• WANTED: Happy members who like to discuss audio and other topics related to our interest. Desire to learn and share knowledge of science required. There are many reviews of audio hardware and expert members to help answer your questions. Click here to have your audio equipment measured for free!

Help with placement/treatment in dedicated room (literally no thought to interior design)

Mawclaw

Member
Forum Donor
Joined
Aug 20, 2019
Messages
69
Likes
133
Location
The ATL
Hey,

Just got a new house with a ghetto finished garage that I am setting up for my work from home/dungeon room. I care not what it looks like or if guests think I am crazy person.

The room dimensions are

Length 21'
Width 11' 2''
Height 7' 2''

Brick on two walls, sheet rock on others. Currently own 12, 2' x 4' absorbers. Gonna build some corner loaded traps and maybe get into the diffusion game. Listening in the nearfield/maybe midfield.

Relevant gear-
Neumann KH 310's
MiniDSP and Umik

I know I am going to have to measure and do the whole thing but I was hoping someone could give me some ballpark stuff and some more advanced reading to do. Currently I have it set up based on http://arqen.com/acoustics-101/room-setup-speaker-placement/ at 38 percent ish.

Im looking to get freakish. Hanging ceiling absorption. Huge bales of rockwool. Soffit mounting(not really, gonna just do stands for now).

This is current setup fresh off the truck. Other KH 310 is MIA for now
IMG_20200130_223402.jpg
 

Hipper

Addicted to Fun and Learning
Joined
Jun 16, 2019
Messages
753
Likes
625
Location
Herts., England
Basic plan should be:

1. Positioning.
2. Room treatment (perhaps instead or as well as using bass traps, use subs).
3. DSP/EQ to tidy up.

Aim is for flat frequency response (FR) at the listening position with decay times of around 200ms smoothly across all frequencies (some say other FR and different decay times). Phase should be reasonably smooth but in my experience that comes naturally with flattening the FR and reducing decay times. That's for a single listener but if multiple listeners then some compromises are required.

Reading:

Sound Reproduction - Floyd Toole
Audio Expert - Ethan Winer (of Realtraps)
http://www.barrydiamentaudio.com/monitoring.htm
http://realtraps.com/
https://www.gikacoustics.com/

Other points.

Ceiling reflections will depend on your speakers dispersion characteristics. I would experiment first by jamming an acoustic panel on the ceiling using a 'T' bar or something to hear if there's any effect before using a permanent installation (I can't hear any ceiling reflections from my ribbon speakers in an 8' high room). Like wise if you have unusual speakers like electrostats (dipoles) there may be different requirements for room treatment.

You should also consider the ambient sound - external sounds that can get into the room (try to stop them) and in room sounds (air conditioning?). The quieter the room the more music you hear.

Measuring. Many use Room EQ Wizard (REW), a free software but requires a laptop, microphone and cable and stand, and a lot of learning. Worth it though, as it can help with all three aspects of the set up - positioning, treatment/subs and final EQ, although you need something to implement that EQ, like your MiniDSP.

To summarize, there is a lot to learn and you should read up (and ask questions on here) before jumping in.
 

pozz

Слава Україні
Forum Donor
Editor
Joined
May 21, 2019
Messages
4,036
Likes
6,825
Budget?

If you really don't care go for 8" thick absorbers from GIK. For bass below 100Hz you'll need room EQ and subs.
 

DJBonoBobo

Major Contributor
Joined
Jan 21, 2020
Messages
1,360
Likes
2,851
Location
any germ
If you want some kind of reference from a fellow and/or amusement, this is what my mancave looks like at the moment. Mine is smaller than yours (15,4' x 9.8' x 8.3'). Inefficient basotect basstraps (rockwool would have been better) plus 2x PSI AVAA, because i like throwing money at things so i don´t have to to anything fancy by myself. I little bit of basotect at ceiling and sidewalls, too. On the backwall is a big open closet and more inefficient basotect. I didn´t care about beautiful covers yet. I´m still experimenting with the AVAAs.

20200131_185847.jpg


Some very quick and very dirty measurements (only one position, not very precise in the sweet spot, var smoothing, average of 1x L and 1x R), lower mids look a bit smoother if measured properly. Also 4 PEQs are active (36Hz -6db Q6, 113Hz -2 db Q10, 139Hz -2.5Hz Q10, 200Hz -2Hz Q1.5). Pink: AVAA active, black: AVAA inactive.

