Help finding amazing room correction post

[Deleted member 48726]

To be frank, I think it's a business decision that firms like Mathaudio, Dirac, and Audyssey that do automatic room corrections need to sell you the idea that full corrections are in general a good thing to do. From their standpoint, the whole idea is that it's a fairly straightforward process, just put up the microphone at the main listening position and then the secondary ones, and the program will make corrections to the full frequency response and not just the bass region which could be seen as a lesser value considering it's such a small part of the full frequency range.

What they should do instead, which of course would destroy the straightforward process (the business strategy of an easy-to-use program), is they should give the users instructions on how to make gated measurements of their loudspeakers, which then the program should base the corrections for, from around 500Hz to 20kHz. The problem with such an approach is that it would make the whole process way more complicated (and would therefore likely be seen as too high of a step for the average consumer), as the users must be able to put both their speaker and the microphone as far from the room boundaries to get a large reflection-free measuring window as possible, which in turn would open up for many potential user errors.



As was mentioned by @dominikz, your situation seems to be an extreme case so the overall improvements of the corrections of the full frequency response are likely way better than no corrections at all. But it's still likely that corrections based on gated measurements above 500Hz, and room-based corrections under 500Hz would give you an even better result.

And even in less extreme situations than yours, I think people who like the sound of full corrections (based completely on none-gated measurements), mostly hear the improvements done to the bass region (which in most cases will give the largest improvement) and based on that overall impressions take it as granted that the full correction was the right thing to do, even if it's possible that some degrading may have come "with the package" of full corrections based on none-gated measurements.

My suggestion is that you figure out how you do gated measurements, make the corrections above 500Hz based on that, and leave the corrections under 500Hz to Mathaudio. I think that will improve your sound even further.
That is of course still "full range corrections", just that the corrections are based on the room response under 500Hz, and the rest are based on the direct response of your loudspeakers.


P.S. This post is not meant to upset anyone who has full belief in the firms that make automatic full-range correction programs, it's just that people like Toole who have done deep research in the field, have concluded that what the human sense of hearing "picks up" from the listening position is not the same as what a microphone picks up from the same spot, which is pretty clear if you just listen to the recorded signal and compare it to what you hear from the same spot.

That's a very polite way of telling people correcting FR is wrong because one man says so.
Those people are not wrong, if they get better sound from FR correction.

I don't think it's fully understood what exactly Dirac Live does. So maybe don't make it a right or wrong situation. Even if you have done so with a lot of polite writing. But your P.S. at the bottom is just a "sorry but not sorry" for saying we are doing it wrong. And I don't think anyone has claimed that a microphone is the same as you ears. But on the other hand you can't just record from it and play it back to prove that point unless it's binaural recording.
I can not get a better sound (for me) than a FR house curve gives me in Dirac.

YMMV

"I place subs in corners and correct full range" Holdt

 

[Snarfie]

But your P.S. at the bottom is just a "sorry but not sorry" for saying we are doing it wrong. And I don't think anyone has claimed that a microphone is the same as you ears.

Thats the whole point. Which does not mean science is wrong. I guess in many cases correcting till let say 400 hz is in many (acoustic) conditions enough. That was one of the reasons (to be sure) to test with different measuring mic's en same sort of speakers (other brands) that showed more or less same sort of FR response. But it looks like their are circumstances that full correction is probably more beneficial. At the end i trust my ears.

Side note:

One of the same sort of speakers (as my current Vandersteen) I tested were Dutch JK Acoustics Optima 3 speakers. When i sold them i let the buyers (a couple classical musicians ) listen with an without correction. They where horrified regarding the uncorrected sound. When they heard the corrected sound they where amazed suddenly listening into the recording ask me a thousand question how this is possible. Guess what when they came home they liked the JK's without correction listening to their cd player. Probably something to do with their better acoustics.

 

[Deleted member 48726]

Thats the whole point. Which does not mean science is wrong. I guess in many cases correcting till let say 400 hz is in many (acoustic) conditions enough. That was one of the reasons (to be sure) to test with different measuring mic's en same sort of speakers (other brands) that showed more or less same sort of FR response. But it looks like their are circumstances that full correction is probably more beneficial. At the end i trust my ears.

Side note:

One of the same sort of speakers (as my current Vandersteen) I tested were Dutch JK Acoustics Optima 3 speakers. When i sold them i let the buyers (a couple classical musicians ) listen with an without correction. They where horrified regarding the uncorrected sound. When they heard the corrected sound they where amazed suddenly listening into the recording ask me a thousand question how this is possible. Guess what when they came home they liked the JK's without correction listening to their cd player. Probably something to do with their better acoustics.

And this (marked) is my point. If what you are doing makes it sound better, what you are doing is right. Regardless what some statistical science shows. As speakers, rooms and people are variables, the truth about what is best for you is highly individual and can not be put into RIGHT or WRONG.

E.G. the inconclusive threads about bass "slam" and / or about how big speakers sound vs. small speakers with subs even with the same frequency response show us that perhaps we should be open to accept that there is something that we can't explain fully from the measurements alone. Or maybe some people have it right in those threads but there doesn't seem to be full consensus. At least I can't seem to boil it down to a single explanation.

