Are rooms more important than systems?

[rdale]

Tile and laminate floors cause a lot of reflections, I would never have them, especially in the living room. Carpet makes a huge difference esp. if it’s wall to wall. Yes that little rug won’t do much.

This is an interesting video about three things which are hard to treat, one of which is reflections off the floor:

 

[StingRay]

Most reflections off tiles will be higher frequencies, these will echo around the room. Are you saying carpets don’t make any difference to the sound of the room? For certain frequencies such as bass I would agree.

 

[rdale]

Most reflections off tiles will be higher frequencies, these will echo around the room. Are you saying carpets don’t make any difference to the sound of the room? For certain frequencies such as bass I would agree.

If you look at pictures of professionally treated rooms, such as recording studios, they usually only have bare floors or a rug in the center. A fitted carpet will only affect the highest frequencies, when what you actually need to treat comb filter effects are absorber panels at the first reflection points 5cm thick or so, which will absorb lower frequencies than a carpet would. A fitted carpet will likely just dull the highest frequencies, and may well be better than nothing in an otherwise untreated room, but it won’t give the improvement in resolution you get from proper absorbers and diffusers installed in the right places.

 

[tackleberry]

I have posted pics before, but here's another one. I have to say I don't mind if people say it actually looks like a man cave, even if my sister didn't seem to think that this afternoon:

What’s at the other end of the room bud?

 

[rdale]

What’s at the other end of the room bud?

A couple of Vicoustic Super Bass Extreme bass traps on my desk, more bass traps under the desk and some skyline and 1d diffuser panels and an absorber directly behind the listening position:

 

[tuga]

So - Dirac should be considered a last resort if all else fails

I have to disagree. Dirac is a tool, and a very good one at that (DRC).
You may have misplaced your expectations about what it could do in your room, which is particularly challenging.

The problem is your room, not Dirac/DRC.

 

[tackleberry]

What’s at the other end of the room bud?

Aah I see, was wondering if there was a blank wall at the other end you could utilise to better position/balance the speakers.

Anyway, you’ve got a hifi system, and I hope you enjoy it.

 

[HollyJohnsen]

Hello, I was a chef for 30 years. I often changed jobs and lived in many different apartments. I always paid attention to the rooms in the apartments and looked for a home for my system. I was always satisfied, I never had an apartment where I was dissatisfied.

 

[karlsushi]

Correct me if I’m wrong but are you running signal from the preamplifier to computer with Dirac then out to an amplifier?

I run Dirac from my pc (which runs as a DSP plug-in through J:River). That is the very start of my chain, which then runs into a DAC (via a USB interface) and then preamp from there.

I have stuck with this version of Dirac as it means I have full flexibility of everything down the chain rather than being restricted to an amp/DAC which incorporates Dirac (albeit there are quite a few using it these days, so the choice is much better).

I have managed to improve bass response by pulling my Spendor A7’s further out from the wall, but to sufficiently reduce the boom, they are too far into the room for practical purposes (i.e. three young children!).

I have considered replacing the speakers with either infinite baffle or front-ported speakers to allow them to be closer to the wall, but this is exactly the point I mean about constantly throwing money at a non-ideal room.

Currently, Dirac in the bass is the best compromise I have found without spending thousands more on new speakers.

I also really love my A7’s and have been stubbornly reluctant to replace them for another speaker. I have always felt they deserve to be tweaked to their full potential, but admit new speakers is probably where I'm headed.

But I'm getting a bit tired of just throwing money at it.

 

[DomT]

I have posted pics before, but here's another one. I have to say I don't mind if people say it actually looks like a man cave, even if my sister didn't seem to think that this afternoon:

Everyone has different tastes but would think that only the small minority would enjoy living in a lounge like that.

 

[DomT]

Most reflections off tiles will be higher frequencies, these will echo around the room. Are you saying carpets don’t make any difference to the sound of the room? For certain frequencies such as bass I would agree.

Carpet vs wood or ceramic cuts down on echo.

