Need help: soundstage?


Hi,
I'm new on this hobby, and I would like to know that what exactly do you look for when placing speakers for the best soundstage or in another term when do you know you have best soundstage? How do you set up the speaker in order to have 3D imaging?
For the current set up, I can hear the singer right on the center with instruments on left and right side but everything is flat. If I can bring the singer up front little bit then I'm in heaven.
My room is 147"Wx180"Lx96"H, and my speakers are 60" from back wall and 40" from side wall (Cardas' formular)with toe in. The speakers are JMlab Electra Monitor run with Classe amp. Are the speakers too far from the back wall or are the speaker not good enough to create 3D sound?
Thanks for your help
DT
worldcup86
I also find the Immedia site a useful different appraoch to the standard cardas set-up technique, I use some ideas I learned there in my system.

Please try this very simple tweak, put vibrapods between speaker and stand and you should hear deeper bass and often
improved 3D effects, only takes a minute to try.

Also you can purchase a TDS Passive Audiophile which also can improve 3D soundstage, cost $400 new or $250 used here.
TDS stands for True Dimensional Sound, there are reviews at
stereotimes.com and soundstage.com
I'm sorry, to be so basic about this, but Have you moved the speakers about the room and sat down to listen? You can go to all the websites you want, ask me and everyone else in the world, but the best thing you can do at the moment is your basic 1/3rd 2/3rds setup, put on what you know to be some well recorded material, a piece you know well that on some system some where you have heard all the qualities that you are searching for and then start moving things around little by little till its right, and right not buy the books or the websites or by some others but by your own ears. Keep this up and we will have another audio fool out here selling us his room setup cd package and I gaurantee there be people jump on that bandwagon and trading insults and writing papers and will be buying and selling it used on the websites argueing which version is best.
And please, part of this is tongue in cheek, but really, I was just aghast that no one has told you to listen. You can write, so you must have some intelligence, you can hear I assume, so combine the two and I genuinely think you can be wonderfully surprised at the results. If nothing else, depending on where you live, I bet you can get three or four people that read this site to come over and help you with this.
Jvia is right. And you have already pointed out what your system does do and doesn't do well. Things are centered (when they should be), but it sounds flat. So your ears are the best tool. A couple of things that might help. First, bass is important. It creates what I call a neutral zone--what I mean is an area that has little placement definition, but which other higher frequency things can be brought into perspective relative to the bass. I don't know if that made any sense, or just sounded like mumbo jumbo--but bass creates a sense of space (audio space that is). Without it, it's difficult to put other instruments or voices into spatial context--at least that's what I've found. Second, are the speakers, some create great 3D soundstages, others do not. I used to own a pair of Klipsch LaScalas--great tonally and dynamically--but they were never going to create a 3D soundstage with layers of instruments. I now own Martin Logans, just about the opposite of the Klipsch in almost every respect--they can really project a 3D soundstage. Assuming your speakers can deliver a convincing 3D soundstage I would suggest as Jvia says--listen. If you have not spent time experimenting with this before I will offer one suggestion that will help. Do things wrong first--what I mean is, put the speakers close the the rear wall and listen to what it sounds like when they are there. Put them too close to the side walls and listen. Toe them in too much and then not enough and listen. You will then know what creates what wrong to some degree and it will in the long run make the tweaking go easier. Even when I know about where and how much toe in for a speaker I always start at a point that is clearly off the mark, then gradually move toward the point that should be correct and go past that point, when I hear the degredation of the effect I just go back to the previous position and that usually does it. It takes a long time and it's an iterative process. If you want to do it fast and relatively painless--then the computer programs (RPG is pretty good), but it will sound the way they have theoretically calculated (typically frequency response only)--which might not have anything to do with what sounds best to you.