Share your in-room measurements?

[IamJF]

In room measurement at listening position (near field) of my reference speakers.
The manufacturers advertisment scale ;-) :

A real measurement:

This is in a highly dampened room, there is very litle ringing even at low frequencies:

 

[anotherhobby]

Measuring roughly 10' square with an 8' ceiling, they say I have bad dimensions for getting good room response. Initially, that was definitely the case. It took some perseverance (and lots of room treatment), but I'm incredibly happy with the end result. My system's in room response now matches my target curve incredibly well in both channels from 20Hz-20kHz, and I've done sweeps up to 105 dB with no compression.

The setup is a nearfield desktop system using Revel M105s and four sealed 8" subwoofers that I made using Dayton Ulitmax drivers. Dual Crown amps provide 525w to each Ulitmax, which are running as stereo pairs, making each L/R channel individually full range. The processor is a miniDSP Flex running Dirac Live, with 2 channels going to a Topping PA5 for the Revels, and 2 channels going to a miniDSP 2x4HD to feed the Crowns/subs.

I'm using a 24dB/oct crossover at 80Hz, and then setting delays on each channel according to the measured distances to my ears. I use Tightly Focused Imaging in Dirac Live since the system is used at a desk, and I have my own target I use that I've added to the graphs.

I have to say, I am very impressed at just how tight Dirac was able to correct each channel!

Before Calibration:

Dirac Live Calibrated:

After how simple the final calibration process ended up being, I feel a bit foolish for how much I was overthinking things. I knew I had to set the XO and delays before running Dirac, and that I should put care into getting them right first. I measured the distances from the drivers to my ears, and set the delays all based on that. I took some initial REW sweeps before calibration, and I didn't like what I saw. Before even trying an initial calibration, I started fine tuning delays until each native response channel looked best to my eyes. Then I ran Dirac and did not get the results I was hoping for. I kept fine tuning and tweaking, moving onto the crossovers, but I was getting disappointing results in Dirac every time. I tried to use MSO to sort it out, and that also went poorly.

I was getting frustrated. By this time, I'd spent days monkeying around. I finally considered that I had never actually attempted to run Dirac with the initial delays that I had calculated based on distance, so why not at least see what Dirac can do with it. Well it turns out that the delays based on actual measurements nailed the best result. Go figure! I could have saved days of monkeying around!

Live and learn! At least I won in the end. It really does sound fantastic, and it's a joy to listen to this rig all day while I work from home.

System diagram is attached.

 

[droid2000]

I love that system drawing.

Why do you have two MiniDSP's? I think the Flex can do everything you need including handling the two subs.

REW can calculate delays for you BTW

 

[napfkuchen]

This is in a highly dampened room, there is very litle ringing even at low frequencies:

That's excellent. I wonder what dimensions your room has and which acoustic treatment was need to get these results. Most likely I've never been in a room with such a low reverb. Must be an overwhelming experience.

 

[Count Arthur]

REW with Umik 1, nearfield with sub, measured from listening position.

 

[flipflop]

Measuring roughly 10' square with an 8' ceiling, they say I have bad dimensions for getting good room response. Initially, that was definitely the case. It took some perseverance (and lots of room treatment), but I'm incredibly happy with the end result. My system's in room response now matches my target curve incredibly well in both channels from 20Hz-20kHz, and I've done sweeps up to 105 dB with no compression.

The setup is a nearfield desktop system using Revel M105s and four sealed 8" subwoofers that I made using Dayton Ulitmax drivers. Dual Crown amps provide 525w to each Ulitmax, which are running as stereo pairs, making each L/R channel individually full range. The processor is a miniDSP Flex running Dirac Live, with 2 channels going to a Topping PA5 for the Revels, and 2 channels going to a miniDSP 2x4HD to feed the Crowns/subs.

I'm using a 24dB/oct crossover at 80Hz, and then setting delays on each channel according to the measured distances to my ears. I use Tightly Focused Imaging in Dirac Live since the system is used at a desk, and I have my own target I use that I've added to the graphs.

I have to say, I am very impressed at just how tight Dirac was able to correct each channel!

Before Calibration:

View attachment 282168
Dirac Live Calibrated:

View attachment 282169
After how simple the final calibration process ended up being, I feel a bit foolish for how much I was overthinking things. I knew I had to set the XO and delays before running Dirac, and that I should put care into getting them right first. I measured the distances from the drivers to my ears, and set the delays all based on that. I took some initial REW sweeps before calibration, and I didn't like what I saw. Before even trying an initial calibration, I started fine tuning delays until each native response channel looked best to my eyes. Then I ran Dirac and did not get the results I was hoping for. I kept fine tuning and tweaking, moving onto the crossovers, but I was getting disappointing results in Dirac every time. I tried to use MSO to sort it out, and that also went poorly.

I was getting frustrated. By this time, I'd spent days monkeying around. I finally considered that I had never actually attempted to run Dirac with the initial delays that I had calculated based on distance, so why not at least see what Dirac can do with it. Well it turns out that the delays based on actual measurements nailed the best result. Go figure! I could have saved days of monkeying around!

Live and learn! At least I won in the end. It really does sound fantastic, and it's a joy to listen to this rig all day while I work from home.

System diagram is attached.

Please share the EQ filters you're using.

 

[goat76]

Please share the EQ filters you're using.

That would be interesting to see, I like to know what information Dirac base their corrections on above the 500 Hz range.


If they base the corrections on just the room curve response without any "gating stuff" going on in the background, they have maybe misunderstood Toole's research and failed to understand that the room curve is just a result and not a target.

If the above is the case, users of Dirac should make 2 different target curves, one for the non-gated response for adjustments to the frequency area under 500 Hz, and another curve with the gated response above 500 Hz for adjustments over that frequency range. The result of these two curves could then be put together into one single correction curve that will better mirror the way we hear things, the dominating direct sound for the higher frequency range and the more diffuse non-directional sound for the lower frequency range.

 

[flipflop]

If they base the corrections on just the room curve response without any "gating stuff" going on in the background, they have maybe misunderstood Toole's research and failed to understand that the room curve is just a result and not a target.

That's what I'm convinced has happened.
I'm going to demonstrate the problem by applying the EQ filters to anechoic on-axis response of the M105, which will show how the sound quality is being degraded.

 

[boxerfan88]

Managed to achieve this at Main Listening Position.

Neumann KH310 with single Orisun DD+12

^ there are a few LF resonances that still rings a little long, but I didn't want to cut the amplitude too deep (already cutting more than -10dB)

^ distortion is kept low throughout upper bass, midrange & treble.

 

[PowerSerge]

This is my Equator Q10 monitors and here is my room

Measurements taken at listening position. Second measurement is done using the MMM method. No EQ

 

[anotherhobby]

I love that system drawing.

Why do you have two MiniDSP's? I think the Flex can do everything you need including handling the two subs.

I have four subs, not two. Running in stereo plus delay from front to rear requires 4 independent channels.

REW can calculate delays for you BTW

Oh yeah, I totally forgot about that. I did do that with an acoustic timing reference. It ended up being very close to my measurements

Please share the EQ filters you're using.

I am not applying any EQ filters of my own at all. This is 100% Dirac, and they don't show you what they are doing.

 

[Deleted member 48726]

In room measurement at listening position (near field) of my reference speakers.
The manufacturers advertisment scale ;-) :
View attachment 281824
A real measurement:
View attachment 281825

This is in a highly dampened room, there is very litle ringing even at low frequencies:
View attachment 281826

That's insanely flat!

 

[flipflop]

This is 100% Dirac, and they don't show you what they are doing.

My disgust for room correction products has reached new heights.
Thanks for looking into it, though.

