Sure, but I think we can be more helpful than "treatment can be done wrong, so don't do it". Proper treatment means more to the sound quality than replacing any other component in the system in most setups.
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Room Treatment to get Soundstage, Spaciousness & Imaging?
- Thread starter Cinema40
- Start date
Sure, but I think we can be more helpful than "treatment can be done wrong, so don't do it". Proper treatment means more to the sound quality than replacing any other component in the system in most setups.
That’s actually unbelievable that track,sound was coming from over my shoulder!
Here is another fun one. If you have good soundstage + deep bass plus play pretty loud, during parts of this it sounds like you're in the church. In the sense that it sounds like you're in a huge space.
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This has been my experience as well, BUT I don't have nearly as much experience as you do.
Controlled directivity can address some of the issues absorption is normally expected to address:
“A speaker that has controlled dispersion does basically the same thing you'd expect an acoustic panel to do, but it does a better job." - Matthew Poes, acoustician
So if absorption isn't needed to "fix" the speaker's off-axis response, that arguably makes the intelligent use of diffusion more likely to be feasible, which ime can make a worthwhile improvement in the sense of acoustic space.
Unfortunately, that doesn't help with @Cinema40's situation. Others probably have more applicable experience than I do.
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- Thread Starter
- #45
I am attaching an actual picture of my room here. (Ignore the chairs on the left and lack of lighting - room's being dismantled)
I have experimented moving the MLP forward to form an equilateral triangle and aiming the speaker directly on axis. Both changes have made a positive contribution to the overall soundstage width but the system still lacks depth. I do not have the option to keep those positions as permanent so I'm looking towards room treatment to get the best possible results in my room.
I have the option to do whatever treatment is required in the room except on the left side wall with the large glass window.
Please advise on how the new room should be planned room acoustic treatment wise to get the best results. I have been watching videos by Anthony Grimani on bass and acoustic treatments and was wondering if going with a layout suggested in his Sonitus Ultimate Line of Acoustic Treatments is the way to go.
I had something like this in mind for a 5.4.6 setup.
I have experimented moving the MLP forward to form an equilateral triangle and aiming the speaker directly on axis. Both changes have made a positive contribution to the overall soundstage width but the system still lacks depth. I do not have the option to keep those positions as permanent so I'm looking towards room treatment to get the best possible results in my room.
I have the option to do whatever treatment is required in the room except on the left side wall with the large glass window.
Please advise on how the new room should be planned room acoustic treatment wise to get the best results. I have been watching videos by Anthony Grimani on bass and acoustic treatments and was wondering if going with a layout suggested in his Sonitus Ultimate Line of Acoustic Treatments is the way to go.
I had something like this in mind for a 5.4.6 setup.
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Have you tried moving the front speakers away from the front wall by at least 150cm?
Even just for a test
You will have enormous depth
I find this view surprising (including Matthew's quote).
I have two permanent systems,
1) My living room. Around 50m^2 (540sqft), roughly 10m^2 (100sqft) of the walls are covered in acoustic treatment. This space is reasonably and relatively evenly damped. Listening distance around 3.5m
2) Dedicated listening room. Around 15m^2 (160sqft), with roughly 15m^2 (160sqft) of the walls and ceiling covered in acoustic treatment, and the floor has wall to wall rugs. This space sounds very dead, to the point where you almost hear the blood flowing in your ears when you just stand still in there. Listening distance around 2.5m.
The dedicated room needless to say have way better surpressed early reflections, and also more direct sound since you sit closer to the speakers. While the living room sounds good, the dedicated room sounds WAY better. Anecdotal of course, but I've had many people say that room is the best sound they've ever heard. And that's not me trying to push my speakers
, it's in large part how the room sounds. I have to explicitly tell people that the room contributes, and the speakers will not sound like this in their normal living room.This is my living room:
This is my dedicated listening room:
I'm sure you know this, but to the benefit of the OP as well:
There are at least three beneficial things that happen when you do this, but not all are obvious.
1) The speakers come much closer to you, giving you significantly more direct sound. The exact same thing would happen if you move the listening position the same distance closer to the speakers. This is by far the largest effect, but isn't really about distance to the wall, but rather distance between speakers and listener - so it can also be achieved by moving the listening position.
2) The visual cues of seeing that the speakers are further from the wall. It's easy for our brain to assume that with more space behind the speakers, of course there will be more depth in the soundfield. In reality the difference isn't so large, but our brain helps make it so.
3) Getting 1.5 from the wall behind the speakers significantly reduces the detrimental reflections from that wall, often occurring in the upper bass / lower midrange. This is a real benefit not easily achieved in any other way, except doing the complete opposite (moving the speakers as close to the wall as possible). However, in most shared living spaces, having the speakers 1.5m from the wall isn't practical. The OP apparently does have a dedicated space, but apparently a door in the way.
