mounting? Or will any speaker that is not rear ported be OK?

Even if i did get monitors that were not rear ported, would I still compromise their performance by wall mounting them?

Last question, I promise...would it work if I kind of flipped the room around? So have the speakers out in the room, with the listening position hard up against the wall, with absorption behind, of course?