How NOT to set up speakers and room treatment ( Goldensound)

[TheZebraKilledDarwin]

How about this little nugget, from post #475:
View attachment 289543

The highlighted bit. I can’t decide whether that’s an insider joke or cargo cult science. Three (3) test subjects substantially agreed, listening to pink noise. I hope the researcher was at least wearing a lab coat.

There is one good use of pink noise I know about: testing phantom center with mono pink noise. The thinner the line,the smaller the image of the noise in the phantom center, the better the stereo imagining seems to become.
Does Dr. Toole discuss, how early reflections tend to spread out this pink noise mono image? I guess not...

 

[thecheapseats]

Contrasting classical and popular music (for example) is at the crux of why a one-size-fits-all approach to room setup/treatment isn't sufficient.

if your purpose is for 'listening' - fine - do anything you want to do that makes you happy...

if it's for recording - that's an entirely different discussion and the criteria and choices aren't the same, at all...

 

[Axo1989]

a "room setup/ treatment" for what purpose?- listening to a finished recording - or creating a recording... please be specific...

This thread is about (or started with) a listening room, so you can start there when considering that post.

if your purpose is for 'listening' - fine - do anything you want to do that makes you happy...

Ok. What's your point then? We can't criticise Cameron's room on that basis, obviously.
.

 

[theREALdotnet]

There is one good use of pink noise I know about: testing phantom center with mono pink noise.

I use pink noise a lot, but not for testing sidewall treatments. There are much better test signals for that, like LEDR.

 

[thecheapseats]

This thread is about (or started with) a listening room, so you can start there when considering that post.



Ok. What's your point then? We can't criticise Cameron's room on that basis, obviously.
.

my point is any discusiion of 'listening' in the dubious treated room mentioned in the OP - left the discussion long ago... in fact, your last comment before mine was about 'pan-potting' - a recording function...

 

[Axo1989]

my point is any discusiion of 'listening' in the dubious treated room mentioned in the OP - left the discussion long ago... in fact, your last comment before mine was about 'pan-potting' - a recording function...

That room can't really be 'dubious' if 'whatever we like is fine' though.

My reference to pan-potting was a paranthetical statement (you know, literally in parentheses) and definitely not what that post was 'about'. You criticised people for comparing orchestral to modern music. I responded with an opinion that the comparison was relevant to setting up a listening room, the ostensible subject of the thread (we've seen people describe that they enjoy reflections/envelopment for the orchestral concert hall feeling, and others say they enjoy focus/imaging for certain modern genres). If you didn't understand what I was getting at initially, I think now you should.

 

[Somafunk]

I tried a totally unscientific and subjective experiment yesterday by removing the side wall absorption at first reflection points, and removing the sidewall absorption/diffusion just behind me whilst leaving front/rear of room as is. (I didn't remove them personally, got my rather bemused mum to remove them for the afternoon)

Just so we're absolutely clear I have absolutely zero/zilch/nada/not a fu£king jot of acoustic training so this purely based on what I heard, the room was set up a few years ago by a mate who works in the industry using rew/umik mic and his 30+ years of work in studios)

Front of room
4 tri traps with membrane range limiter, 2 4" absorption panels with tuned membrane and 1 4" absorption/diffusion

3 2" panels on ceiling

Rear of room
Rear of room with 8" bass traps with tuned membrane and 4" absorption/diffusion

I removed the 4 side wall panels shown below (old pic, ignore my previous krk's, these are all old pics)

I sat and browsed my usual listening of electronic/electronica such as Jon Hopkins, Craven Faults, Underworld, Moby, Carl Craig, Rival Consoles, Chemical Brothers, Daft Punk, Dave Clark, Loscil etc...etc.

The sound in listening position in front of monitors was undefined, less direct snap, less impact and the side wall reflections were rather annoying for my preferred musical choice.

So today the panels are back up and I'm a very happy bunny today.

This concludes my totally unscientific subjective appreciation of how my room sounds with/without side wall treatment

 

[thecheapseats]

That room can't really be 'dubious' if 'whatever we like is fine' though.

My reference to pan-potting was a paranthetical statement (you know, literally in parentheses) and definitely not what that post was 'about'....

pay attention -> pan-pot placement, "to place sounds beyond the left-right speaker pair" (your words) - is a function of the recording process... as well as your reply to another poster's mix description comment was, "they have limited exposure to new music, and thus less idea of how it is assembled" (your words, again) - sounds like recording to me...

if you insist on walking those comments back... fine... however, they're off topic...

...You criticised people for comparing orchestral to modern music... I responded with an opinion that the comparison was relevant to setting up a listening room, the ostensible subject of the thread...

you didn't specify "listening' room (right after speaking about a recording function) - otherwise I wouldn't have asked for the clarification... your words again-> "Contrasting classical and popular music (for example) is at the crux of why a one-size-fits-all approach to room setup/treatment isn't sufficient"... in recording rooms - there isn't a difference... sorry you're confused...