 

[Deleted member 48726]

My disgust for room correction products has reached new heights.
Thanks for looking into it, though.

Why don't you like Dirac Live?
Sure, they don't show the filters but It's part of their "secret sauce" of mixed phase filtering calculations. I don't care personally because I've had exceptional results with the software that I couldn't get through REW and rePhase.

 

[flipflop]

Why don't you like Dirac Live?

It's redundant and can something make matters worse, as shown above.
Manual EQ is very easy to apply, saves you money, and there's full transparency in how your settings affect your sound.

 

[Deleted member 48726]

It's redundant and can something make matters worse, as shown above.
Manual EQ is very easy to apply, saves you money, and there's full transparency in how your settings affect your sound.

Hmm. I don't agree. It seems there was an issue of the user setting the delays. This is pointed out in the Dirac manual. There are different ways to go about delays. For subs I connect a speaker to the one output on the minidsp and the sub to the other (speaker to output 1, sub to output 2). Then run one initial Dirac sweep and download it into the minidsp config. There I note the delay it has measured and I set that in the L+R speaker. This delay includes both physical delay (distance) and any DSP processing delay inherent in the sub. I note that delay and apply it to both L+R speakers. Then I run Dirac measurements as usual with sub connected to output 3 or 3+4 on the miniDSP..

Also it seems there is absolutely full transparency between "what you see is what you get" IR to the response curve (from the post above)-->

 

[flipflop]

Hmm. I don't agree. It seems there was an issue of the user setting the delays. This is pointed out in the Dirac manual. There are different ways to go about delays. For subs I connect a speaker to the one output on the minidsp and the sub to the other. Then run one initial Dirac sweep and download it into the minidsp config. There I note the delay it has measured and set in the L+R speaker. This delay includes both physical delay (distance) and any DSP processing delay inherent in the sub. I note that delay and apply it to both L+R speakers. Then I run Dirac measurements as usual with sub connected to output 3 or 3+4 on the miniDSP..

The issue is completely unrelated to delays. The issue is that when Dirac fills in a dip in the in-room response, it creates a resonance in the anechoic on-axis response.
As mentioned earlier, I would love to share a graph detailing the issue, but for now, I'll use 1 kHz as an example. Dirac adds 4 dB of gain to the left channel. That 4 dB of gain also gets added to the direct sound:

With 4 dB of gain to the on-axis response, the curve would be hitting the top of this graph. Bad.

Also it seems there is absolutely full transparency between "what you see is what you get" IR to the response curve (from the post above)-->

That's not how human hearing works. We can discern direct sound from reflected sound. An in-room curve is mainly reflected sound.

 

[Deleted member 48726]

The issue is completely unrelated to delays. The issue is that when Dirac fills in a dip in the in-room response, it creates a resonance in the anechoic on-axis response.
As mentioned earlier, I would love to share a graph detailing the issue, but for now, I'll use 1 kHz as an example. Dirac adds 4 dB of gain to the left channel. That 4 dB of gain also gets added to the direct sound:
View attachment 282340
With 4 dB of gain to the on-axis response, the curve would be hitting the top of this graph. Bad.

That's not how human hearing works. We can discern direct sound from reflected sound. An in-room curve is mainly reflected sound.

Yeah. So the changes made have effects. Do those effects matter when the measurements at the listening position shows a nice corrected response? -This is the point of the correction, no?

 

[flipflop]

Do those effects matter when the measurements at the listening position shows a nice corrected response?

Yes, they matter, because we hear the on-axis resonance regardless of what the "nice corrected" in-room response shows.

This is the point of the correction, no?

The point is to make things better, not worse.

 

[Deleted member 48726]

Yes, they matter, because we hear the on-axis resonance regardless of what the "nice corrected" in-room response shows.

The point is to make things better, not worse.

So we hear stuff that isn't shown in the frequency response?

The point is to get the response we want at the listening position. Who cares then, in the bigger picture, what the speaker sounds like in an anechoic environment..