Room EQ help needed

[nck045]

Got my first REW measurement done today! I measured 1m away from the tweeter level and apparently it confirmed what I hear in my room - boomy low end and some treble roll off. I'm very new to this, any suggestions on how I should apply the EQ? I guess the bass can be tamed down easily enough, but I'm worried about the 5db dip at 4khz which does not look normal. Not sure if this is room induced or something is wrong with my speakers. I am using the 4-way JBL 4344

 

[sigbergaudio]

Measure at the listening position at ear height (not 1m from the speaker), left and right channel individually. Then share both left, right and average (there's a button in the lower left part of the graph to generate average).

Also change the Y-axis to 45-105dB before sharing.

 

[nck045]

Measure at the listening position at ear height (not 1m from the speaker), left and right channel individually. Then share both left, right and average (there's a button in the lower left part of the graph to generate average).

Also change the Y-axis to 45-105dB before sharing.

Thanks, I will do as instructed One more question, what graph smoothing should I select?

 

[flipflop]

In addition to what has been said above, you also need to change the smoothing from 1/3 oct. to Var and tell us your room dimensions (length, width, height).

 

[nck045]

In addition to what has been said above, you also need to change the smoothing from 1/3 oct. to Var and tell us your room dimensions (length, width, height).

I will re-do the measurements and report back, thanks!

 

[sigbergaudio]

Thanks, I will do as instructed One more question, what graph smoothing should I select?

Since you're asking, sharing the following would be great:

20-20,000hz with 1/12 smoothing (or Var as suggested above would be okay too)
20-200hz with no smoothing

 

[nck045]

@sigbergaudio @flipflop

New measurements are in! Hope I did it correctly this time, if not please let me know what needs to be changed.

All measurements are done from the listening position, which is 2.5m away from the speakers. Please refer to photo for room dimensions. Room height is 4.8m

Thank you in advance

 

[droid2000]

You def could use some help below 300Hz, and that 5KHz dip is weird. What do you have on hand to do the EQ?

 

[nck045]

You def could use some help below 300Hz, and that 5KHz dip is weird. What do you have on hand to do the EQ?

Do you think the 5KHz dip is from the room or from the speaker? I'm asking because they are vintage speakers so if that dip is coming from the speaker itself, there might be something wrong with the driver or crossover that needs addressing/fixing.

Unfortunately my EQ options are limited. Currently I am using standard 10-band which comes with my wifi streamer. I tried pulling down the bass region and raising the 5KHz band and everything is sounding much better - overall tighter and balanced sound with all the details present. Without EQ the sound is too boomy and muddy.

 

[nck045]

For reference, this is supposedly the anechoic measurement of the speakers JBL 4344

 

[sweetsounds]

First of all, in the bass below 200Hz, the result isn't that bad. Overall, the room or speaker is a little boomy. Some people like it, but it usually masks the sound details.

You could try a high pass shelf filter of about -4dB below 150Hz. If you want to do it better, use two -4dB filters with the right Q, one to lower 60Hz to 150Hz, one with a high Q for the 37Hz room mode.

I suspect the 5kHz dip is caused by the speakers. What model do you have?

The 7k hump would annoy me, to my ears it is not adding details but sharpness, so I would dial that down as well.

The increase above 10kHz is not highly accurate, but if you are older than 40, not much of a concern anymore. It gives a little air.

 

[sigbergaudio]

This measurement looks a bit weird. Which microphone are you using, and how did you place it? Pointing at the speakers? With a calibration file?

 

[nck045]

First of all, in the bass below 200Hz, the result isn't that bad. Overall, the room or speaker is a little boomy. Some people like it, but it usually masks the sound details.

You could try a high pass shelf filter of about -4dB below 150Hz. If you want to do it better, use two -4dB filters with the right Q, one to lower 60Hz to 150Hz, one with a high Q for the 37Hz room mode.

I suspect the 5kHz dip is caused by the speakers. What model do you have?

The 7k hump would annoy me, to my ears it is not adding details but sharpness, so I would dial that down as well.