FR.png


AVAA active, left channel:
L w AVAA.png


AVAA inactive, left channel:
L wo AVAA.png


Don´t know if this helps, but maybe for some perspective. :)
 

napilopez

Major Contributor
Forum Donor
Joined
Oct 17, 2018
Messages
2,109
Likes
8,420
Location
NYC
I'm not an expert on room treatment, but just want to go ahead and say, you might want to consider movable/easily removable panels if you plan on treating the sidewalls. Contrary to popular belief, most people prefer a good amount of sidewall reflections. However, this can be a matter of preference, so if you can have somethng that's not permanent you can experiment and see what you prefer.. I'd guess treating the ceiling, front, and rear wall will probably yield the biggest improvement to sound.
 

LTig

Master Contributor
Forum Donor
Joined
Feb 27, 2019
Messages
5,760
Likes
9,442
Location
Europe
Actually with the situation as shown in the OP I would care mainly about the reflections on the desktop. Floor bounce is not existent WRT the LP. The same more or less is true for side and ceiling reflections since you would here them when sitting 2 or 3 meter away from the desk.

Problem is how to get rid of desk reflections. The best setup in a mixing studio is to not place the speakers on the meter bar of the mixing console but some distance behind so that the meter bar blocks those waves which would reflect on the desktop. In your case this would mean to install a vertical panel on the back of the desktop which blocks sound, and move the speakers some 0.5 to 1m away.
 

LeftCoastTim

Senior Member
Forum Donor
Joined
Apr 15, 2019
Messages
375
Likes
757
My 2 cents:

The Revel Manual has room arrangement suggestion on page 5. It looks simple, but it’s actually based on good science / knowledge. Arranged this way (Speakers 25% away from front wall, listener 25% away from back) and using speakers with good directivity, room EQ and treatments are probably not needed. This is what I would do if I had a free form placement.

In the real world, couches and speakers are against the walls, so EQ is generally needed to cure room modes. Since you don’t have this problem, and looking at your current setup, I think the only change I would make is to move the speakers away from the desk.
 

exaudio

Member
Forum Donor
Joined
Jun 11, 2018
Messages
46
Likes
75
Apparently research says reflections from floors and ceilings are more detrimental than reflections from walls. In several of Amir's recent speaker reviews he's made a point when a speaker could benefit from treated ceilings and carpeted floors.

Back in December @amirm and @Ethan Winer had an interesting back-and-forth about how much room treatment was really needed in a home environment. From what I can tell, both agree that some early reflections from side walls are a good thing and you don't want to over-treat those. Where they differ in opinion is how much, if any, additional treatment is needed.

If this is a multipurpose room full of furnishings and such, there is no need to acoustically treat a room. Acoustically treating a room is most necessary for empty, dedicated rooms. If your room has a lot of hard surfaces without much damping material, then yes, putting a thick carpet on the floor is a good start.


Ethan's stance was that even in the home reflection points and bass traps can be beneficial.

I'm really surprised to hear you say that, Amir. Have you never seen the response and ringing in an untreated room? My Early Reflections article above shows how terribly skewed mids and highs are when the specific reflection points aren't treated. And carpet addresses only one of those four locations. But bass problems are at least as damaging to sound quality.

They both cite research and make some good points. Since they're both smart guys, in my own room, I figured I'd split the difference and treat floor, ceiling, front and back walls, and leave the side walls alone.
 
OP
M

Mawclaw

Member
Forum Donor
Joined
Aug 20, 2019
Messages
69
Likes
133
Location
The ATL
So in my quarantine I have spent some time dialing things in and using dirac. I implemented the panel behind the desktop to minimize reflections off the desktop.
This is the response that I have so far.
1584450600006.png


Any opinions on this? Graph is 1/12th. Things that I have questions about
1- The comb filtering at 500-800 Hz? Is it rear wall reflections? Even audible?
2- The bump at 11K?
3- Also there is a discrepancy in Dirac vs REW with same mic etc. Has anyone noticed this?

Thanks for everyone's help/opinion.
 
Top Bottom