 

[tackleberry]

A couple of Vicoustic Super Bass Extreme bass traps on my desk, more bass traps under the desk and some skyline and 1d diffuser panels and an absorber directly behind the listening position:

Might be a silly question, but have you tried it firing across the room?

 

[rdale]

Might be a silly question, but have you tried it firing across the room?

No, I haven’t but on one side there is a door onto the terrace outside and on the other side is the kitchen area and so it isn’t really possible to have speakers anywhere other than where I’ve got them.

 

[tuga]

it does make a difference but we don’t live in an ideal world… I like a system that can cope in a living room sized space…but then introduce that into a smaller slightly dampened room and its other level stuff with the micro/macro dynamics you get..

It is the speaker/room interaction that creates problems. And to a lesser degree one could add amplification (amplifier/speaker interaction may result in "boomy"/uncontrolled bass).

The room is responsible below the Schroeder frequency (~200-400Hz) and the speaker takes over above that.
Room size and proportions, surface materials and furnishings all have a huge influence in the end result.

Woofer distance to boundaries (walls, floor, ceiling) and listening spot location will determine the impact of the room in the bass and sub-bass region.
Speaker directivity and toe-in, proximity to side walls and their surface materials will affect the midrange and treble.

This is the response of my speakers in two different homes, almost identical above 500Hz:

• the "lossier" old room has underlay-carpeted beam and block floor, plasterboard to timber upper-floor ceiling and plasterboard on stud walls
• the denser-construction new room has carpet on concrete slab floor, plaster on concrete slab, plaster on block walls

 

[tuga]

Might be a silly question, but have you tried it firing across the room?

Perhaps intentionally, or maybe by accident, @rdale has chose speakers with narrow directivity for his two systems, the right choice since they both have the listener to speaker distance a lot longer than between the speakers (judging from the photos).

 

[rdale]

Everyone has different tastes but would think that only the small minority would enjoy living in a lounge like that.

I’m happy to be in that small minority. But there are many different finishes, colors and styles of panels that you can choose which can suit people who have different tastes to myself.

 

[rdale]

Perhaps intentionally, or maybe by accident, @rdale has chose speakers with narrow directivity for his two systems, the right choice since they both have the listener to speaker distance a lot longer than between the speakers (judging from the photos).

My hope is that once I get my new REL subwoofers dialed in, and maybe with a new amp I have on order, the imaging will improve such that it will be wider than the speakers.

 

[Cable Monkey]

In the early years of the Scalford based Wam shows I always did well showing my system. I’d spent a lot of time messing around with speakers and stands often owning more than one pair and comparing everything. All of this was done in a smallish room in a flat, solid walls and concrete floor through carpet. The effect I was chasing back then transferred to the Scalford setup because it was an almost identically proportioned room with solid walls and floor so all of the tweaks I had settled on worked. I had ProAc stand mounts and the original Cambridge Audio 840 integrated. When I moved to a house and occupied the small spare bedroom it all fell apart aurally. I’ve had to adopt a very different approach since then and I know that what I now chase won’t translate to your average hotel room.

 

[tuga]

My hope is that once I get my new REL subwoofers dialed in, and maybe with a new amp I have on order, the imaging will improve such that it will be wider than the speakers.

To widen the soundstage you will need to allow for side-wall eraly reflections (achieved by removing the acoustic panels).

 

[tuga]

If you look at pictures of professionally treated rooms, such as recording studios, they usually only have bare floors or a rug in the center. A fitted carpet will only affect the highest frequencies, when what you actually need to treat comb filter effects are absorber panels at the first reflection points 5cm thick or so, which will absorb lower frequencies than a carpet would. A fitted carpet will likely just dull the highest frequencies, and may well be better than nothing in an otherwise untreated room, but it won’t give the improvement in resolution you get from proper absorbers and diffusers installed in the right places.

Bare hard walls but also floors are terrible for (music reproduction) acoustics, the worth example being a tiled bathroom.