absorbers for small rooms

[blanc]

Hi,

generally speaking, a room shall have more diffusors than absorbers for a better acoustic quality. What about a tiny room smaller than 6m^2? Is absorbing more important because echoes are more serious?

 

[Elkerton]

My experience, and Floyd Tooles's, is that normal furnishings, couches, paintings, bookcases, chairs, drapes, rugs, etc. are all that is usually necessary although I realize that many audiophiles have dedicated rooms where much of that is left out.

 

[holdingpants01]

For rooms smaller than 6m2 I would recommend headphones, or small speakers in very near field with room correction like Neumann KH80, it's not worth fighting with such small space and you can completely forget about diffusion. For reference 6m2 is 64.5 square foot, that's like a car interior size

 

[Berwhale]

There's a thread on diffusion here: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...ecome-a-decorative-item-loved-the-idea.38955/

 

[blanc]

Yes, I'm talking about bookshelf speakers.

 

[ernestcarl]

Try downloading Jesco's summary guides (https://www.acousticsinsider.com/) and perhaps even subscribe to his youtube channel.

Acoustic quality is partly subjective here as some people may like more or less of that "roomy sound" -- I like to have less, and use adjustable DSP and multichannel upmixing to bring back some of the lost "immersiveness" and envelopment feel caused by acoustic absorption.

 

[Justdafactsmaam]

Hi,

generally speaking, a room shall have more diffusors than absorbers for a better acoustic quality. What about a tiny room smaller than 6m^2? Is absorbing more important because echoes are more serious?

Depends on the goal. If you want to hear the source material then use absorption. If you want to hear the listening room then don’t use absorption. Diffusion is IMO a compromise between the two. Personally I have zero interest in imprinting the sound of a listening room on my audio.

 

[Bjorn]

A small room needs more absorption than diffusion due to the fact that diffusion requires distance to avoid lobing and comb filtering. Plus very early arriving reflections are generally best to attenuate as much as possible in to order to hear into the mix with some accuracy.

A 6m2 room is seriously challenging and will likely never sound particular good and would require a lot of both absorption and bass trapping and there's isn't space either for the latter.. I would consider good headphones and a headphone amp for such a room instead.

 

[fredoamigo]

A small room needs more absorption than diffusion due to the fact that diffusion requires distance to avoid lobing and comb filtering. Plus very early arriving reflections are generally best to attenuate as much as possible in to order to hear into the mix with some accuracy.

A 6m2 room is seriously challenging and will likely never sound particular good and would require a lot of both absorption and bass trapping and there's isn't space either for the latter.. I would consider good headphones and a headphone amp for such a room instead.

I don't know what it's worth, but in "The Master Handbook of Acoustics" page 400 it says that small rooms become really problematic from 1,500 cubic feet or about 42 cubic meters.


"Room Size
Problems are inevitable if sound is recorded or reproduced in spaces that
are too small. Gilford1 states that studio volumes less than approximately
1,500 cu ft are so prone to sound coloration that they are impractical.
Rooms smaller than this produce sparse modal frequencies with exaggerated
spacings, which are the source of audible distortions."

 

[Bjorn]

I don't know what it's worth, but in "The Master Handbook of Acoustics" page 400 it says that small rooms become really problematic from 1,500 cubic feet or about 42 cubic meters.


"Room Size
Problems are inevitable if sound is recorded or reproduced in spaces that
are too small. Gilford1 states that studio volumes less than approximately
1,500 cu ft are so prone to sound coloration that they are impractical.
Rooms smaller than this produce sparse modal frequencies with exaggerated
spacings, which are the source of audible distortions."

This room is around 15 m³ with normal height. It's an acoustical nightmare with rooms modes going high in frequency and myriads of early reflections with high gain.