The increase above 10kHz is not highly accurate, but if you are older than 40, not much of a concern anymore. It gives a little air.

Thanks for the tips. After EQing the bass is now well controlled and I am quite happy. However, the 5KHz dip seems to be the main problem, making the sound much less detailed. Speakers are vintage JBL 4344s and strangely enough the reference anechoic response I posted above (borrowed from another site) does not show a dip at 5KHz

 

[nck045]

This measurement looks a bit weird. Which microphone are you using, and how did you place it? Pointing at the speakers? With a calibration file?

I am using the Behringer ECM8000 https://www.behringer.com/product.html?modelCode=P0118

Is it good enough? The microphone does not come with a unique calibration file. Yes, I pointed it at the speakers at ear level from my listening position

 

[flipflop]

@sigbergaudio @flipflop

New measurements are in! Hope I did it correctly this time, if not please let me know what needs to be changed.

All measurements are done from the listening position, which is 2.5m away from the speakers. Please refer to photo for room dimensions. Room height is 4.8m

Thank you in advance

Your room is quite large, so you don't want to EQ above about 90 Hz based on your in-room measurements.
Unfortunately, there haven't been published any proper anechoic measurements of your speakers, so if you want to correct the rest of the frequency response, you would need to send them in for review to Amir or Erin. Alternatively, you can make your own quasi-anechoic measurements.

Some general notes about your measurements, loudspeakers, and room:

• The vertical scale should be reduced (again) from 45 to 55 dB to show a typical 50 dB range (55-105).
• You might want to perform future measurements with the moving microphone method.
• Your speakers and listening position should form an equilateral triangle with the speaker axes pointing towards the listener's head/ears.
• Your speakers should be positioned at least 0.5 m from any room boundary to avoid too severe adjacent boundary effects.

 

[sigbergaudio]

I suspect the large dip at 5khz is a measurement error rather than the actual speaker response.

You could test to do an on-axis measurement at tweeter height at around 20-40cm, and you should get a decent measurement of the speaker response in that area.

 

[nck045]

I suspect the large dip at 5khz is a measurement error rather than the actual speaker response.

You could test to do an on-axis measurement at tweeter height at around 20-40cm, and you should get a decent measurement of the speaker response in that area.

Here's an on-axis measurement 30cm from the tweeter. Seems like the dip is still there, would you consider this a room or speaker problem? Is there a possibility that the capacitors in the speaker crossover has deteriorated and thereby causing this dip?

 

[nck045]

Your room is quite large, so you don't want to EQ above about 90 Hz based on your in-room measurements.
Unfortunately, there haven't been published any proper anechoic measurements of your speakers, so if you want to correct the rest of the frequency response, you would need to send them in for review to Amir or Erin. Alternatively, you can make your own quasi-anechoic measurements.

Some general notes about your measurements, loudspeakers, and room:

• The vertical scale should be reduced (again) from 45 to 55 dB to show a typical 50 dB range (55-105).
• You might want to perform future measurements with the moving microphone method.
• Your speakers and listening position should form an equilateral triangle with the speaker axes pointing towards the listener's head/ears.
• Your speakers should be positioned at least 0.5 m from any room boundary to avoid too severe adjacent boundary effects.

View attachment 299691

Thank you for the helpful suggestions. Seems I have lots of reading up to do!

 

[sigbergaudio]

Here's an on-axis measurement 30cm from the tweeter. Seems like the dip is still there, would you consider this a room or speaker problem? Is there a possibility that the capacitors in the speaker crossover has deteriorated and thereby causing this dip?

That did not look very good at all. Below 500hz or so you will be affected by the room, but above that you should see a pretty smooth response. Could you perhaps try the same on the other speaker to see if they are similar?

EDIT: I see you don't have 60dB on the y-axis, that makes it look even worse. If you can make sure you have 60dB from top to bottom (for instance 45dB to 105dB, or 55-115dB), that would be great.

 

[sigbergaudio]

As a comparison, here's an in-room, 40cm measurement of one our speakers with the same smoothing: