Have you ever not had this problem with these speakers?
I can't formulate a theory that fits all of the facts that you have stated, but I'm wondering if one of the speakers might have the connections to one of its drivers or one of its crossover elements reversed. Since the crossover is nominally at 1700Hz, with third-order rolloff, a miswire resulting in partial cancellation of frequencies in the crossover region could pull the image toward the other speaker, since it is mid-range frequencies that would be affected.
If not, and only one channel was reversed (either inadvertently or intentionally), that would certainly explain the diffuse image and attenuated bass. On the other hand, if you truly reversed the phase on both channels, and the result was that the image moved to the opposite speaker, and simultaneously became diffuse with attenuated bass, perhaps (and I'm just guessing here) there are two inter-related problems present, such as a miswire in a speaker combining with asymmetrical room effects, resulting in confusing symptoms.
BTW, the polarity switch on the preamp is undoubtedly an absolute phase reversal function, which would invert both channels simultaneously. That would result in effects which were either very subtle or non-existent, depending on the recording. I can't explain, though, why flipping that switch gave different results than interchanging pins 2 and 3 on both interconnects, unless I've misinterpreted something in your post or you inadvertently had pins 2 and 3 interchanged on only one channel.
Hope that is of some help.
-- Al
I can't formulate a theory that fits all of the facts that you have stated, but I'm wondering if one of the speakers might have the connections to one of its drivers or one of its crossover elements reversed. Since the crossover is nominally at 1700Hz, with third-order rolloff, a miswire resulting in partial cancellation of frequencies in the crossover region could pull the image toward the other speaker, since it is mid-range frequencies that would be affected.
As an aside, reversing the polarity of only the interconnects from CDP to preamp resulted in a mirror image of the image shift, but the sound was very diffuse with no bass at all, and inverting the phase on the preamp had very little effect on the sound.A diffuse image combined with attenuated bass is an almost certain indication that the two channels are out of phase relative to one another. When you say you reversed the polarity of the interconnects from cdp to preamp (and I assume you were using balanced interconnects), do you mean that you interchanged xlr pins 2 and 3 simultaneously on the cables for BOTH channels?
If not, and only one channel was reversed (either inadvertently or intentionally), that would certainly explain the diffuse image and attenuated bass. On the other hand, if you truly reversed the phase on both channels, and the result was that the image moved to the opposite speaker, and simultaneously became diffuse with attenuated bass, perhaps (and I'm just guessing here) there are two inter-related problems present, such as a miswire in a speaker combining with asymmetrical room effects, resulting in confusing symptoms.
BTW, the polarity switch on the preamp is undoubtedly an absolute phase reversal function, which would invert both channels simultaneously. That would result in effects which were either very subtle or non-existent, depending on the recording. I can't explain, though, why flipping that switch gave different results than interchanging pins 2 and 3 on both interconnects, unless I've misinterpreted something in your post or you inadvertently had pins 2 and 3 interchanged on only one channel.
Hope that is of some help.
-- Al