 

[Axo1989]

pay attention -> pan-pot placement, "to place sounds beyond the left-right speaker pair" (your words) - is a function of the recording process... as well as your reply to another poster's mix description comment was, "they have limited exposure to new music, and thus less idea of how it is assembled" (your words, again) - sounds like recording to me...

if you insist on walking those comments back... fine... however, they're off topic...

you didn't specify "listening' room (right after speaking about a recording function) - otherwise I wouldn't have asked for the clarification... your words again-> "Contrasting classical and popular music (for example) is at the crux of why a one-size-fits-all approach to room setup/treatment isn't sufficient"... in recording rooms - there isn't a difference... sorry you're confused...

Ok, thanks for the master-class in being obtuse. Off to ignore-land with you.

 

[thecheapseats]

Ok, thanks for the master-class in being obtuse. Off to ignore-land with you.

you're welcome!!...

 

[fpitas]

Only on ASR can it be so controversial how dead you like your listening room

 

[thecheapseats]

Only on ASR can it be so controversial how dead you like your listening room

yep - it's a wonderful thing... dead like a coffin...

 

[fpitas]

it's a wonderful thing... dead like a coffin...

Completely appropriate if you listen to goth.

 

[thecheapseats]

Completely appropriate if you listen to goth.

I don't listen to music - I only make it...

 

[Axo1989]

Completely appropriate if you listen to goth.

Some days I'm pretty partial to deathcore.

Edit: kinda needs that song (and were any of them even 24 yet?)

 

[dfuller]

I tried a totally unscientific and subjective experiment yesterday by removing the side wall absorption at first reflection points, and removing the sidewall absorption/diffusion just behind me whilst leaving front/rear of room as is. (I didn't remove them personally, got my rather bemused mum to remove them for the afternoon)

Just so we're absolutely clear I have absolutely zero/zilch/nada/not a fucking jot of acoustic training so this purely based on what I heard, the room was set up a few years ago by a mate who works in the industry using rew/umik mic and his 30+ years of work in studios)

Front of room
4 tri traps with membrane range limiter, 2 4" absorption panels with tuned membrane and 1 4" absorption/diffusion

3 2" panels on ceiling

Rear of room
Rear of room with 8" bass traps with tuned membrane and 4" absorption/diffusion

I removed the 4 side wall panels shown below (old pic, ignore my previous krk's, these are all old pics)

I sat and browsed my usual listening of electronic/electronica such as Jon Hopkins, Craven Faults, Underworld, Moby, Carl Craig, Rival Consoles, Chemical Brothers, Daft Punk, Dave Clark, Loscil etc...etc.

The sound in listening position in front of monitors was undefined, less direct snap, less impact and the side wall reflections were rather annoying for my preferred musical choice.

So today the panels are back up and I'm a very happy bunny today.

This concludes my totally unscientific subjective appreciation of how my room sounds with/without side wall treatment

Yeah this is my experience as well.

And before anybody says "well that's what's preferred" there is a difference between preferred and correct.

 

[Keith_W]

Since we are sort of on topic ... I have heard that RT60 and RT30 are not applicable in small room acoustics. Is this true?

 

[napfkuchen]

Since we are sort of on topic ... I have heard that RT60 and RT30 are not applicable in small room acoustics. Is this true?

From what I have read here / "seen on youtube": the smaller the room, the lower the achievable / desired RT60. But since this thread has turned over most of what I believed to be "true" this is proably false and one might better place some speakers in a giant cathedral and hope for the best.

 

[Axo1989]

Since we are sort of on topic ... I have heard that RT60 and RT30 are not applicable in small room acoustics. Is this true?

Yes and no. We don't get to diffuse field in small rooms. And the process for measuring reverberation time can be tricked as early reflections can throw the measure off. It's still a reasonable indication. REW has an improved method for small rooms iirc, worth a try.

Also, it's usually just RT60 (the metric) not to be confused with T60/T30/T20 (the method). Although the nomenclature RT30 is also used (somewhat ambiguously). To derive a full reverberation time aka RT60 run (with normal ≥ 5 dB drop before start, then decaying the full 60 dB) can be a tough call in normal spaces with background noise (you need a very loud sweep/impulse) so T30 (for example) times a 30 dB decay, assumes it's linear* (pretty much true when we skip the start and stop before the tail) and multiplies by two (or by three for T20). In other words, it's normalised to the same timescale.

*actually, regular (it's exponential decay, and dB are a log scale)

 

[Cubic Spline]

RT60 (Reverb Time) is a global measure of the room, "same in all spots" > that's why you need a diffuse field.
T60 is a local measure of decay in the room, specific to one emiter & reciever spot.

Simple expl is your T60 at the frequency of first length mode can be very long close to the wall and almost non existent in the perfect center. It's not position invariant > RT60 has no sense.