Cote Dazur
Addicted to Fun and Learning
If you do not want to bring your speaker forward, I am curious to follow this thread, as to me, it is the only way you will get depth.
Speaker flush to a screen will never get depth. Great for movies or video but terrible for depth.
No amount of room treatment will overcome that.
Speaker flush to a screen will never get depth. Great for movies or video but terrible for depth.
No amount of room treatment will overcome that.
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One thing I don’t get is why these discussions about room treatment so many times end up about bad examples, and stays there, where the room treatments have been seemingly used randomly without the use of any measurements to confirm what is actually needed for the specific room. And the most surprising thing I’ve noticed about these discussions is that members here, who usually are well aware of the importance of measurements, seems to almost completely toss that knowledge away right at the moment room treatments are discussed. Why is that?
It’s as if every discussion about loudspeakers would end up being mainly about examples of bad loudspeakers.
Room treatments are used to fix problems in the time domain.
You measure, you look at the time domain measurements to see if the room has an uneven decay time in any specific wide-band area of the response or just need a lower decay time overall, and you buy the treatment with the coefficients needed to treat those areas that need treatment.
A good practical way of getting it right is to install one type of room treatment at a time, measure it to see if you are on the right track, and then see what the next step should be to reach the result you want.
It’s as if every discussion about loudspeakers would end up being mainly about examples of bad loudspeakers.
Room treatments are used to fix problems in the time domain.
You measure, you look at the time domain measurements to see if the room has an uneven decay time in any specific wide-band area of the response or just need a lower decay time overall, and you buy the treatment with the coefficients needed to treat those areas that need treatment.
A good practical way of getting it right is to install one type of room treatment at a time, measure it to see if you are on the right track, and then see what the next step should be to reach the result you want.
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Wesseling Audio Lab
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It starts with embracing any speaker placement necessary
One thing I don’t get is why these discussions about room treatment so many times end up about bad examples, and stays there, where the room treatments have been seemingly used randomly without the use of any measurements to confirm what is actually needed for the specific room. And the most surprising thing I’ve noticed about these discussions is that members here, who usually are well aware of the importance of measurements, seems to almost completely toss that knowledge away right at the moment room treatments are discussed. Why is that?
It’s as if every discussion about loudspeakers would end up being mainly about examples of bad loudspeakers.
Room treatments are used to fix problems in the time domain.
You measure, you look at the time domain measurements to see if the room has an uneven decay time in any specific wide-band area of the response or just need a lower decay time overall, and you buy the treatment with the coefficients needed to treat those areas that need treatment.
I have unfortunately met many people who sell treatments, who don't really know what they are doing. So I think both people doing it themselves, combined with people who get bad advice, sums up to quite a few treated rooms that are not treated correctly. It's a bit like people saying "subwoofers don't work for music" or "room correction and EQ sounds horrible". They base this on having listened to systems where these tools have been used incorrectly. Which is fair of course. But leaves them unaware of how it can sound when done properly.
Agreed on principle, the only issue I have with this approach is that many underestimate how much is needed, so they may add a few panels, and then the measurements show almost no change whatsoever (combined with the fact that one may not know what to look for in the measurements).
- Thread Starter
- #53
Thank you all for your advice. If i were to summarise -
- You cannot achieve good soundstage depth without having ample room behind the speakers no matter if you add diffusion or practical levels of absorption back there.
- Soundstage imaging and width are influenced by toe in but does require placements away from side walls too.
- Adding room treatment may often do bad things to speaker response if not properly planned and is easy to get wrong.
- Should i just let the room be this way considering that I've achieved a good RT60 time?
- Is there an advantage to treating the first reflections on the ceiling or walls considering the speaker placement is less than ideal for good soundstage?
- What are the room treatments that are hard to get wrong and generally recommended?
I don't agree with this, but I know many do.
That being said; Can you explain again why you can't move the speakers away from the wall? If it's a door, if you redo the room can you perhaps change the direction, by changing speakers walls, either 90 or 180 degrees?
Treatment of wall first reflections may actually reduce soundstage width. So I usually come to the conclusion that I would rather treat other surfaces and leaving the side walls bare.
You will (in my experience) seldom go wrong with covering an entire surface to get the overall decay in the room down, for instance the entire front wall and/or the ceiling with absorption.
I find this view surprising (including Matthew's quote).