 

[dominikz]

And this (marked) is my point. If what you are doing makes it sound better, what you are doing is right. Regardless what some statistical science shows. As speakers, rooms and people are variables, the truth about what is best for you is highly individual and can not be put into RIGHT or WRONG.

I absolutely agree that if one is completely happy with the sound one gets, that is all that is important - no need to dig deeper or make changes based on advice from other people. Absolutely nothing wrong with that and I support it fully.

However, IMHO that doesn't necessarily mean there's actually no possibility for improvement (both objective and subjective), or that most other people would share the same experience. Only pretty formal investigation could show the truth of this - but of course there is absolutely no need to go to that length when one is already satisfied.

E.G. the inconclusive threads about bass "slam" and / or about how big speakers sound vs. small speakers with subs even with the same frequency response show us that perhaps we should be open to accept that there is something that we can't explain fully from the measurements alone. Or maybe some people have it right in those threads but there doesn't seem to be full consensus. At least I can't seem to boil it down to a single explanation.

Here however I have to disagree somewhat.

People reporting in informal ways about being happy with one or another kind of setup IMHO doesn't really tell the rest of us much - definitely not enough to make any conclusions - because we can't tell what is causing the differences in opinion. It could of course be a real effect (which might still be caused by an unintentional and undetected error) but could also be related to some of the plethora of perceptual/cognitive biases we humans simply can't switch off.
Those differences in opinion might just a well disappear in a well-controlled test. Or they may not - but really we have no way to be sure without formal research. And people are sometimes not aware that there's quite a bit of formal research available.

This is why I personally try to be accepting of people's stated individual preferences, but when asked for advice I try to give advice backed by research, or at least those promoted by authorities in the field.
For example, I have a record player and sometimes quite enjoy listening to it (for reasons I won't go into here), but I wouldn't try to convince someone else to buy one.

 

[goat76]

@Holdt

I'm all for going with what one subjectively finds sounds the best in the end, no matter what it may be. But have you ever tried applying EQ corrections based on gated measurements for the frequency range above 500Hz for your speakers, and then compared that subjectively to the corrections Dirac makes for that frequency range? In case you've never tried it, how can you be sure it will not result in an even better sound than what you already have now with the full-range Dirac corrections?

Why not be open to possible improvements to your system, wouldn't it be cool if you could make it even better than now? I mean, it doesn't cost you anything more as long as you already have a microphone and using REW. I'm not your enemy here.

Could you make a couple of measurements with one of the loudspeakers and the microphone placed as far away from boundaries as possible, one with the Dirac EQ curve applied and one without, then apply a gated window to both measurements and see what the Dirac EQ adjustments have done to the direct sound of your loudspeakers?

 

[Deleted member 48726]

@Holdt

I'm all for going with what one subjectively finds sounds the best in the end, no matter what it may be. But have you ever tried applying EQ corrections based on gated measurements for the frequency range above 500Hz for your speakers, and then compared that subjectively to the corrections Dirac makes for that frequency range? In case you've never tried it, how can you be sure it will not result in an even better sound than what you already have now with the full-range Dirac corrections?

Why not be open to possible improvements to your system, wouldn't it be cool if you could make it even better than now? I mean, it doesn't cost you anything more as long as you already have a microphone and using REW. I'm not your enemy here.

Could you make a couple of measurements with one of the loudspeakers and the microphone placed as far away from boundaries as possible, one with the Dirac EQ curve applied and one without, then apply a gated window to both measurements and see what the Dirac EQ adjustments have done to the direct sound of your loudspeakers?

Honestly, I've earlier spent maybe a day a week for a year measuring and EQ'ing via. REW made curves with and without subwoofers, MMM method, averaging multipoints full, half, quarter spectrum.
I will tell you again: I KNOW that nothing sounds better to me than Dirac Live full range house curve. I know because I've tried and explored all variants of the application.
If I were to get something out of gated measurements the sound would be better from correction, if I'd only EQ the bass area. It's not. I've done that as well.
Some bonus information about what sound I like that might explaing my preference better. The best sound I've heard comes from when I first tried the apple airpods pros. (yeah, laugh it off, you audiophile buggers, I can take it )
I've since strived for that "dry" sound in my listening room as well. And only Dirac Live has managed to make me happy.

I know you're not my enemy. I tend to write my posts too hastily, often on the phone, and they will sometimes seem blunt. I mean nothing by it.

 

[Deleted member 48726]

...

This is why I personally try to be accepting of people's stated individual preferences, but when asked for advice I try to give advice backed by research, or at least those promoted by authorities in the field.
For example, I have a record player and sometimes quite enjoy listening to it (for reasons I won't go into here), but I wouldn't try to convince someone else to buy one.

I do as well. But when experience don't align with the "authorities" I advice people to do what gives the best result for them. Because that then tells me the truth must might be somewhere in-between and it's not a case of RIGHT or WRONG. Results will vary based upon a combination of rooms, speakers and acquired taste.

 

[Snarfie]

Honestly, I've earlier spent maybe a day a week for a year measuring and EQ'ing via. REW made curves with and without subwoofers, MMM method, averaging multipoints full, half, quarter spectrum.
I will tell you again: I KNOW that nothing sounds better to me than Dirac Live full range house curve. I know because I've tried and explored all variants of the application.
If I were to get something out of gated measurements the sound would be better from correction, if I'd only EQ the bass area. It's not. I've done that as well.
Some bonus information about what sound I like that might explaing my preference better. The best sound I've heard comes from when I first tried the apple airpods pros. (yeah, laugh it off, you audiophile buggers, I can take it )
I've since strived for that "dry" sound in my listening room as well. And only Dirac Live has managed to make me happy.

I know you're not my enemy. I tend to write my posts too hastily, often on the phone, and they will sometimes seem blunt. I mean nothing by it.

I have the same experience but than with Mathaudio did use an draw many target curves till i found for me the best sound. Changed position desk moved the speakers etc etc . The current speaker position an full range correction seem to be the best solution and not only for me that heard the difference. An yes i did also new measurements with different amp's my former JK class A amp a Sony pre mono combination i ended up with 2 different NAD Amp's an the NAD C370 was the one that could handle the gain/volume loss caused by the flat correction as best effortless. Suggestion that there is something wrong with my gear is not likely.

 

[dominikz]

Because that then tells me the truth must be somewhere in-between

While I agree with the overall message of your post, I'd replace "must" with "might" in the quoted statement. I now find it interesting to consider that a single word could be a summary (and extent) of a disagreement.

 

[Deleted member 48726]

While I agree with the overall message of your post, I'd replace "must" with "might" in the quoted statement. I now find it interesting to consider that a single word could be a summary (and extent) of a disagreement.

Ha! -Yeah. I just fixed that to somewhat approach an agreement.

 

[goat76]

If I were to get something out of gated measurements the sound would be better from correction, if I'd only EQ the bass area. It's not. I've done that as well.

Can you please elaborate on what you mean by the above sentence?
Why would corrections based on gated measurements be equal to what you hear with your corrections only kept to the bass area?

 

[thewas]

The important question is how do the loudspeakers look like anechoically before and after correction above modal region.
Most hifi loudspeakers have deficiencies both in the direct sound mainly described by their on-axis and listening window measurements as well in their directivity/radiation described by the polars, early reflections and sound power measurements.
Also there are the parameters of audios circle of confusion (variation of recordings), listening levels, listening distance, room acoustic problems and individual hearing deficits.
All those can contribute that a loudspeaker might sounds better with full bandwidth correction based on some target which contributes that either their above flaws, the flaws of the recordings or deviations of the the listening level and room are partially compensated.
Which switches the question for me to "Does equalisation above modal region sound better if everything is (close to) optimal?"
In my few such experiences were everything was very good equalisation above modal region wasn't really needed and probably would have rather a negative impact.
But as my current listening room, loudspeakers (although far from poorly measuring), many recordings and even ageing hearing isn't optimal often a full band correction sounds better to me.
Like in almost all complicated question a simple definite answer doesn't seem to exist, this took me almost 20 years of experiments with loudspeakers and room correction to find out.

 

[OCA]

Any sound wave with wavelength shorter than the source producing it becomes directional. You can measure sound pressure and its change in quantity in time at the LP but you cannot measure its directionality with an omni-directional microphone let alone correct for it.

Dirac Live has been implemented with "non-minimum phase" high-order IIR and high-order FIR filters and the choice is merely influenced by constraints on filter size and computational power, aiming to achieve sharper cutoffs with lower orders than min-phase filters. However, this choice inevitably introduces stability issues due to poles outside the unit circle and produces ringing artifacts around sharp transitions. I have 128k taps available for my DRC (about 128x the resolution Dirac has most machines it runs on) and I wouldn't do any correction beyond the room transient unless I have really bad speakers with very poor directivity.

 

[Deleted member 48726]

Can you please elaborate on what you mean by the above sentence?
Why would corrections based on gated measurements be equal to what you hear with your corrections only kept to the bass area?

Obviously that is a brain fart on my end as it surely isn't the same thing. I had the general postulate that FR correction was wrong in mind when I wrote that and mixed it up.

I'm still of the belief that a correction with reflections is the right way as these are reaching the listening position as well as the direct sound. And I'm well aware that ears are not an omnidirectional microphone. It has taken me some time to dial in the house curve in Dirac Live to sound just right to me with minute changes, listening tests, switching profiles and further corrections on the curve based on the no. 1 ranked profile.

You got me thinking there for a bit. -Could I have reached the "perfect" EQ faster by looking at gated measurements in REW? -Maybe, maybe not.
Either way I have reached a point where I don't feel the need to tweak any further and love the sound every time I put on music. -Which was the goal to begin with. Should I ever replace my beloved Infinity Kappa 8.2, I'd still do it the same way as I think the result is outstanding.