I have two permanent systems,
1) My living room. Around 50m^2 (540sqft), roughly 10m^2 (100sqft) of the walls are covered in acoustic treatment. This space is reasonably and relatively evenly damped. Listening distance around 3.5m
2) Dedicated listening room. Around 15m^2 (160sqft), with roughly 15m^2 (160sqft) of the walls and ceiling covered in acoustic treatment, and the floor has wall to wall rugs. This space sounds very dead, to the point where you almost hear the blood flowing in your ears when you just stand still in there. Listening distance around 2.5m.
The dedicated room needless to say have way better surpressed early reflections, and also more direct sound since you sit closer to the speakers. While the living room sounds good, the dedicated room sounds WAY better. Anecdotal of course, but I've had many people say that room is the best sound they've ever heard. And that's not me trying to push my speakers
This is my living room:
View attachment 548049
This is my dedicated listening room:
View attachment 548050
Looks like you've done a really good job of getting fairly short and unusually uniform decay times in your smaller room.
I still think your speakers' exceptional radiation pattern consistency across all but the very bottom end of the spectrum plays a significant role. Of course you didn't say otherwise, but my point is that you started out with speakers whose off-axis energy did not need to be corrected by room treatment targeting a specific frequency range, like the all-too-common off-axis flare at the bottom end of the tweeter's passband.
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1. I think it's more complicated than that. For example, https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/sound-stage-depth.37498/page-10#post-1487479. Also here on ASR: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...ctions-depth-of-soundstage-and-dipoles.56940/, https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...-what-is-it-exactly.71587/page-2#post-2606292. On DIYaudio, https://www.diyaudio.com/community/...ing-toole-and-geddes-for-stereo-setup.368188/. See also the Rissoud section under https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...acoustics-self-education-links-sharing.45583/. The obvious counterexample is the use of flush- or soffit-mounted monitors in pro audio.
2. I suspect that imaging tends to come at the expense of width and vice versa, hence Griesinger's interest in localization (and the limits thereof in concert hall) and arguments against ASW, so one should determine one's preferences and then proceed accordingly. I can post some links if interested, but have you heard systems that provide the kind of imaging and depth you're looking for? What kinds of speakers, setups, and room acoustics were involved?
1. It sounds like you're not satisfied with what you have, so no harm in experimenting. For example, fiberglass absorption may be roughly twice as effective as foam. I can't tell, but it looks like horizontal microfiber-wrapped cushions attached to the door? I rather doubt the covering is acoustically transparent, so may result in early ipsilateral reflections with inconsistent timbre. Relative acoustical symmetry can be helpful in stereo reproduction, so you may wish to look at differences between left and right speakers individually (frequency and ETC curves?). It looks like you're sitting with high back sofa, so you'd basically have a reflective surface right behind your head. Have you tried listening with a different seat without the headrest, or at least putting a thick pillow behind your head? Your "diffusers" on the back wall look more like scattering panels, with the hard ones reflecting downward towards the listening positions. Have you tried thick absorption directly behind the listening positions?
2. Hmm, take a look at comments by @j_j in the first link I posted under #1 above.
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Cote Dazur
Addicted to Fun and Learning
In light of those 2 points, which from my experience are accurate, be bold, place those 2 speakers way forward, pass the door location, in a equilateral triangle, that will also take care of point 2. See if you enjoy your new found depth without doing anything else.
Let us know how it went if you try it.
Not sure if you listen with your head on the seat head rest, if you do, I would place a folded light blanket on those leather head test.
Well, I guess interested or not, since I'm thinking about it:
Trade-offs (I guess I used to think about it less simply): https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...precise-soundstage.48542/page-35#post-1876095
Griesinger and ASW: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...cert-hall-acoustics-links-and-excerpts.51487/
- Thread Starter
- #59
I will explore the entire 180 degree turnaround and check how that will work with the seating arrangement in the room. If that works out, pretty much all speaker placement problems are solved.
1. I have only briefly experienced soundstage in a dedicated listening room that i demoed a couple of speakers in. Speakers varied but all of them were powered by a Cambridge Audio amplifier. All speakers sounded spacious with different sound signatures.
2. For the Focal Aria 926s, the reviewers mention leaving the back wall reflective. In the new setup I had initially planned on installing a mix of diffusers and absorbers on the rear wall.
It might just be a placebo effect but the headrest thing made more a difference than what I would've believed. Sounds just become "cleaner" as I move my head away from the recliner's headrest. Not necessarily better though.
That ART on/off graph tells the whole story. ART is doing its magic up to around 150 Hz, where it hands over to Dirac Live. In an untreated room, the 150–225 Hz region would typically contain more peaks than dips, so Dirac would mainly attenuate those peaks. Notice that it correctly avoids boosting the large dip in that range, likely because it has identified it as a non-minimum-phase issue. My guess is that this dip is actually caused by your room treatment absorbing a significant amount of energy in that frequency range.
